[SeaGypsy]

Surely this has been written about. I'm not quoting anyone here though, just telling it like I'm seeing it.

There is basically nothing else to invest in, no other game in town. The parasitic relationship between established capital & the ever growing poor has become the bedrock of developed, so called 'service economies'.

Social media abounds with self professed RE self made millionaire investors, leaving one to ponder why if they are so wealthy, do they need to play the seminar circuit? Also at question, what volume of leverage are these people working with, how deep in debt are they really?

The big end of town knows, it's obvious as daylight. Lip service is paid to "something must be done about the lack of affordable housing", while local governments in the few remaining growth areas stagger rezoning to ensure prices sustain current value of existing developments.

I'm in Australia, we have almost zero manufacturing left, apart from housing- kept up by importing people. Our last car factories shut a month ago. Agriculture has largely mechanised, leaving less jobs than ever, despite producing more than ever.

The ethics of this market are zilch. There is virtually no honesty about the reality. The rentier class is bleeding the working poor to death, calling it good. Nothing will be done to make housing affordable, because there is nothing else to give backbone to the economy.

Me, I'm revolted & revolting, planning my exit from the sick game, the only game in town.

[Subjectivist]

Seems you are on target to me. The Feudal systems prevalant many places around the world often seem to have started off as rentiers gradually growing to dominate the economy, ultimately becoming the ‘lords’ while the service level workers gradually devolve into ‘peasants’. Even in Ancient Egypt at one time most farmers were land owners with the Pharos being the largest land owner. Then there were a series of bad harvests and most small land owners were forced to sell their land to buy food for selves and family. Once the bad weather period ended all those former free farmers found themselves working the same land as hired labor instead of owners and after a few generations their descendants were peasants who were stuck in the situation with no simple alternatives.

[SeaGypsy]

Perhaps we are in a high tech high population version of the same thing.

At my gym complex I often meet downsizers, who have sold up to buy into a trendy beach suburb, where minimum spend is around $1mil AUD. They describe themselves as RE rich, cash poor. Mostly the only way these people could realise the wealth they have is to become homeless, sell up & downgrade or emigrate. Then there's another bunch, in massive debt, absolutely reliant on record low interest rates. This lot have mostly not been around to see even long term average borrowing rates, let alone recession driven spikes. They see themselves as being on the path to wealth, to becoming rentier landlords. They don't see the 'do or die' of where they are actually at financially.

[SeaGypsy]

The biggest migrant sources now are India & China. There's very low unemployment in Melbourne & Sydney, a bit more in regional cities & smaller capitals. Wages have been flat since the GFC, while RE has gone up by 50-100%. Anywhere within reasonable commute of reliable employment is ridiculously expensive.

Great for holidays. Depending on budget there's lots of options. I'm an expert on the shoestring version.

[Outcast_Searcher]

The world has changed. It's not a conspiracy -- it's technology.

Now, are governments dealing with it "well"? That probably depends on where you are in the economy, as far as how you see it.

Overall though, we're wealthier, if we can just be smart about it.

If a half dozen factories can produce all the electronic disk readers (DVD, Blu-ray, etc) everyone wants, using almost all robot labor, this implies lots of people can have these with very little work. Never mind that we're rapidly moving toward streaming -- the principle applies -- I just know off the top that few such factories are needed. Another example would be peanut butter, with the giant Jif factory in my city, and not all that many employees.

I think we're better off that what people need physically is fairly easily made, and there's a whole lot more of what people want for leisure (but can live without) via services. Choice seems a whole lot better than no choice.

Now, if robotics/AI do indeed continue to suck up more and more of the jobs, then the issue is do governments effectively deal with that, and if so when? My concern is the signs are strong that this continues, whether it's robot car painters, robot cashiers, robot driving, robot order fulfillment / materials handling -- whatever. And yet, aside from empty campaign promises -- little seems to actually happen to help people being displaced from jobs.

It's like there's no imagination.

Example: Coal mining jobs going away in droves. But we need lots of solar panel and wind equipment installers if we're going to build out a smart green energy infrastructure fairly quickly. Seems like a good place for government to get involved. Potentially a huge jobs program, and teach a relevant skill for those willing to work hard and travel. But far as I know, we have zilch on that front.

Or simply education/retraining. For people willing to make good grades, having people back in decent (technical service) jobs seems a lot smarter than having them unemployed or working at Arby's. And yet, I see little as far as widespread, effective moves to make such job retraining a reality for those unemployed from factories as their jobs go overseas, or to robots.

I see little to nothing as far as serious experiments with ideas like a UBI to deal with ever-increasing robotic labor (aside from some exceptions in Europe). What are we waiting for? Complete chaos? How much could some meaningful experiments to learn what works, what doesn't, what needs to be tweaked, what incentives can help, etc. cost?

Our leadership has little vision -- and we keep re-electing it.

[SeaGypsy]

Totally agree on the lack of imagination, though to me it seems more governmental herd mentality & the fact the people in government are themselves invested- it's not in their interest to do anything which puts the RE bubble economy even slightly at risk.

The most obvious partial solution would be revitalising rural towns, incentivise people to move to the regions, without selectivising to promote RE bubbles in rural communities. Pretty danged obvious.

[StarvingLion]

Weez all gonna rich with A.I.

Its all a con.

Fake society.
Fake money.
Fake leaders.

24x7 FRAUD.

[SeaGypsy]

Doesn't matter what they are called, HRDD? Human redundancy displacement devices? GAE? Growing absurdity exponentializer?

The Vedas speak of two kinds of people making up the majority- the foolers & the fooled. Ethics demand abstention from the former, intelligence from the latter.

[SeaGypsy]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', ' ')Our “economic miracle” of 104 quarters of GDP growth without a recession today doesn’t come from digging rocks out of the ground, shipping the by-products of dead fossils and selling stuff we grow any more. Mining, which used to be 19 per cent of GDP, is now 6.8 per cent and falling. Mining has fallen to the sixth largest industry in the country. Even combined with agriculture the total is now only 10 per cent of GDP.

ARE WE BUYING HOUSES WITH FLAT WHITES?

With an economy that is 68 per cent services, as I believe John Hewson put it, the entire country is basically sitting around serving each other cups of coffee or, as the Chief Scientist of Australia would prefer, smashed avocado.

Successive Australian governments have achieved economic growth by blowing a property bubble on a scale like no other.

A bubble that has lasted for 55 years and seen prices increase 6556 per cent since 1961, making this the longest running property bubble in the world (on average, “upswings” last 13 years).

[Newfie]

A couple of years ago my daughter was looking to buy a rental house as an investment. Philadelphia. Long story, she didn’t. It while helping her look I noticed that the adds were all directed towards investors not first time home buyers.

I took that as a sign folks with money wanted it out of traditional investments and into something more solid, something of intrinsic value.

[Ibon]

In 2004 I sold a business and exited the stock market and never looked back. I have to admit though that all my investments since then make me a member of this rentier class. I was a 30% partner in a villa development project in Thailand, I bought property in the Canadian Rockies in a booming tourist town, bought two properties in Florida and of course the 400 acre reserve here in Panama. All of these investments doubled or tripled in value during this time and we did short term rentals with most of these properties. The home we are now selling in Florida, on the market for 2.5 times what we paid for it, has been generating for the last 7 years over $ 100k a year short term vacation rental income. It is a sick game Sea Gypsy, and I have to confess I have milked it for almost 15 years.

I have divested of everything except this reserve in Panama. The property in Florida is on the market and we will only keep a tiny bungalow there as a small base in the US as our only remaining property outside of Panama.

I thought I was leaving the world of commerce in 2004 but I really didn't. Even now this refuge in Panama cannot sustain itself on coffee and cattle. It needs tourist dollars to float. And where do these tourist dollars come from?

I really don't think there is an exit from this game.

[SeaGypsy]

Being virtually all of your properties are expressly for tourist accommodation, a take it or leave it market- not quite the target of my disgust.

In Australia & the more prosperous cities globally, where so called slums have been outlawed or never existed, the lowest basic level of accommodation has become ludicrously & unjustifiably expensive. Can't afford it- tough, sleep in the streets, but don't get too comfortable doing that either (expect semi constant harrasment/ being pushed into tourist accommodation, bunk houses etc.)

[Tanada]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SeaGypsy', 'B')eing virtually all of your properties are expressly for tourist accommodation, a take it or leave it market- not quite the target of my disgust.

In Australia & the more prosperous cities globally, where so called slums have been outlawed or never existed, the lowest basic level of accommodation has become ludicrously & unjustifiably expensive. Can't afford it- tough, sleep in the streets, but don't get too comfortable doing that either (expect semi constant harrasment/ being pushed into tourist accommodation, bunk houses etc.)

[asg70]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SeaGypsy', '
')The rentier class is bleeding the working poor to death...

[GHung]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tanada', '
')
IMO much safer to be poor in a rural community than an urban one. For one thing when you know people you tend to build relationships with them for good or ill, at least you know what to expect and who specifically to never trust. Every time I visit a city in the top 100 in the USA I feel as if a great weight of humanity is squashing the decency and joy right out of my being. When I was a child and into my 30's I would visit Detroit for cultural events, sporting events, or medical appointments and as I grew older I despised visiting more and more to the point I do not choose to go there now if I can find any way to avoid it. Cleveland and Toledo are not a great deal better, but you have to do what you must to get through life.

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tanada', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SeaGypsy', 'B')eing virtually all of your properties are expressly for tourist accommodation, a take it or leave it market- not quite the target of my disgust.

In Australia & the more prosperous cities globally, where so called slums have been outlawed or never existed, the lowest basic level of accommodation has become ludicrously & unjustifiably expensive. Can't afford it- tough, sleep in the streets, but don't get too comfortable doing that either (expect semi constant harrasment/ being pushed into tourist accommodation, bunk houses etc.)

[GHung]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I') wonder how the 400 million chinese feel about this ...you know...the ones who abandoned the toil of rural agrarian subsistence farming to the factories of mega metropolis urban areas during the past 25 years