At least here in France, the "housing" they offer is just a mattress in a huge room with no intimacy and dangerous people around. Most homeless people are skeptical at first, but after getting robbed/assaulted they certainly will refuse temporary housing for the rest of their life.
If the authorities really cared about the homeless, they would requisition empty dwellings and assign them individually so people have a proper home to rebuild their life.
Sure, but does it not occur to them that property owners might be performing an important function such that a policy that causes most of them to leave landlording might worsen the situation of homeless people and other poor people?
Suppose the government instituted a rule that applies to any game developer and in particular to the developer's office or whatever structure he likes to be inside when he is developing games or meeting with the other developers working on the same game. The rule says that if the game developer leaves his office and fails to hire a security guard to watch the property, then 72 hours after the game developer's departure, anyone (including career criminals) have a legal right to take over the office (even if the developer's office is his home). Wouldn't that curtail -- possibly severely -- the quantity and the quality of new games developed in whatever jurisdiction the rule applies to? Or at least raise the price of games (to cover the cost of the security guards and to compensate developers for the hassle) with the result that some of the consumers who used to be able to afford to buy video games are now priced out of the market?
> Sure, but does it not occur to them that property owners might be performing an important function such that a policy that causes most of them to leave landlording might worsen the situation of the homeless and other poor people?
Sure, but I think most people feel stronger about helping people at the bottom of society, rather than the ones closer to the top.
Worst case scenario for the homeless, they remain homeless and have lesser life expectancy. Worst case scenario for the landlord with vacant properties losing their vacant properties, less wealth in the future.
> Suppose the government instituted a rule that applies to any game developer and in particular to the [...]
Yes, that'd be a terrible policy. Same if it applied to property. So luckily, there is nothing like that in Spain that works like you described it, regarding properties.
> Sure, but does it not occur to them that property owners might be performing an important function such that a policy that causes most of them to leave landlording might worsen the situation of homeless people and other poor people?
Yes, actually, that did occur to me, and when I put any thought into it at all I realized it made no sense whatsoever.
Owning things is not performing any function whatsoever. Landlords are leeches on society who remove much-needed resources and provide nothing.
Before you make the tired "but they provide homes" argument: no, builders provide homes.
Before you make the tired "but they make repairs" argument: that's a handyman, and a handyman generally does a better job and is not paid anywhere near as much as a landlord.
Before you make the tired "but not everyone can own homes" argument: the reason not everyone can buy homes is that our entire housing structure is based around making short-term home ownership and home ownership for cheaper than rent impossible. If you remove landlords from the equation, those incentives go away.
> Suppose the government instituted a rule that applies to any game developer and in particular to the developer's office or whatever structure he likes to be inside when he is developing games or meeting with the other developers working on the same game. The rule says that if the game developer leaves his office and fails to hire a security guard to watch the property, then 72 hours after the game developer's departure, anyone (including career criminals) have a legal right to take over the office (even if the developer's office is his home). Wouldn't that curtail -- possibly severely -- the quantity and the quality of new games developed in whatever jurisdiction the rule applies to? Or at least raise the price of games (to cover the cost of the security guards and to compensate developers for the hassle) with the result that some of the consumers who used to be able to afford to buy video games are now priced out of the market?
We have an actual reality we can talk about, we don't need bizarre hypothetical scenarios.
Nobody is saying that squatting is the solution we want. What I am saying is that if you refuse to address the actual problem, i.e. you refuse to get rid of landlords, then you can't be surprised when people whose disfranchisement you support decide to find solutions you don't like.
> > What is it about this issue that makes so many people wish to treat landlords harshly?
> Compassion.
I don't feel like that's the true motivation. Where is the compassion for the middle class worker who can just barely afford some house, just to have it stolen (see parallel threads in this discussion for accounts of that happening) then?
If it was actually compassion, we'd be advocating for the government to provide adequate services to all homeless, paid for by taxes with progressive taxation so the rich also pay into the solution.
> compared to how they see the people with a lot
As noted in parallel comments, the people with a lot are immune from having their property stolen/squatted because they can afford private security measures that make this impossible. The victims here can only be middle class property owners who can't afford private security to watch their property 24x7.
> If it was actually compassion, we'd be advocating for the government to provide adequate services to all homeless, paid for by taxes with progressive taxation so the rich also pay into the solution.
I think that is the solution which pretty much everyone who has compassion for the squatters is advocating for. I'm comfortable saying that almost nobody thinks squatting is a good solution to this problem.
The problem is, providing adequate services to all homeless, paid for by taxes with progressive taxation so the rich also pay into the solution, has to happen first, before you get rid of squatting protections. Because otherwise you're just taking away the bad solution and leaving no solution, for the people most harmed by the current situation. And mysteriously once the squatting protections are gone and property owners' problem is solved, homelessness stops being a conversation until the next time it causes a problem for a rich person.
You're noticeably vague on what you think "adequate services" means. I refuse to be that vague. There is one, and only one, solution to homelessness: homes. Not shelters, homes. Not mental health services (though that would be good, too), homes. Homes: places where you can have privacy and security and pets and the right to decide who gets to enter the space. Services that do not result in homeless people being in homes are not adequate.
Until I see a real solution to homelessness implemented I'm really not interested in solving the problems homelessness causes for better-off people. Solve homelessness, and those problems will likely go away on their own; if not we can talk about it then. But until then, I'm quite okay with society dealing with the ugly consequences of its ugly failure to provide homes for its people.
> But until then, I'm quite okay with society dealing with the ugly consequences of its ugly failure to provide homes for its people.
This ignores a fundamental characteristic of human nature. If you want people to help you out, you can't screw them over.
While I don't know anything about the legislative process in Spain, I guess it is not too different from elsewhere, so you probably need broad support from the masses (middle class) to make big changes.
We already established (elsewhere in this discussion) that the rich don't feel any impact from squatting. They have private security forces, so it is a non-issue to them.
So if we want the government to provide for adequate services, middle class support is needed. If we allow all middle-class property to be stolen by squatters, there will be zero support from the middle class to provide any help to the thieves. Like it or not, basic human nature.
> This ignores a fundamental characteristic of human nature. If you want people to help you out, you can't screw them over.
This is a totally naive approach. I have 0 hope that the rich will "help us out" no matter what we do--rich people don't become rich by being generous. Either we use our majority to make them be productive members of society and pay their fair share, or we get nothing from them. This idea that we're going to concede to them on a few issues and they'll suddenly stop hoarding resources is a total fantasy.
> We already established (elsewhere in this discussion) that the rich don't feel any impact from squatting. They have private security forces, so it is a non-issue to them.
I disagree. The middle class has largely been disfranchised from owning the homes they live in, so the idea that there's some massive section of the middle class that owns second homes they leave empty doesn't hold much water. The people you're talking about aren't middle class.
> So if we want the government to provide for adequate services, middle class support is needed. If we allow all middle-class property to be stolen by squatters, there will be zero support from the middle class to provide any help to the thieves. Like it or not, basic human nature.
Thank you for the strategic advice, but no thanks. This strategic advice you're giving sounds suspiciously like you trying to represent rich people as middle class, and represent rich people's goal of enforcing property rights as a step toward achieving goals that you don't even support. That may not be your intent--for all I know, you completely support the progressive taxation and regulation of landlordism necessary to provide (free) homes for the homeless. But if that's the case I think you're being naive: the promise that if we just give the rich people what they want they'll magically become generous and start giving back has been part of the conversation for decades, and those promises are never kept.
> > If you want people to help you out, you can't screw them over.
> This is a totally naive approach.
I would've thought this was the entirely uncontroversial part of my premise!
Are you seriously saying that you feel the way to get people to help your cause is to screw them over?
We're going to fundamentally disagree there. The whole premise of politics is to find ways to make alliances to achieve goals. If you make most people hate your cause, you won't get very far.
> the promise that if we just give the rich people what they want they'll magically become generous and start giving back has been part of the conversation for decades, and those promises are never kept.
Of course. That's just a variant of trickle-down economics, which is nonsense. The rich will keep it all very happily and never give anything back.
> The people you're talking about aren't middle class.
And yet, they must be. The actual rich are immune from house occupations. Their houses are either in private enclaves where you can't possibly get in, or in the case of standalone houses they have private security coverage where you can't possibly get in.
This is how it is in the US. I realize the article is about Spain, so perhaps the very rich act different in Spain and they just let their multiple properties sit unguarded for long times.
> Are you seriously saying that you feel the way to get people to help your cause is to screw them over?
No, I'm saying that we don't need rich people to help our cause, because non-rich people are the super majority.
> And yet, they must be. The actual rich are immune from house occupations. Their houses are either in private enclaves where you can't possibly get in, or in the case of standalone houses they have private security coverage where you can't possibly get in.
There's a lot of rich between "private enclave with security force" and middle class that can't afford a second home to sit empty that you're ignoring.
Sure, multibillionaires are above it all. But I think you're drastically underestimating how rich one has to be to have even one empty home. If you own the home you live in you're already on the upper side of middle class. And if someone breaks into the house you live in, there's no place in the world where that person has legal protections.
> No, I'm saying that we don't need rich people to help our cause, because non-rich people are the super majority.
So, we agree on that.
We just have different perceptions of who "the rich" are.
A software engineer making $100K/yr (in a low cost of living part of the US, not in silicon valley) is not "the rich", but these people often have multiple apartments. I know first hand since many my of my friends are in this demographic.
> Sure, multibillionaires are above it all.
It doesn't take a multibillionaire to own more than one house/apt. It just takes a middle class income person in many parts of the country.
> And if someone breaks into the house you live in, there's no place in the world where that person has legal protections.
Ended up watching a few news reports from Spain to understand these home invasions better.
Here's one example where an 80 year old woman left the house she was actively living in for only two days to visit her son elsewhere. After coming back two days later the house had been invaded. The police say they can't do anything. That they supposedly have to wait 24 hours (then changed to 48 hours) and start a judicial process. Even though this was her primary residence and was only gone two days.
> I don't feel like that's the true motivation. Where is the compassion for the middle class worker who can just barely afford some house, just to have it stolen (see parallel threads in this discussion for accounts of that happening) then?
If you have someone trying to break into the house you live and stay in, you don't call them "okupas", it's trespassing/breaking and entering. One quick police call and you'll get help to have them thrown out.
The squatting/"okupas" thing is about occupying otherwise vacant properties.
What would be more interesting is to have statistics about empty dwellings. The banks have evicted countless people after the 2008 crisis, but are they renting those places now? If so, how cheap is it?
There is no shortage of housing. There is a shortage of rentable affordable housing, due to an epidemic of greedy landlord accaparating the market.
I've never heard of something like this. It's not exactly like squatters are millionaires trying to save on rent to buy more champagne... I'm not saying this has never existed, there's probably an outlier somewhere.
What does exist for sure and is publicly advertised is companies like the original article trying to make owners desperate about squatters so they will sell their property for cheap. For example here in France, "Squat Solutions" has been doing this for years, buying property for ~10% of market price because of squatters, after convincing the owners they had already lost everything.
Yea I didnt mean real squatters being the buyers. More like A who is a company/or rich person pays person B to go and squat in person Cs house. Then A goes to C and say "Ill buy your house for 10% of market value" and then the sale is done B leaves and C sells it at marketprice for a huge profit. And A and B just start the cycle again
In that case, was the dwelling abandoned? Of course the squatters are gonna say they didn't break in because that's the only way they'll keep their homes, but is it morally wrong to break into a speculator-owned dwelling that has been empty for 5 years? I've personally done it multiple times in my youth...
France, like Spain, has strong residence protection for anyone, including homeowners. So if someone takes your house while you are away it is not legally squatting, but rather homebreaking and they will be evicted without even a trial.
If a house you own gets squatted you may stop paying for electricity/gaz/water. But to be honest apart from big corps abandoned buildings, i've never seen a squat where the electricity/water was already on.
It is illegal to rent dangerous housing. It may not be illegal to give it away in good faith, and it's certainly not your responsibility as an owner if it gets squatted. To my knowledge, and despite hearing about this constantly on homeowners forums, there has never been a case of owners being legally responsible for injuries to squatters.
> So if someone takes your house while you are away it is not legally squatting, but rather homebreaking and they will be evicted without even a trial.
At least in the US there have been cases where the squatter forged a lease and showed that to police that came to evict them. With the scant evidence the police would deem it a civil matter and you have to go to court. I'm not sure what the process is in Spain though.
Forging a lease for an empty dwelling is easy. But forging a lease for the owner's residence is much harder. You'd have to get rid of the owner's stuff, make sure the neighbors don't testify that this is the owner's residence, come up with fake papers to prove the owner lives elsewhere.
All in all, i'd be curious if you have an example because that sounds like opinion manipulation from the owners as that case is very unlikely. At least similar cases i've heard about in France have been 100% debunked. It's much more likely the owners live(d) elsewhere and had an empty dwelling squatted.
That's precisely what fascist news organizations will have you believe, but the reality could not be further. Here in France BFMTV or CNews regularly have segments about poor people displaced from their homes by squatters (like the Maryvonne case or the Roland case) however when you check for information, you realize they were not protected by the police because they had abandoned the house for years so it was not considered their residence.
People going away for vacations, even months-long vacations are definitely protected by the law. It is illegal to break into people's home. It may not be illegal, depending on your jurisdiction, to enter an abandoned housing unit and claim it as your residence. It may still be illegal to break into it.
(when i say fascist news organizations i do mean they are run by actual fascists like Bollore, it's not a figure of speech)
From a legal standpoint, assaulting people is illegal. Assaulting them in their residence (trespassing) could be even more illegal. They definitely could take you to court.
From a moral standpoint, do you realize you're advocating for the mafia here? That's exactly what private mafia companies have been doing for years. Rightful owners enjoying their property are already well protected by the law and the police (too much actually), at least in western Europe, as explained by other commenters.
The okupas are the ones running the extortion racket. If anyone is acting like the Mafia, it's the people illegally occupying the house and demanding money to leave.
What happens in the US is that the land owner hires people to squat in the house. They don't lay a finger on the real squatters. They just take up all the rooms and generally make it annoying to live there until they leave. Then they get paid by the landowner and move out.
This has resulted in lots of funny videos where squatters get angry at other squatters for squatting. The hypocrisy is astounding.
> If anyone is acting like the Mafia, it's the people illegally occupying the house and demanding money to leave.
People demand housing, not money. It's not a racket that people are homeless and need a place to live. It's funny how you go into conspirational thinking that quick. It's more concerning that you think it's better to pay the anti-squat mafia tons of cash, rather than give the same amount to the squatters to leave the place so they can find another home.
> This has resulted in lots of funny videos where squatters get angry at other squatters for squatting.
Just because you live in a squat doesn't mean anyone can come and live there. It's your residence, not a public space. There's enough empty dwellings to house everyone decently. That doesn't make it a moral obligation if you are struggling and squat a home to house every single homeless person that comes by. I mean, you don't have a greater moral obligation for that than someone who rents or owns their home.
It's not hypocrisy to get angry at assholes trying to ruin your life when you're already low on cash and living in precarious housing. It's cruel that you would find human misery "funny".
> Just because you live in a squat doesn't mean anyone can come and live there. It's your residence, not a public space
Do you really not see the hypocrisy of this statement?
"It doesn't mean anyone can come and live there. It's your residence, not a public space."
Then how on earth do you defend squatters moving into another person's residence illegally? This is the kind of laughable hypocrisy typically displayed when squatters come back to house they've illegally occupied and meet some new housemates. It's amazing how they can rationalize that it's acceptable for them to move into people's homes without permission, but not acceptable for other people to do the same.
It is not their residence. They broke in and just moved in.
Kicking out people who are trespassing is how you have a safe and lawful society. Allowing private citizens to do whatever they feel like to innocent people is mafia like behavior.
It is their residence. That's the semantic difference between residence and ownership. You may reside somewhere without owning it, and vice-versa.
Now, breaking into people's residence is a different matter, and is already highly criminalized. Laws about squatting and tenants rights don't exist in the void without a reason: they are supposed to be a balance between ownership rights and housing rights. Allowing the real estate mafia to make its own law is not exactly a balance...
Do you realize most people working in IT are paid minimum wage or close to that? Most sysadmins and developers i've met here in France are under 2000€/month and it's only on places like HN that i read about huge salaries in IT.
(sorry i don't have stats this is just anecdata)
The Spanish population in general ain't that good when it comes to English and the quality of living in Spain is, in general, quite good. Weather and food are hard to replace.
Which begs the question: "Well why don't they work remotely from Spain then?" and the answer to that is that the Spanish IT sector does a whole lot of that to begin with, so a business in the market for it can just hire one of the many consulting business there.
Where would you move, and how? Wages are not better in surrounding countries, unless you work in specific companies it's not easy to get in. You also need the opportunity. Most people living paycheck-to-paycheck have little time and mental space to radically change their situation...
This is untrue. Borelliosis is treatable at any time: it's caused by a spirochete very similar to syphilis. The second time I had it it was diagnosed about 10 months after infection began, and a simple course of 100 mg Doxycycline for 21 days was all it took.
It's true that (a) sometimes an advanced case where the bacterial infection has spread to the brain requires a stronger intravenous antibiotic that will cross the blood-brain barrier and (2) the infection can cause permanent damage to the joints, heart, and even the brain. But the latter is no longer Lyme disease, it's just arthritis, heart disease, or brain damage and has to be treated symptomatically. You no longer have Lyme though.
Well the suitcase itself is not radioactive, and contains "emergency" martial law declaration material that is not covered by the "nuclear" adjective. Given that the USA were built on genocide, and at that time, FBI/CIA were already conducting mass arrest/incarceration and targeted assassinations (COINTELPRO) it's more of a change in public scenery than an actual policy change.
But "emergency tyrant outfit" doesn't quite have the same ring to it, does it?
If the authorities really cared about the homeless, they would requisition empty dwellings and assign them individually so people have a proper home to rebuild their life.