YIMBYism is Code for Gentrification
Political economist David Fields on YIMBY as just another lie of neoliberal capitalism.
If NIMBY is the classist rejection of affordable housing ("Not in my back yard”), then YIMBY is sold as the progressive counter to it: “Yes, in my back yard; because I believe affordable housing should be widely available, even in my own neighborhood.” But of course, housing development has nothing to do with the needs of the poor or the working class. It has nothing to do with the public purpose.
Steve’s guest, political economist David Fields, explains:
“YIMBY is yes to housing in my backyard, but housing for developers to extract profit from land value. So build as much as possible within a given area and, in the end, extract as much as possible through rent extraction and land value appreciation. It's not, in my view, yes to actual affordable housing in my backyard to house working class folks. No, it's yes to luxury skyscrapers, luxury this, luxury that. Build as cheaply as possible for vested interests to maximize gain.”
YIMBY’s want us to believe that sheer quantity will bring prices down, because that’s how the market works. Those who object are accused of NIMBYism. In addition,
“They're economically illiterate, they're economically stupid, they don't know, they don't pay attention, and they're not letting the magic do its magic. Which, anybody who knows a modicum of economics and knows that supply and demand is institutionally configurated - not natural - should be flabbergasted and say, how did this get to be so popular, so celebrated? Well, there are vested interests involved.”
The episode explores the misleading narratives of YIMBYism and compares the market-driven approach to housing to trickle-down economics, emphasizing the constructed scarcity and profit motives behind urban planning. David points out the misuse of economic models like the Marshallian Cross, highlighting flaws in the market logic often used to justify YIMBY policies.
David and Steve talk about the broader neoliberal agenda of privatization and deregulation, and its stranglehold on government policies. Awareness and organization are needed to combat systemic class inequality in housing and beyond.
David Fields is from a critical realist and genetic structuralist ontology and epistemology. His work centers on the intricacies concerning the interactions of foreign exchanges and capital flows, with economic growth, fiscal and monetary policy and distribution, whereby critical attention is paid to the notion of endogenous money. He also delves into the political economy of regional development to study patterns with respect to the nature of housing, social stratification, and community planning.
@ProfDavidFields on Twitter
FULL TRANSCRPT with EXTRAS
[00:00:43] Steve Grumbine: All right, folks, this is Steve with Macro N Cheese. Folks, today's guest is a recurring guest. Because when I have people I trust that bring good information to the table, I want to bring them back. There's so much more than any one episode could ever capture. On this particular subject, the last time I even sort of discussed this was with Nathan Tankus. And this was back in year one of this podcast, where we talked about the curious case of rent control. And if you haven't heard that. May I suggest that you go back into the archives of Macro N Cheese and check out The Curious Case of Rent Control with Nathan Tankus.
In this case, we are going into the world of NIMBY and YIMBY-ism. Because this is really happening big time out there, and you don't realize exactly how misled and misunderstood people are, and how things that sound like it's fighting for justice, ain't really so.
And one of the things this podcast strongly endeavors to do is to bring about an understanding of neoliberalism and its attack on society. And the mass quest for not only privatizing, but, you know, yielding to capitalists and saying, Hey, little guy, screw you. We don't care about you. As long as the, quote unquote, middle-class says something, then they're happy as can be.
So with that, I'm gonna blend this into a couple narratives so you guys can understand how the road of good intentions leads to a very, very poor outcome. We talked about state-by-state healthcare previously, and we tried to explain to those advocates for state-by-state healthcare, that states were not currency issuers. That the ability to survive and to provide the kind of robust, systematic health care could not be done at the state level. Could be administered perhaps at the state level, but at the national level for so many reasons.
And we went through the economics of it all from the currency-issuer or currency-user perspective. But folks, when they get locked into an idea, it becomes ideological. It becomes like a jail cell and they can't understand new information.
So with that, the context of housing as a right flies directly in the face of this new kind of bourgeois, millennial, rich kid kind of YIMBYism - Yes In My Backyard - which is what YIMBY stands for. And it goes up against what has been painted as the curmudgeon's Not In My Backyard, aka NIMBYs. And this concept really is important because it is the foundation for almost all gentrification.
It's the foundation of so much misinformation. And, ultimately, when you look and you follow the money and you see who's behind YIMBYism, it sure isn't poor people. It sure isn't the lower end of the working class. It's a bunch of rich kids. It's a bunch of developers. It's real estate people. And it's also all the politicians that get big kickbacks from these kinds of housing initiatives.
So I wanted to bring on my guest, David Fields, to discuss this because that's kind of one of his specialties. So I'm going to just give you his bio and then I'll kick us off. David is from a critical realist and genetic structuralist ontology and epistemology. His work centers on the intricacies concerning the interactions of foreign exchanges and capital flows, with economic growth, fiscal and monetary policy and distribution.
Whereby critical attention is paid to the notion of endogenous money. He also delves into the political economy of regional development to study patterns with respect to the nature of housing, social stratification, and community planning. So, with that, David, welcome to the show, sir.
[00:04:50] David Fields: Uh, thanks, Steve. It's really great to be here again and converse with you. It's been a long time and looking forward to this.
[00:04:57] Steve Grumbine: Absolutely. So, you know, I look out there at DSA [Democratic Socialists of America] and other groups, and I know there is an element of DSA that has the NIMBY perspective, that understands and fights against gentrification. But apparently there is a huge swath, a huge battle even within DSA and other left-leaning organizations, that have no problem with building luxury housing so that the rich kids can have plenty of housing. And they don't care what it does to the region, the area, the street, the neighborhood, in terms of how it impacts low-cost and poor working class individuals. Tell me about YIMBYism and NIMBYism from your perspective.
[00:05:40] David Fields: Oh, for sure. I'll first start with YIMBY. It's an unfortunate telling when somebody hears YIMBY. They say, of course, I want affordable housing in my backyard. And that's, I mean, if you're progressive, that's your natural inclination. However, the way YIMBY has unfolded and become constituted, it's quite opposite of that. And it's actually a perversion of putting actual affordable housing in my backyard.
YIMBY is actually a political scheme, that's been manufactured, molded, shaped by developers, economic elites, vested interests, you name it, to say that, well, uh, we're going to turn actual affordable housing work on its head. And if we just let the market do what it's supposed to do by building so much that's possible within a given area without constraint, without regulation, without accountability, you will. If we just let the market do its magic and build so much that's possible within a given area, prices will naturally follow in terms of going down, as a way that, you know, supply and demand hypothetically works.
Now, if you don't know much about the Marshallian Cross or supply and demand [theory], you think, Oh, of course, you know, and that's the way the market should come down. I mean, prices will fall and, and people were able to have enough housing because there's a, there's a shortage. No.
YIMBY is yes to housing in my backyard, but housing for developers to extract profit from land value. So build as so much as possible within a given area and, in the end, extract as much as possible through rent extraction and land value appreciation. It's not, in my view, yes to actual affordable housing in my backyard to house working class folks.
No, it's yes to luxury skyscrapers, luxury this, luxury that. Build as cheaply as possible For vested interests to maximize gain. And the way these YIMBY's who promote this, which in my opinion, or kind of like the yuppies of the 1980s, they didn't go away, is that, well, if you say no to this, you're obviously not progressive, not with it, not caring, and therefore NIMBY. Which is completely wrong.
NIMBY, the way it's supposed to mean, is not having affordable housing in my backyard. And it's actually - yes, it's classist - but YIMBYs have turned it on its head to say those who are going against allowing developers to do what they want to do are not progressive, are not with it, are not caring for the community and should be shunned.
So they perverted the dichotomy between YIMBY and NIMBY. YIMBY should mean, in my view, yes to actual affordable housing that working class people can, in fact, achieve and sustain. And NIMBY is the class's reaction to say no to that. But like I said, YIMBY's, those who say the market should allow it to do what it can, they're not with it, they're economically illiterate, they're economically stupid, they don't know, they don't pay attention, and you're not letting the magic do its magic.
Which anybody who knows a modicum of economics and knows that supply and demand is institutionally configurated - not natural - should be flabbergasted and say, how did this, get to be so popular, so celebrated? Well, there are vested interests involved.
And they've sustained it through works like the right-wing economist, Edward Glaezer, at Harvard. He wrote this book called The Triumph of the City, who laid out an argument saying that if you allow for abundant housing, regardless [of] the way it is, and relaxed controls, prices will naturally come down if supply exceeds demand. Richard Florida and his book called The Rise of the Creative Class, that if you build the conditions so a so-called creative class can flourish, positive spillover effects will naturally ensue just by letting the market do what it can. Which anybody who has a modicum of understanding [of] their neighborhoods knows that it's a complete ideal type that has no reflection on reality. And the books that I would recommend to counteract this fantasy:
Michael Storper's The Keys to the City and Patrick Condon's Broken City, which actually call out saying that this is nonsense. Because if you look at the actual on the ground realities, there's no prices that are naturally coming down. It's maximized land value, maximized profits, gentrification, increased spatial polarization, and increased institutional benign neglect of the working class folks who desperately need housing, public accountability, services, you name it, etc.
[00:10:43] Steve Grumbine: Correct me if I'm wrong, but this feels an awful lot like Ronald Reagan.
[00:10:48] David Fields: Oh yeah, yeah.
[00:10:49] Steve Grumbine: And just trickle-down concept here.
[00:10:52] David Fields: Yeah. It's trickle-down dogma. I mean, that's exactly what it is. They don't say trickle-down economics, but you can say it's trickle-down housing. That, yes, the prices will come down through so-called filtering. The more privileged folks will move to more expensive - which will make housing more available to the working class folks - and the market works its magic 'cause the supply curve is exceeding the downward sloping demand curve.
And anybody who knows the complete dogma nonsense corporate welfare of supply side economics of the eighties, knows that this is snake oil.
[00:11:30] Steve Grumbine: I know that you're from a post Keynesian perspective more so than an MMT perspective. But within that space, could you explain the demand and supply curves for the listeners? Those that maybe are not as well up to speed on that?
[00:11:44] David Fields: Yeah, for sure. So there's the supply and demand model, which formally is called the Marshallian Cross - which stems from Alfred Marshall - that the demand for goods is naturally downward sloping because as prices go down, demand goes up. And the supply curve, which is the supply of goods, goes up because as prices go up, they'll supply more to achieve the equilibrium where you have a natural price and everything equals out. It's your supply and demand graph that you see in every econ 101 book. I'm going to say it forthright - it's bullcrap.
It has been empirically refuted. Theoretically contested, quite exactly, to say: No, in the real world, these curves do not slope this way, and it only explains an individual good in a very hypothetical economy with homogeneous goods and allowing the market to, in fact, allow prices to be zero everywhere and everywhere.
So essentially saying that there'll be no such profit. Now we know that there's profit everywhere. So that's the first indicator that this model doesn't work. But it makes for good arguments because they say, well, it's a supply and demand and everybody takes it as "as is". It ends up being quite epiphenomenal, as in, like, don't contest it, it's sacred, it's holy, like the Bible, and it can't be refuted.
Well, sorry. Reality flies in the face of such fantasy.
[00:13:16] Steve Grumbine: So, you know, I spoke with a gentleman named Davarian Baldwin, who talked about , basically, the "Ivory Tower of UniverCities." And this model couldn't be any more in your face. I mean, universities are the single largest land holder in most communities and, most urban communities, anyway.
And they, basically, make great services, great whatever for those rich kids that plan to go to school there. While simultaneously balkanizing the region and blocking out the poor from any of the benefits in their own backyard. And they're, the poor, the working class, are treated like, you know, parasites in the community to be policed. And they're policed with private police, you name it.
These models are all over the place. There are no models out there - I shouldn't say there are no models - I'm sure there're great models. But there are no real efforts on behalf of officials, actual elected representatives, etc., and the business community, to, in fact, provide housing for working class. And within that space, what is the number one thing? Profit maximization.
When you are a non-profit entity, like a university, and you're able to acquire lands in the name of your university and then sublet them to Boeing so that they can launder their development work through the non-profit of the university, and so forth. This is like a huge avalanche of neoliberalism and a huge avalanche of othering and gentrification on a whole biblical level, quite frankly. Help me understand why there is no cohesive fight back against this? It feels like a very loose group of people. There's not enough.
[00:15:11] David Fields: Oh, there is.
[00:15:13] Steve Grumbine: Tell me about it.
[00:15:14] David Fields: There is, but we're called NIMBYs.
[00:15:18] Steve Grumbine: Well, so tell me more about this. Cause everywhere I'm looking, YIMBY's are winning.
[00:15:22] David Fields: Yeah. And that's why it really aggravates me. Because if I go out there and say like, look, this is not doing what you think it's doing. That the prices will go down and affordability will maximize, and in the end we'll have an inclusive community.
No, it does see a complete opposite. Spatial polarization, gentrification, heavily involved with the university, which, in my view, kind of goes against what they supposedly stand for, that's another channel.
Those who are fighting against it, saying that we want actual social provisioning, we're called the NIMBYs. Which, if you go back to what it really means, no, we're far from it. But it's a way for vested interests to shun any space for critical engagement to say they're NIMBYs, they're against progress. Therefore they're ostracized, therefore they're othered and should not be listened to, and they're against, progress.
Which we know is completely fallacious. They engage in psychological reductionism to say that we don't know anything about economic fundamentals. We don't know anything about social progress. We don't know anything about city and community planning. We don't know anything about major players involved who provide jobs, et cetera, et cetera. Which, like I said, is nonsensical.
So one way that I want to push us, in the fight is to say, no, we are not NIMBY. We are actually trying to capture the dialogue that's been usurped by venture [capital] and invested interest, and bring back to the actual discussion that YIMBY is supposed to mean actual social provisioning. Not letting the market do what it wants, which is institutionally configured to benefit a certain privileged group.
No, we're about social provisioning, maximizing living standards, you name it. And NIMBY[s] are actually today's YIMBYs, the neoliberal players who are against that and only want to build a sphere of exclusivity. And those who can't afford it? Well, so be it. They're ostracized and out.
[00:17:35] Steve Grumbine: You know, I look at this in the same way - and you're going to see a pattern, folks - at least the way my mind is operating here. And David, you can keep me honest if I stray too far.
But I look at the greenwashing that occurs in the Green Growth Group, and I recognize a similar thread here. It's all in the name of, you know, win-wins. Let's help business become very profitable on trying to save the planet through these green products that they have to market. They have to sell. Instead of looking at it from a public service standpoint - a public purpose standpoint, federally funded and delivered - they would rather use that public private partnership or that neoliberal arrangement of privatization altogether, and push the profit motive to everything they're doing.
And when you think of green growth, you know, folks like Jason Hickel have been very explicit in nailing down the concept of green growth and capitalism being capable of addressing the climate crisis. And once again, it's all about a group of people that are in favor of capitalism in favor of profit seeking, rent seeking, et cetera.
Is this not the same battle and only with different piece parts?
[00:18:51] David Fields: Mm hmm. Yep. It's exactly... hit the nail on the head - it is greenwashing. It's using language and discourse to hide the realities of a parasitic behavior, which is extraction for profit gain regardless of social costs. I mean, to say that heavy capital intensity can somehow be ecologically sustainable, it's kind of like saying, Oh, well, there's such thing as clean coal.
Well, anybody with just a modicum of sense, like, that's ridiculous. It's the same thing that, wow, you know, if you allow a tower, a building, letting the market do what it can without regulation, accountability, or fees, or et cetera, et cetera.
If you just let them build it, you know, it's like "Field of Dreams" with Kevin Costner. They'll come out of the woods and wonder. Look! Voila! You know? Which, again, anybody with just a modicum of a sense of reality like, Sorry, what is this? It's like not Moses parting the Red Sea, come on. Give me a break.
Um, I'll go back. It's exactly what you said. It's greenwashing. It's hiding the realities to not really explain explicitly what capital is, in fact, doing. Capital is doing what it can to extract part of profits, regardless of social costs.
And to show you the reality of how ridiculous this neoliberal YIMBYism is, if it in fact did what it claims to do, New York City, San Francisco, Dubai, London, Paris, would be the most affordable cities on the planet. Now we know that they are far from it. Why? Because they build luxury towers and there's no prices falling. And they say, well, that's because vacancy is at zero. No, if you look at the housing stock of these cities, these spheres of exclusivity, the vacancy rates are quite high.
Well, then that, that's a conundrum. Why is that? Well, because they're not building housing for human need. They're building housing for maximized rent extraction. Maximized land value extraction. And there's no tide that lifts all boats. If it is, it's in their head and they want to keep hiding that.
[00:21:07] Steve Grumbine: You know, I, look back over the years and, I'm 55, born in '69. So I've seen the Eighties, I've seen the Seventies, I didn't know much about it, but I seen it. And, I've been able to watch how neoliberalism has overtaken pretty much everything. I remember it used to be a thing that us kids would love to go to the mall. And we would show up to the mall and everybody was there. The elevators and escalators were jam packed with people. All the stores were jam packed with people. Now, you go to malls and they're run down. They're falling apart. Anchor stores have vanished because they're doing everything online. but just in America alone, there are over 300 abandoned or failing malls in the United States spread across 45 states. Think about that. And if you think about the fact that each of these things are a development project for people, if you wanted. Instead of it turning into luxury apartments being ripped down and turned into luxury, these can be turned into decent, affordable or free or public housing.
And instead we treat it like, Oh no, no, no, because it's a private property issue. If someone owns it, it isn't ours to plan around, right? We can't plan around that because it belongs to someone. So it's, since it's their private property, they get to choose what they do with this stuff. And in my opinion, what is an economy for if it's not for the people?
Well, you know, go back to the Magna Carta, go back to all the founding documents of this country. We've never, ever, ever been focused on ensuring regular people have the tools and the means and the economy to survive. It has always been for the wealthy, white landowners and that's carrying forward in this YIMBYism, is it not?
[00:22:58] David Fields: Yeah. I agree. I mean private property, many businesses, vested interests would say, we can't mess with private property. Private property is the modus operandi of a market economy. And everyone with a critical mind would say, well, what constitutes private property. What constitutes a market economy, why do we have this Why do have that we can't contest the first commandment of, it's mine and therefore not yours.
Well, it's configured in a certain way to ensure that a system is not for the many, but is for a privileged few. And if you contest that, you're bastardized. So yeah, I agree.
It's exactly what you said. Private property is sacred. Which, I think it was Proudhon who said it's actually theft. Legally enforced extortion. But let's not talk about that. Yeah, it is. And I mean, anybody with a simple caring for those who want to maximize human potential and, meet human needs, yeah, why can't we turn these buildings into actual affordable housing for anybody and everybody? Oh, no, because that goes against the work ethic. That goes against market fundamentals. And I hate it. I hate it when they say it's market fundamentals.
Well, okay. Who created the market? Where did the market come from? Who established these fundamentals? Is the market in 2024 the same as the market in 1855 and 1963? No. What changed? What gave way to different forces? Why did things change? Et cetera, et cetera.
But no, you'd still want to talk about that because if you start going and opening those boxes or start reading those pages, one would realize that all these fantasies that these vested interests parade and celebrate . . . (It's okay if I use the Anglo Saxon word?)
[00:24:46] Steve Grumbine: Absolutely.
[00:24:47] David Fields: . . . utter bullshit.
[00:24:48] Steve Grumbine: So I want to ask you a question, and this has really been somewhat heavily on my mind as an MMT proponent, albeit, way over here on the Left, so I'm out of step with most MMTers that are falling in line with the uh, establishment. Kamala and, you know, Biden, et cetera. I'm left of that, and for me, I say, you know what?
The federal government, with its currency issuing power, could easily buy up all the abandoned malls. Could buy up all the space and then put it out to bid using their FAR, their federal acquisition, or any number of federal rules to find the low cost provider. Put the best they could and become the de facto price setter for the housing industry, right now, by providing public housing across the country.
It wouldn't raise anyone's tax dollars, necessarily. Because it's not like the taxes are actually financing this. Uh, they're just a hedge against inflation and creating demand. But when you think about why they don't do it, it's not a matter of, they can't do it. I want to be crystal clear for anybody that's listening. This is a matter of that's not what the ownership class of this nation wants.
It is a direct 100 percent result of capitalism. The ideological framework baked into capitalism. And the working ideological framework for both the Democrats and Republicans who represent the same, albeit maybe different ownership, but the same capitalist class. They do not represent we the people, in any way, by the way, in any way, shape or form.
So within that space, David, I ask you this. What do you suppose is the reason these YIMBY's don't ask the federal government, or ask any of the powers that be with public purpose abilities such as the federal government - I'm going to keep coming back to that because they are the currency issuer.
Why do you suppose they don't look there and they say, Hey, why don't you buy up this property and zone it out so that we can have whatever housing? It's because really, at the end of the day, it would expose them. Would it not?
[00:27:06] David Fields: Yeah, it would completely expose them. It would show that what neoliberals and market economists like to say, a market failure. Which is actually built into the system. It's supposed to fail by definition. It would expose that the market's not doing its job. So yeah, it's absolutely protection. We could easily turn anything into a public good since we don't have debt denominated in another currency because we have fiscal federalism.
We could easily provide basic needs. But then we don't allow the freedom to starve for a good majority of the population and therefore capitalism, specifically American version, can't perpetuate it, or can't sustain it or can't reproduce it. Um, yeah we could easily, but that would go against the logic of capital, it would show that it can't provide basic needs. It can't satisfy everyone's wants and sustain high standards of living for all. And their ideological fabrication would fall down immediately. So they do everything in their power to not expose that and allow their parasitic behavior to continue operating without any barriers.
And it's interesting how you mentioned federal government and subsidies and price setting. Oh, there is price setting. There is pricing. The market's not doing what the way they think they're doing. If you look at rents, if you look at land value, it's heavily inflated. It's a, uh, duopoly. It's a oligopoly. Whatever you want to call it. There are a handful of concentrated interest[s] who are in fact setting the price at a certain level to maximize gain. And if there are social costs like homelessness, housing insecurity, ecologically unfriendly living establishments, spatial polarization, people starving, who cares?
Who cares? We'll try to fix it with some apologetic reformism like charity and other sorts of marginal social services. And this plagues, so called progressives, like AOC [Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez] who abandoned what she supposedly was, and others. It's not just a right-wing contingent or what we perceive to be a right-wing contingent. It's bipartisan.
It would expose lots of contradictions. But we need, like Marx said, a reserve army of labor that are heavily exploited in order for the system to sustain itself. Otherwise, it would fall apart. Which was exposed in the calculation debate by Oscar Lang, who said that, yeah, if we have a price setting for the people, it exposes the market as complete nonsense.
And the calculation debate, I forget the years, but where Oskar Lange pretty much said, no, [Friedrich] Hayek, you're full of crap and actually solved his issue and said, no, you're, you're completely wrong. Or any critical economist throughout history knows that the market conditions are historically specific institutionally configurated, socially determined, structurally procured, et cetera, et cetera. That, if the market sees more contradictions, well, they resort to governing powers who determine the market in the first place to establish more measures to overcome that, to ensure that the system does not fall apart. 'Cause if it did, well, capitalism would be on the wane and well, we don't see that happening, do we?
[00:30:41] Steve Grumbine: No, in fact, I mean, our friend, Clara Matei, wrote a great book about how economists invented austerity in defense of the capital order. And once people start fighting back and I'm well on record saying, I don't believe a lot of this comes through the electoral process.
But you think about this, it's like it cannot survive. Because it depends highly on skimming and profit. rent seeking, et cetera. And one of the things that I guess I'm really struggling with here, David, is that we look at our population and they're inundated with a ton of crises all at once with very limited understanding of the world in which they live.
And the cultural hegemony that allows them a certain worldview that is really, largely, unchallenged. And if it were challenged, that would be algorithmed into the underbelly or the armpit of information. There would be no means of people hearing an alternative perspective because they'd have to go find that specific thing.
When in reality, the cultural narratives that our government that works hand-in-glove with industry wants us to hear, is that free market driven ideology, that Ayn Rand, makers and takers kind of ideology. You hear the economic reports put out. It's always put out with the idea of an investor, and what an investor might want to see or how they'd want to view it.
There is no real meaningful working class narrative. So all we have is the cultural hegemon telling us this is how it is. And people just assume there is no alternative, TINA, right? That Margaret Thatcherism, there is no alternative. And yet at the same time, we know, inherently, that there are tons and tons and tons of properties, not just malls. Although that was an obvious one right there in your face. But there's tons of property out there that just sitting there vacant that they would rather let it stay vacant than rent it at a reduced rate.
[00:32:53] David Fields: Or even luxury properties. Or what we deem to be a luxury properties or socially equitable. They'd rather sit on it. Let it be vacant because they're not fulfilling a housing need. They don't care. What they want is the rent and land value. So you look at every city. Every city. When you look at the housing stock, there's always significant vacancy rates.
Why? Because they'd rather rent at a certain level, and if they can't match that, they'll be offset by land value extraction. Okay? Every city that has seen massive amounts of housing growth has concomitantly seen increased housing insecurity. Now, I'm not going to say every city, but I would say most. And I know that's empirically validated.
What's empirically untenable is abundant housing, regardless of what price it is, regardless of what it looks like. Mostly luxury in terms of the investor purview, has not reached a security of housing for all. Because that's antithetical to the original drive, which is that surplus extraction.
[00:34:01] Steve Grumbine: There's a false scarcity.
[00:34:02] David Fields: yeah,
[00:34:03] Steve Grumbine: A false scarcity. A fake scarcity.
[00:34:05] David Fields: Yes, there is a false scare. It's manufactured.
It's not because, oh, there's a housing shortage and if we just keep building and building and building the way the market works, prices will fall and we'll have the equilibrium where the shortage surpasses. No, it's not a shortage. Where there is a shortage is housing that is affordably available to those in need.
That's manufactured, because if we did meet housing needs for all that would go against the bottom line of the investor class, which is that surplus extraction.
Intermission
[00:35:04] Steve Grumbine: So you know, I talked to some of my Georgist friends who are very, very wedded to the concept of a land value tax [LVT]. In fact, we've spoken to, uh, several Georgists who are very, very committed to the land value tax scheme. Obviously, it's not really good at a national level, but at a local level, in terms of directing productive land use, and taxing land that's just being squatted on basically, to prevent this sort of speculator, investor grade garbage that makes up so much of the financial economy. Uh, and it's really harmful and creates vast swaths of inequality. Can you tell me your perspective of land value tax?
[00:35:53] David Fields: Well, sure. Now, I'm not a Georgist. I mean, I read Henry George's work. The way I look at it, yeah, I would say a land value tax would have to be significant to try to steer vested interests away from parasitic behavior. But my critical mind steps in and says, well, how far can that go if the institutional arrangements, the regulations, go unchanged?
I mean, does that just end up being less surplus so they can take away from their property? I don't know. So I would say, yeah, land value tax, if it's implemented appropriately to curb the, uh, instinctual speculative behavior of the leisure class. If it does that, great. But I don't know.
It would have to be significant to, in fact, curb it. [What] would ultimately need to happen altogether is changing the structural conditions to not allow the parasitic behavior to happen in the first place. Which means, okay, having greater public influence in terms of the housing stock so it's actually geared to needs. Providing full employment at living wages, et cetera, et cetera.
And this is off topic, but it goes back to what we talked about before. It's not shortage of housing. It's a shortage of what's socially equitable and affordably available. What's actually causing the prices to be out of reach and leaving many folks unsheltered and suffering from an absence of meeting basic human needs is because of nominal wage suppression and housing price inflation going through the roof because of that surplus modus operandi which we've been talking about.
Now going back to my take on the land value tax, I'll reiterate. Yeah, it's great. It has to be implemented accordingly. That's locally specific. That's attuned to geographical dynamics, demographics, et cetera, et cetera. But knowing that it's just a step in the long run process of having more socially beneficial characteristics at play that structurally arranges a society that's equitable in the first place. And with not an emphasis on the almighty profit motive, which is certainly not sacred, certainly not natural, and certainly not eternal.
[00:38:22] Steve Grumbine: You know, I, I, I'm not a huge fan in my older years here of horror movies, but there was a time when I really enjoyed horror movies. And one of the key aspects of horror movies was that scary thing where you see the kid or the teenager or whoever the star of the movie was running from the perceived evil.
And all of a sudden they bump into a random person. It looks regular and normal. And they're like, Oh my God. I'm so glad I found you. I'm so glad I found you. Can you please help me? He says, sure. Come on back to the house. I'll get you some coffee or whatever. And all of a sudden they drink the coffee and it's got poison, got some, you know, sleeping thing in it. And all of a sudden they're on the spit getting ready to get eaten or whatever, right?
Like the idea that government, and I believe government can be for we the people, could be the perfect antidote for all that ails us. But as of today, government and our institutions are captured. So it's kind of like inviting Nosferatu into the home. And then all of a sudden wondering why you've got two bite marks in your neck. And this is so unfortunate because I am a big government kind of guy. I'm, I'm not interested in eliminating government. I'm even on the somewhat of a central planning locally administered side of the coin as well.
I know everybody doesn't share in that. But that's kind of my angle when I think about best use of public policy to ensure that the people, themselves, are taken care of. And at the same time, provide enough nuance for local differences. Right? But when I think about this though, we keep going back to the same people. They keep voting for wars, keep voting for genocide, keep voting for making life harder on the working class. Privatizing the public commons, et cetera. And then we're shocked, we're absolutely just gobsmacked that they did one more thing to privatize it again. Oh my God. I thought they were my friend. Is it people are ignorant? These elected officials?
[00:40:37] David Fields: There's more of a structural underbelly.
[00:40:39] Steve Grumbine: That's what I'm looking for. Help me out with that.
[00:40:42] David Fields: Yeah, there's more of a structural underbelly. And I'll go back to a famous quote by Adam Smith, the so-called Libertarian hero of, of YIMBYs and YIMBROs, whatever they want call themselves. You know, it's like they read the first chapter of The Wealth of Nations and then forget everything else. Or don't read everything else. Or, in fact, don't even read the first chapter critically. I don't know what they do. They think Edward Glaeser is their god and that's the only thing that matters.
And I quote: "Government, so far as instituted for the security of property, is, in actuality, instituted for the rich against the poor, of those who have property, against those who have none at all."
End quote. And that's Adam Smith.
[00:41:23] Steve Grumbine: Okay.
[00:41:23] David Fields: What he meant by that is that government - this is my interpretation and Adam Smith, in my view, was a socialist. So I think he would agree with my sentiment - government is always a government for whom? Government for what purpose? It's not just there to somehow not allow business do what it's supposed to do. Or government is too big - that it's providing too much stuff for the people.
Because without government, there wouldn't be a market, or what we call a market, there in the first place. Governments define markets. Governments define what's commodified. Governments define what sort of price will be allowed to be negotiated and implemented. Governments define the conditions of how things will be built or how industry will proceed.
So government's always there everywhere, omnipresent. The ultimate question that one has to ask is, Is this a government for me who is, a slave to the wage and has to sell my labor power for sustenance? Or is this a government for the leisure class who don't have that constraint and [are] allowed to proceed at will and with their parasitic behavior?
That's what you have to ask. But we don't wanna ask those questions 'cause that gets at the heart of the deep contradictions of the economic system that we're embedded in. And if you are benefiting or if you're profiting from that system, you don't want those contradictions exposed.
So you do what you can, going back to the cultural hegemon argument that you talked about before to say, well, yeah, it boils down to big business versus big government or, left or Left, or no, I wouldn't say Left cause, Democrats aren't Left, uh, liberal or conservative. That's what it is. It's all same seesaw.
But as Marx, way back when said - now don't get me wrong - he was, he was in favor of elections and in democratic processes. But he was very poignant when he made this statement that the masses come around every now and then to vote who's going to exploit them next. And given the conditions that we're embedded right now, in my view, at least, he's spot on.
[00:43:50] Steve Grumbine: You know, I've said countless times and people mistake what I'm saying. And it's infuriating because there's only so many ways to say the same thing. I tell people vote as much as you want, vote six times on Sunday. I'm not here to tell you not to vote. I'm here to tell you, you're not going to get any change through voting.
[00:44:09] David Fields: Well, if they did, there'd be some progress. You know, there's some marginal reform. It goes back to what Eduard Bernstein in the social democracy movement, which was a neutralization of the more radical elements of the 19th century. Yeah, there could be progress there in terms of maximizing the living standards for the majority of the people, the working class. And you can allow more folks to get embedded in the process and change it.
But as we've seen throughout history, they get captured. And that revolutionary process by reformative means may, in some circumstances, reach their goal. But in a lot more cases, it does not. Going back to my argument saying that they get captured. They get overwhelmed. You could say, that's what happened to AOC. She got captured.
Or Bernie. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Bernie got captured. That's a very legitimate argument. 'Cause if voting in fact, did lead to the revolutions that we want to see, you and me in particular, they'd make it illegal. For everybody. Or, at least, the working class.
[00:45:17] Steve Grumbine: Well, you know, I think about this a little differently, even, even taking what you've just said and what I said and taking it another step further. Every time I've seen real incremental, even incremental, incrementalism, the good incrementalism, what you know, that minor reforms, et cetera, they don't come simply by going to the ballot box.
None of them. They all come from an amazingly
[00:45:43] David Fields: No way.
[00:45:43] Steve Grumbine: tireless group of people in between elections, working to grow knowledge. Working to build and organize power outside of the electoral process to, in fact, create narratives that overcome that hegemon, the hegemonic messaging. And that is literally the only - so when I say you're not getting there through voting - uh, there's a lot of people that on November 4th, or whenever the next election might be for them, uh, they throw an 'I Voted' sticker right on their forehead, take a selfie for social media, and they go back to, you know, robotic lifestyle.
They do their own thing. And they, that's the last time they'll think about this stuff until the next election. Or they will be part of the noise-generating machine of the establishment that never focuses on the issues that really matter to people. It's suddenly about Donnie Tiny Hands Combover.
Instead of focusing on the real life issues of working Americans. A perfect example of this is regular inflation of consumer products. But then you look at energy costs and you look at housing and you say, well, how can this be? How did this happen? You know, if you're sitting there drowning, little people. And you're not able to get your healthcare needs met, little people. How in the world do you expect to be able to rent or buy a house, little people? And then all the little laws and stuff that preclude people - and bad credit ratings - I mean, my God. Credit ratings are used to keep people out of homes.
So we we've got every possible thing stacked against the working class and the working poor to actually have shelter over their heads. While this group of people out there is actively begging for luxury condos and stuff to be built in areas where instead of being top down, it should, you know, it should be bottom up.
It really should be bottom up. Help me understand. I mean, like, obviously, the unspoken war that's going on in this country. Is a class-based war.
There are groups of people out there who absolutely refuse to accept class anymore. They think we've moved on. We no longer have a shop floor. So the idea of unions, the idea of this, that, and the other is an antiquated concept. And understanding -
let me just say this for those who probably think I don't hear them. I understand full well that the federal government could regulate or, by law, eliminate the things that we're begging for the federal government to do. But to your point, they're captured.
So if they're captured, a vote isn't going to solve that. The only way to solve that is to literally organize and bring to light that which is in the dark.
[00:48:43] David Fields: hmm.
[00:48:44] Steve Grumbine: Help me understand why you think people are so naive that they think they can just cast the vote and these things will miraculously happen without their involvement.
[00:48:53] David Fields: It's multifaceted. It's complex. There are a lot of details and variables. But from my view, if I were to make a conclusion or an understanding, people think that all the civil rights movement happened and that's it. It didn't just happen. It's still ongoing. And in many ways, many of the gains of the civil rights movement have been curtailed and rolled back, to a great degree, especially for women's rights. Yeah, they think that incremental process you were talking about before. Actual on the ground realities to expose , clearly, the needs that we're desperately yelling for, was only a moment in time. And it happened, it ended, and everything is fine. We're in that post-racial society that was popular a few years ago.
Yada, yada, yada. No! That's nonsensical. That's idiotic. Many of the contradictions, injustices that we were experiencing back then have not been resolved. I mean, people forget that when Martin Luther King led the rally on the mall in D. C., it wasn't just for recognizing that there's hate throughout our system with lots of discrimination, it was for jobs and justice!
[00:50:11] Steve Grumbine: Um,
[00:50:12] David Fields: Jobs and Justice signs that said, we want a full employment for all. An economy that benefits all. In fact, Martin Luther King, when he was assassinated, [in Memphis, Tennessee] he was joining, I think it was garbage collector, sanitation workers who were on strike for better living conditions.
But we don't talk about this 'cause that shows that well, wait a minute, things they were talking about then haven't been really resolved. Why aren't we talking about that? Well, that's the point. Obfuscation, false consciousness, misdirection. Or, Gramsci said, mis-recognition, distraction, which has only gotten worse with all these gadgets, gizmos, distractions, TVs, you name it,
which prevent us from looking at those fissures. And especially since we don't have any time for leisure, given our work schedules, if we have work. We don't have the time, energy, nor stamina to roll back and say, hmm, yeah, these things haven't been resolved. So what are we left with?
Ah, well, if we, uh, if we vote, things will get better and we won't have, uh, the Trumpism that we have. Well, what do you think gave way to Trumpism in the first place? The liberal apologetic reformism that Kamala represents prior to Trump. And it's a see saw, back and forth, don't worry, things will be fine if we just vote.
Well, sure, marginally. In some cases, incrementally. Yeah. But structurally? No way.
[00:51:50] Steve Grumbine: Not a chance. I think that this is an interesting place to kind of bring our airplane in for final descent. I'm interested very much in helping folks realize that, you know, in the end, there is no businesses set up that are focused with the primary objection. I shouldn't say there are no businesses. Let's just say there are such a severe gap in the number of paid, brilliant, educated, you know, Ivy Leaguers who are in the business of maximizing profit for real estate moguls and their legal teams that tie up anybody that challenges them in court for years and years and years.
The entire structure of America is based on preventing the voice of the working class to be heard. And those people are paid. So when they wake up in the morning, their job, they've entered into careers and finance and other things that screw the working class. And so they, by extension, are kind of that managerial bourgeoisie class - petty bourgeois anyway - that, that literally lives to devour the poor.
And people need to kind of wake up to the fact that the people that we're fighting against are paid. Literally. So they don't have to worry when they're done with their eight to five, they can go bounce their kid on their knee. They can go to tee-ball practice or Girl Scouts or, or Cub Scouts, or whatever hell else they want to do in their community. They can be the mayor. They can run for whatever, because they have time. Because all throughout the day, their entire six-figure job was spent working to take away the ability of the working class to have affordable housing.
And this is one - so many other issues - it's not just housing. Obviously this podcast here is about that YIMBY NIMBY side. But if you look on a broader scale, the Pete Peterson Foundation, which is 'fix the debt' and all that good stuff - the biggest lying liars on the planet. And it's a bipartisan think tank with billions of dollars. Billions with a B of dollars to fight against any kind of public spending. Any kind of public works. And, literally, with the fear-mongering of the national debt, using the debt ceiling as another leverage point to win. And the working-class Americans can't even do basic volunteer work because they're so exhausted.
And because you're not getting paid, you're not getting the best of the best of the best, sir. You're getting the best of the available: the retired. The folks that are not capable of doing a nine-to-five uh, volunteering their time, or worse. It's those folks that are well to do that are looking for a hobby that are not really that bought into the fight.
And then they come in and then they milque-toast the entire effort away from effectiveness because they're comfortable. You know?
So help me out. Is there a light at the end of the tunnel for this? What, what is happening that is countering the YIMBY or have YIMBY's just outright won?
[00:55:16] David Fields: No. YIMBYs are, they definitely, uh, won many, many battles, but they have not won the war. Because people were starting to react that . . . just like how many folks realize that trickle-down economics that was paraded through Reagan, et cetera, and was the embodiment of neoliberalism, which is not said outright anymore, but still continues to live on passively through mainstream doctrine.
Folks are realizing that this is complete and utter nonsense. And they are realizing it. And they are realizing how far the rabbit hole goes into parading this nonsense so things don't change for the better. They realize, like, for instance, they're, like, Patrick Condon, who wrote this wonderful book called Broken City, is exposing how ridiculous Edward Glaeser is in his market logics of housing. And interestingly enough, you know, who, um, what institutes Edward Glaeser is a part of? The Manhattan Institute, which is a right-wing think tank in New York. And he's also part of the Policy Exchange group in England, which is one of the most Tory -dominated, right-wing think tanks in the world.
So it's interesting. Uh, and this is how multifaceted the culture industry that you talked about - it works to sustain the injustices - is that what we think is democratic, open, progressive and pluralistic, is in fact, quite not. It's in fact just reproduction of the right-wing dogma, which is YIMBY, and other facets that go along with that to keep perpetuating it.
But that doesn't preclude the extent to which people are exposing the fallaciousness of this. Folks like Patrick Condon or Michael Storpor with his book, Keys to the City. Or even on the ground. When people are, advocating for affordable housing, they are promoting the idea and they're recognizing, they're showing, they're exposing how ridiculous this YIMBY idea is.
It's not for 'yes' to Housing For All in our neighborhood. It's yes to build whatever is possible to maximize revenue for the investor class. That's what it is. But they call it YIMBY. Or the vested interest involved call it YIMBY to conceal that. So ends up becoming a political schema to hide their parasitic behavior and to castigate those who are against it as those who are against progress. You know, the good and evil dichotomy that seems to rear its ugly head.
[00:57:59] Steve Grumbine: Okay.
[00:57:59] David Fields: But going back to your point, no, I don't think that we're at this nihilistic stage where we're just dropped in this hellfire of Dante's Inferno with no way out. No, I think there are on the ground movements that are exposing the ridiculousness of mainstream headlines and mainstream literature like supply and demand, and all that jazz. And knowing that, yeah, it's, it's the Holy grail, which does not exist. And if it does exist, it's filled with poison. , Right?
So this culture industry that's been built up, I think is falling down. Now, falling down like a house of cards? No. Because of what you talked about, there are folks who are, who get paid to make it entrenched. But that does not preclude the exposure of the contradictions of this structure. What we need to do is just keep promoting those movements that are exposing it and showing the ridiculousness of how discourse and language is expropriated and reoriented so things don't get changed
[00:59:10] Steve Grumbine: David, that was amazing. I appreciate your time on this, sir. Tell us us, where can we find more of your work?
[00:59:19] Steve Grumbine: Anywhere and everywhere. No. You can just see my work on researchgate.net. And if you just Google David Fields, Utah, there's lots of stuff out there of what I've written. In fact, what will come up, and this is, and I didn't tell this at the beginning, I, in fact, exposed these contradictions writing on housing in my state, but I was thrown under the bus because I exposed that
[00:59:42] David Fields: housing is not being built for the many. It's being built for rent extraction. And supply and demand dynamics are not working the way they think they do.
But I was called an outsider. I don't know the logics of markets, et cetera, et cetera. You can see it come up if you Google me, uh, David Fields, Utah housing, that should come up. But the point is I expose the truth and those who expose the truth will get ridiculed.
But c'est la vie. That's how progress gets made.
[01:00:12] Steve Grumbine: That's right. You got to have thick skin when you're in the exposing it business.
So, all right. Well, David, you also do a lot of work with the monetary blog.
[01:00:22] David Fields: I do.
[01:00:23] Steve Grumbine: Tell us more about that.
[01:00:25] David Fields: Oh, sure, sure. So there is this blog called the Monetary Blog. M O N E, well, you know how to spell monetary. It's Monetary Blog. A lot of articles, a lot of narratives, a lot of good resources. Where we try to expose, like I said, going against the culture industry, where we expose the fallaciousness of mainstream economic doctrine.
We show what it really means when we say debt. What it really means when we say inflation. What we really mean when we say, how the economy is actually structured. So there's a plethora of interesting articles on the Monetary Blog. Which is sponsored by the Monetary Policy Institute, which was founded by Louis-Philippe Rochon. And where I and others have been a part in, um, showing deep fissures of mainstream economics. It's a wonderful resource for anyone who has interest in taking a critical view on mainstream economics and knowing, understanding, that it does not tell the reality that humans face.
I've been deeply wedded in that, along with many others, and I highly encourage many folks to check it out. Monetary blog, Monetary Policy Institute. Check it out. And in fact, while you're there, check out, uh, a section called RIP. We call it the RIP series where Louis-Philippe Rochon and myself, we've done R.I.P. inflation expectations.
Yeah, you name it. R. I. P. Phillips Curve. Uh, R. I. P. Purchasing Power Parity. Um, R. I. P. . . . There are tons of them. Which we, quite bluntly, uh, lay to rest many economic concepts that have been taken for granted. And where we expose that, um, this is just justifying injustices which we don't want to reproduce.
[01:02:22] Steve Grumbine: David, thank you so much for being my guest today. I really appreciate it.
[01:02:22] David Fields: You bet. Thanks for having me.
[01:02:24] Steve Grumbine: You know what? This is one of those weird, awkward moments where I have so much more to say and yet we're out of time. So, David, I want to just really make sure that you know how much I appreciate you being part of this. Obviously, we take some pretty tough positions and sometimes folks are afraid of that. But we're tired of waiting around for people to get it right.
We want to try to force this conversation - THESE conversations - publicly. And you know, as a 501(3)(c) nonprofit, you know, we live and die on donations. Your donations. And they are tax-deductible. So please consider donating to us. So you can come to patreon dot com forward slash real progressives. Or you can go to our substack, uh, realprogressives.substack.com.
Please consider donating to us. Without your help there is no us. So, if you find value in what you heard today, or if you find value in all of our other podcasts . . . Please do listen to the catalog! We're coming up on [Episode #] 300 here.
So every week for years, we have made sure you have had a new podcast. They're, purposely evergreen. There's a few of them that maybe are time-sensitive, and with that, thank you so much, David.
[01:03:36] David Fields: You bet. Thanks for having me.
[01:03:37] Steve Grumbine: Thank you all for listening. We at Macro N Cheese are outta here.
Books:
Baldwin, Davarian. In The Shadow of the Ivory Tower
Florida, Richard. The Rise of the Creative Class
Glaeser, Edward. Triumph of the City
Mattei, Clara. The Capital Order: How Economists Invented Austerity and Paved the Way to Fascism
Storper, Michael. Keys to the City: How Economics, Institutions, Social Interaction, and Politics Shape Development
A must listen for all who believe YIMBY is a good thing.
#YIMBY is another #UBI. Sounds good on the surface, but in reality is a gift to the #rentierclass.