CONFESSION (mea culpa)

saneinsane: about 11 weeks ago

Surely this needs to be updated, how poor people act on Streeteasy needs to be called out. Some of the worst

paul10003: about 6 months ago

if i recall correctly, i think you're saying i talk out of my ass because i mentioned that there is such a thing as a "market failure". ........ to be clear, i talk out of my ass all the time -- and i'm told i'm quite good at it -- but i'm not sure that acknowledging the existence of market failures is a case in point. i told you to google it in the same way i would tell someone that challenged me to provide evidence that the world is round.

re: giamatti. i confess that i don't follow baseball at all. which i'm pretty sure is one more reason i'm a moron.

LICComment: about 6 months ago

I think Paul is starting to lose it. However, I was amused after I called him on his talking out of his ass, when his response was - go look at google . . .

West81st: about 6 months ago

paul10003: I think Vverain was alluding not to the elder Giamatti's brilliant career as a university president and baseball commissioner, but rather to his more recent occupation as a corpse.

paul10003: about 6 months ago

poorishlady: if you haven't already figured it out from the tone of this thread, i'll be explicit: this entire thing - all 118 posts - is total utter 100% pure, no additives or preservatives BULLSHIT. we're just horsing around because i think we're all a bit stupid and immature. don't take offense, ok?

hugs and kisses,
Paul

p.s. i'd appreciate better insults than bart giamatti. you can do better!

West81st: about 6 months ago

VVerain: That was way too subtle.

VVerain: about 6 months ago

I think Bart Giamatti will play Paul10003.

stevejhx: about 6 months ago

I can do Christian Bale. No probs.

poorishlady: about 6 months ago

I still think Christian Bale will do a great job as stevejhx.
Paul10003 ---- you called me a douche? First time I've ever been called that. I think Paul Giamatti will play your part.

paul10003: about 6 months ago

Petrfitz is a fine man, upstanding citizen, of the highest intellect. and compassion for those less fortunate. ... did i mention compassion?

stevejhx: about 6 months ago

No, I said, I want everything controlled. But what I want is PRICES to be controlled downwards, but INCOMES to be controlled upwards. That way, I could spend less money but save more. They should legislate 25% annual compound yields in savings accounts, and hold my rent down to 1972 levels. Then I'd be as rich as petrfitz by the end of the month.

paul10003: about 6 months ago

oh god, i fear i may only be entertaining MYSELF now. great fun, great fun.

paul10003: about 6 months ago

about food control? or about you being a bigger douche than LIC?

stevejhx: about 6 months ago

paul10003, there are a lot of people in this city who have that exact same attitude.

kylewest: about 6 months ago

Gristedes? Nah. Wholefoods. Citarella. Hey. You know what. I wanna personal chef. Whose gonna subsidize that?

paul10003: about 6 months ago

f**k rent control - i want food control. i wanna walk into a gristedes, flash my FC card and get my filet mignon for $1. i wanna walk into your local coffeehouse, order up a grande whatever douche drink, be quoted $8, and reply back: nope sorry paying for food is for suckas.

then, when i'm old and don't wanna eat anymore, i wanna be able to pass my FC card onto my cousin so that he can use it.

paul10003: about 6 months ago

p.s. LIC, you're a douche.

but not as big a douche as steve.

though vverain probably takes the cake for douche-ness.

hey poorishlady, make some moneyish, you douche.

paul10003: about 6 months ago

LIC - sorry my question was rhetorical and does not require a response. from your tone, i am guessing that you do not believe that market failures exist (or are, indeed, anomalies). that's cool. you'll pardon me, but i'm gonna politely bow out of having to prove it to you, because as a wise man once told me: "in the end, mud wrestling with a pig just gets you muddy."

...and a less-wise man once told me: "dude, just google it." you might wanna try that.

stevejhx: about 6 months ago

VVerain, thank you for your interest in my tits.

VVerain: about 6 months ago

I think Steve said he is fat, grey and balding / shaved and has man tits. Not sure that Bale is the right guy.

poorishlady: about 6 months ago

Oops, that was a typo. I meant Christian Bale. He's clearly the actor to play Stevejhx.

poorishlady: about 6 months ago

Tom Cruise can play three parts: JuiceMan, Kylewest, and Urbandigs.
Johnny Depp would love to be Spunky, but Jack Nicholson might want the role.
Stevejhx: Christian Slater.

poorishlady: about 6 months ago

Jennifer Jason Leigh or Susan Sarandon will do wonderfully as poorishlady. Meryl Streep or Cate Blanchette or Kate Winslett could do it, too. But I must say, Kathy Bates and Lily Tomlin aren't bad suggestions. Or how about Sonja Sohn from The Wire? It's a juicy role . . .
Hey!!! We're all so beautifully clean-cut!!! We surf this instead of surfing porn!!!

West81st: about 6 months ago

stevejhx: So to cut through the inflammatory rhetoric, you seem to be advocating a gradual phase-out of rent regulation. That's exactly what is happening, and I don't think anyone here seriously opposes the trend.

Although the battle's pace may be too slow for your liking, your side is winning the war. Rent control has already dwindled to the point of macroeconomic insignificance, and rent stabilization will get there over the next thirty years, even if the Legislature continues to renew it. Chill out. You're arguing with phantom opponents.

stevejhx: about 6 months ago

lowery, you question - which VVerain says is "on target" - makes the assumption that the rent increase could have occurred all at once. Of course it couldn't happen all at once; it was a situation that had gone on since WWII and didn't have a voila solution.

It took years for the Soviet Union to bankrupt itself; years for Cuba to get where it is today. These price constraints have pernicious long-term effects, but in the short-term their effects can be negligible.

So yes, had rents been free all along - in good times and in bad - then I believe the Bronx would have been saved, or at least a good deal of it.

VVerain: about 6 months ago

Lowery you are on target with your questioning.

lowery: about 6 months ago

steve - if the Bronx landlords in the '70s could have raised the rents to whatever they wanted, how do you suppose that would have changed anything? Would tenants with higher incomes suddenly have moved to the Bronx areas that burned down? Would the tenants living in those buildings suddenly have coughed up the higher rents because they were getting services? What makes you think the prior tenants in the burning neighborhoods moved out because of rent regulation? Don't you suppose there may have been other factors at play? And westelle, that's an interesting leap you've made, from tenants unable to pay rents to encouraging people to burn down their apartments. Are you referring to the tenants or to the landlords?

LICComment: about 6 months ago

paul - it is difficult to respond to your question without you giving a concrete example of a market failure, especially in real estate. I don't think these market failure are as "all-too-oft" as you portend.

paul10003: about 6 months ago

LIC - i didn't mean to imply RE market failures per se; but rather, market failures in the broader sense. of course, this could mean RE market failures, stock market failures, product market failures, etc.

stevejhx: about 6 months ago

The outer boroughs are quite affordable, especially the Bronx. It was good enough for my mother and my grandparents when they couldn't afford Manhattan anymore, so I don't abide the discussion by leasinglawyer. And LIC and Bensonhurst were good enough for my grandparents on my father's side.

I also don't understand this, "hehehehehehe gas on the fire. Damn you are easy."

If anyone does, please let me know.

eah: about 6 months ago

Totally agree LICC.

LICComment: about 6 months ago

This whole concept that working-class people can't afford to live in NYC is either a myth or an outright lie. There are many very nice, good, safe neighborhoods in Queens, Brooklyn, Staten Island and the Bronx that are well affordable to rent or own for police officers, firefighters, teachers, skilled laborers (electricians, carpenters, etc.), nurses, and anyone else at those same income levels. To say that people should be entitled to live in a specific part of the city, or that the middle-class neighborhoods in the outer boroughs don't count for some reason, is insulting and obnoxious.

leasinglawyer: about 6 months ago

hehehehehehe

gas on the fire.

Damn you are easy

stevejhx: about 6 months ago

getter = better

stevejhx: about 6 months ago

"Housing is one of those inalienable rights that some guy a couple of hundred years ago wrote about."

Those inalienable rights were devised by John Locke, at a time when only property owners could vote. They were borrowed almost verbatim by Thomas Jefferson, at a time when only property owners could vote, and only white men could own property (including black people).

So much for that theory. Housing is not an inalienable right - someone's got to pay for it. No free lunch, remember?

2. Landmarks Preservation is a zoning matter. Sometimes I think it's a good idea, other times I think that they go overboard.

3. Socialized medicine and social security are both social responsibility. You'll have to be more specific if you want a better answer.

3.1 (I guess). Preferring public transportation that all could use throughout the city is "ignorant," when the High Line clearly profits most the people who live by it? Doubtful.

4. Evidence Points to Little Harm from Lifting Rent Control

The most striking feature of the end of rent control in Massachusetts was that a remarkably small number of rent-controlled households–only about 7 percent–applied and qualified for these transitional extensions. In the three rent-regulated cities, about 42,500 units were subject to rent controls in 1994. However, tenants in only 3,090 of these units were deemed eligible for short-term protections because of their low incomes.

To say that this came as a surprise to most would be an understatement. It was generally believed that considerably more households would qualify for protection from decontrol. Clearly, the number of poor tenants in rent-controlled housing had been overestimated. It is worth noting that there has been a virtual absence of horror stories of hardship evictions reported by Boston’s vigilant press.

http://www.manhattan-institute.org/html/cr_3.htm

That said, who said the working class had a right to live in Manhattan, or anywhere else? Do they have a "right" to first-class flights at coach prices?

Doubtful.

"Next time you go into a store, or a diner or some other establishment, have a look and the man or woman working there and think what it might be like to discover that the rent that you pay with your hard earned salary will be doubling so that you can no longer afford even the most basic requirements of a comfortable life and then tell me that rent regulation is THEFT. You prick."

First, there are ways of controlling unconscionable rent increases and they already exist in NYC.

Second, people routinely are forced to sell their properties because they can't afford the property tax anymore. Should we grant them a waiver from their taxes, and if so who pays them instead?

Third, that's the EXACT SAME ARGUMENT used by the Luddites to oppose mechanization: CHANGE HURTS CHANGE HURTS CHANGE HURTS!

No it doesn't. It makes us all better, just like lifting trade barriers does. Some people experience dislocation - as a whole everyone is getter.

You need a fast lesson in market economics - what you propose is what drove the Soviet Union into bankruptcy, and what caused NYC to nearly collapse in the 70's. May your heart bleed for the rest of your life - this from a lifelong Democrat - because you CANNOT regulate prices for long without dire consequences. Nixon tried it in the 70's and it only made inflation worse; Chavez is trying it in Venezuela; Castro did a nice job in Cuba.

Things cost what they do for a reason - supply and demand. You can't manage one without managing the other, and no person or government is powerful enough to manage our economy. Ask George Soros.

leasinglawyer: about 6 months ago

1. Good for you. I too put myself through college and law school.

2. I said nothing about zoning, I asked you about Landmarks Preservation which equates more to a taking than a zoning use issue.

3. I said nothing about socialized medicine or social security, I asked you about social responsibility.

3. Your High Line comment confirms your ignorance.

4. Your statement that rents will go down if rent regulation is abolished is unsupported and unsupportable. Even assuming, arguendo if they do go down by small percentages, the working class is still priced out of most of NYC.

5. I'm sure you do give to charity. Giving back to the community is far more that writing a check to your favorite charity.

6. I have no idea where the bail or contract question came from. Are you relating a personal experience.

As you might have surmised, I take issue with self important people who think that the dollar and who has it is the beginning and the end of the inquiry. Housing is one of those inalienable rights that some guy a couple of hundred years ago wrote about. You take a roof over your head and 3 squares a day for granted my friend. Next time you go into a store, or a diner or some other establishment, have a look and the man or woman working there and think what it might be like to discover that the rent that you pay with your hard earned salary will be doubling so that you can no longer afford even the most basic requirements of a comfortable life and then tell me that rent regulation is THEFT. You prick.

Oh, and stevejhx, I agree with everything you said in your follow up about sleazy ambulance chasers and tort reform. It would remove one category of vultures but would leave rent gouging landlords in place.

stevejhx: about 6 months ago

"they're" = "their."

stevejhx: about 6 months ago

Oh, and leasinglawyer, I also support tort reform so that sleazy ambulance-chasing lawyers don't file ridiculous lawsuits hoping for a settlement because it's cheaper. How about loser paying the winner's legal costs, and no contingency cases. That'd be a first step toward cleaning out a bunch of vultures who live off of everyone and claim they're acting in the public good, when all they do is act to enrich they're own pockets.

stevejhx: about 6 months ago

"Steve, are you self made or did mommy and daddy send you to school and buy you your first pad?"

Self-made, paid for undergraduate (George Washington) and graduate (Columbia) out of my own pocket.

"How do you feel about Landmarks Preservation (should they have been allowed to build a monstrosity on top of GST)?"

For the most part I have no problems with Landmarks Preservation, but I do think they go over the top. Zoning is quite different from rent regulation.

"How do you feel about (or do you even recognize) social responsibility?"

Absolutely and I fully support socialized medicine and social security (they're more efficient than the private sector) as well as a progressive income tax unlike our current regressive one. It is not, however, my responsibility to ensure that anyone can have anything they want at my expense. Quite different from my paying more taxes.

"Are you a Friend of the High Line?"

No, I think it's ridiculous. They should build a subway on it - it's more needed.

"Without 'subsidized housing' or rent regulaiton, the toe jam that shines your shoes and wipes your ass would not exist in this great city."

Bullshit. Everyplace where they get rid of subsidized housing and rent regulation, rents go down.

"We do well, we live comfortably, we live in an amazing country and we have an obligation to give back to the community."

No doubt about it, and I give to charity every year. "Giving back to the community," however, does not - to me - involve making sure someone can have someplace to live that he otherwise couldn't afford. We need individual responsibility.

BTW if a relative of mine got arrested I wouldn't bail them out, either, nor would I cosign a contract for them.

"Take off the blinders you prick."

Thanks for the unnecessary insult, ye who enjoys "this toally absurd self indulgent discussion." What is self-indulgent about supporting decontrol of rents so that prices will come down, as they will. That is not self-indulgent; that works to the benefit of all.

You prick.

leasinglawyer: about 6 months ago

Don't forget, it is High Rent ($2,000 per month) and High Income ($175,000 per year for the 2 prior years). Both tests must be satisfied for Luxury Decontrol.