Why Don't We Do Housing Like Vienna?
Housing Should Be A Human Right First, Profit Vehicle Second.
As of January 2024, over 771,000 people were homeless in America.
An already staggering number before you learn there are simultaneously 15 million vacant homes in America, a ratio of almost 20 vacant homes for every homeless person.
A number that has came down since 2023 when it was nearly 30 vacant homes per homeless person, only because the homeless population has increased.
Obviously there is an issue here, and if we agree shelter is a necessity to life, and life is a human right, then housing is a human right.
Thus why are we restricting it like a commodity first? We should do housing similar to how Vienna did in the mid 1920s, where even now over 60% of the population live in these homes.
Vienna first froze rent in 1917 to the levels from 1914, making it hardly profitable going forward. They then established a housing tax, along with a tax on luxury goods, both worked as progressive taxes that most workers weren’t subject to.
They used these funds to construct over 60,000 flats and apartments that were then handed out on a ranked basis of need. Those with disabilities, children, etc were prioritized and thus sheltered first.
Rent was stabilized to only cover upkeep and nothing else, this was typically 4% of a workers wage and was waved for those who could not work or were unemployed for the moment.
They purposefully constructed these homes to be connected to local infrastructure like easily attainable jobs, stores, and schools to help further lower travel costs and make daily life more simple.
Over time these became split between low-income residents and regular workers, allowing an even greater source of revenue to expand and develop more projects. This allowed Vienna to become one of the most livable cities in the modern-era, with half of the properties representing these city owned flats.
We could do something similar in America, even with a public-private split down the line. It could be funded by a modest tax on Wall Street.
For reference, Vienna raised what would be in today’s money 255 million dollars in taxes to fund this project. A 0.5% tax on Wall Street would generate 100-200 times that. A 1% tax on Wall Street would generate 230-400 times that.
So it’s simple.
Freeze rent at 2020 levels to stem off private investment, use a Wall Street tax to fund the development of tens of thousands of affordable flats and apartments close to local infrastructure, move in the homeless prioritizing the most vulnerable.
Housing first programs like this even in America have shown faster exits from homelessness for those within, meaning they stay within stable housing and don’t quickly return back to the street as we see with temporary shelters.
Housing is a human right and it’s about time we start acting like it.