patrick.net

ja says

My point is that it will *not* reduce those barriers.

Then why is owners to renters ration roughly 2:1 in the united states while it's exactly reversed in switzerland?

ja says

Funny because your proposed tax would cause many people who choose standard deduction now to use MID instead in order to offset the imaginary income that you are ascribing to them.

Obviously, if you can tax rental imputed income, you would be able to have both deductions.

If you are so worried of the details to dismiss the big picture, ask about them (to me, or check the blogs of anybody proposing it). But don't imagine things..

As I have demonstrated again and again, you are just too inexperienced with business accounting and tax filing to realize the problem. The blogs that you refer to are probably similarly lacking in business and tax experience.

I would argue that the government is just getting a lift from the bubble, not riding it:

Their government has been causing the bubble. After all, their central bank (which in the case of China is actually controlled by the government) is the engine creating all that cheap credit.

Again, if you have proof that cities don't attract talent, please share.

It has nothing to do with "smartest people concentration."

But I think it's unquestionable that it empowers people.

Commerce empowers people. Cities tend to be where commerce takes place. OTOH, there are plenty slums where people people are not empowered at all; they are also in cities.

And those who get there accelerate their lives. For professors and for burger flippers. Google Geoffrey West if you are interested in more details of what I meant.

Perhaps for you, but for me, no need for Geoffrey West to tell me that.

Some would say that without very existence of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, no thirty-year fixed mortgages would exist. The nature of mortgage lending in other countries would seem to support this.

Would you go that far?