UBIHousing

How to avoid higher rents/housing and land prices

As the lower class will have more money to spend and housing, the free market will cause higher prices for them immediately.

• Reddit link of paper Dangers of basic income without land value taxation. It is about paying a basic income with land value taxation and the benefits of it (as housing prices of the lesser land will remain low and speculation on land prices diminishes).
• Actualisation of cadastral income In Belgium, we already have a tax on houses/land (kadastraal inkomen), but the rates are still the ones from decades ago and we could set them higher to reflect the actual prices.

Housing and environment

Old houses are often badly insulated and are bad for the environment as such. New houses are required to conform to the latest technology, which admittedly makes them more expensive.

• One in three houses in Belgium is older than 60years (Dutch)

• Study about housing in Belgium:
  • While married couples improved their comfort situation, it got even worse for singles. (20% of singles in good comfort, almost 60% for couples) (and number of singles is increasing (1.6 million in Belgium) [1]
• The energy norms for new houses are quite strict [2]