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this post was submitted on 24 Aug 2023
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"You shouldn't be allowed to own something and use it for any purpose that you want, just because you bought and own it"
The fuck.
Can't drive a car without a license, rules around usage of things you own are pretty standard.
I can still buy a car and have it just sit there. The driving part is due to affliction of other people's well being. Me raising the money to buy a house and deciding I want it as a summer stay location, so I leave it sitting there while I'm somewhere else would have no harm on another's life.
So lets turn it into the extreme.
Say you are so rich, you buy every house on the planet. Which you will use as your summer/autumn/winter/spring stay locations.
Would that still not harm on another's life?
There are also rules for where, when, and how long you can have your car sit somewhere, including your own yard in some places.
I believe that you should be able to keep a property empty if you choose, it should just be taxed in a way that's proportionate to the damage it causes to the community.
Empty properties inflate housing costs -> Increased housing costs reduce the amount of people willing to live in the area -> Which reduces the amount of people able to work for local businesses.
Should someone be allowed to buy all the freshwater lakes around a major city and then not sell the water for people to drink?
Nestle vibes
They could now if they wanted. Most lakes are government or private property. You think they'd want to lose profit margin?
Not to mention the massive difference again, the wellbeing of other people. Houses are crafted by skilled workers, it's not a right to their labor, nor a right to the owner's property who purchased it after it was built. You do however have a naturalized right to survival.
The point is, property taxes are fine but saying "um you should be forced by the government to use something you own in a specific manner" is nonsensical and authoritarian overreach at minimum.