Opinion of Gentrification

[traininthedistance]

A whole hell of a lot better than any of the alternatives that actually exist.

[traininthedistance]

The alternative to gentrification is bankrupt city governments which are unable to maintain their infrastructure, educate or even keep safe their citizenry, and it is also a continued acceleration of soul- and climate-destroying suburban sprawl.  I recognize that gentrification can be disruptive to incumbent renters, but even for them it is often better than the alternative.  A poor black person who is priced out of Bed-Stuy and has to go live in further-away Canarsie is still able to access the myriad social services that NYC is able to provide because it is in good shape (in large part because gentrification has boosted the area's economy and the city's tax base).  A poor black person in Detroit is SOL.

Gentrification is, and I am not exaggerating, quite possibly the single best development of the past 20 years.  It is doing its level best to save America.

[traininthedistance]

It depends what you mean by gentrification and even then it depends a little on the circumstances, but, basically it's a bad thing. It also tends to lead (and quite inevitably) to the creation of banlieues (there isn't a good word for this in English), which is something that middle class people have a strange tendency to forget.

Why are "slums" more desirable in the inner city, than in an outside ring ala Paris? In all events, it would seem to me to be good social policy ceteris paribus for the lower SES types to have housing near where they work.

Well, it's good social policy for everybody to have housing near where they work, for myriad reasons.  To the extent that it forces lower SES types to have longer commutes, that's really the one thing about gentrification that I would consider to be a likely negative.

[traininthedistance]

I don't understand why people get their knickers in a knot about gentrification by itself.  Gentrification is the market working, it's not possible to stop.  If people are willing to pay more money to buy a house or rent in a neighborhood, how or why stop them?  We're not going to have some utopia where everyone can afford to live wherever they want. 

The debate we should have is about housing codes, zoning, economic opportunity and the environment.  People should realize that the current geography of bad/good neighborhoods is largely the product of failed government policy.  For years government has actively subsidized the suburbs, leading to an inefficient use of urban space and undervalued neighborhoods like those in North, central and South Brooklyn.  The goal ought to be, every neighborhood is livable, with a mix of uses and space for different kinds of people, not the status quo for every particular neighborhood.

Agreed 1,000%.