The nerve of those Berkeley socialist hippies! Restricting automobile traffic in order to increase the value of private property:
Berkeley’s attitude towards automobiles has always been pretty plain if you’ve ever tried to drive there — bring ’em if you want, but we ain’t making it easy. The city has closed off many of its side streets with barriers and huge potted plants, pushing up property values on those lucky streets at the stroke of a pen, while pushing traffic onto just a few clogged, noisy streets.
Oh, but it gets worse:
But Berkeley isn’t against making a buck off parked cars, and over the past year or so it has been looking for ways to charge more in busy areas.
Why? Because Berkeley hopes to change the behavior of drivers, who park longer in downtown spaces after 6 p.m., when they don’t have to pay. Calling those two extra hours “a high-demand time for many businesses,” Berkeley says it will be helping them by forcing shoppers to shop quickly, hustle back to their cars and make room for more shoppers to park and spend.
Something I will never understand is why business types think the law of supply-and-demand doesn’t apply to parking.
I love (read: hate) hearing people complain about how traffic calming and bike lanes will increase property values. It makes the street and neighborhood nicer, of course it will increase property values! That’s not why we do it, but property is going to be expensive in places that are not hostile to human life.
You’ll understand this if you understand one basic principle: Business types hate competition and they hate free markets.
Business types are trying to become noblemen — they’re trying to loot and steal. They love monopolies and cartels and substandard goods. They love getting concessions from government, paid for by taxes on the serfs. They love free labor — slavery is preferable!
They’re not, generally speaking, trying to sell good products to customers, or anything like that!
Adam Smith understood this: in the Wealth of Nations he actually says that whenever businessmen meet they end up conspiring against the public.
Veblen understood this: he wrote a whole book about businessmen, called “Theory of the Leisure Class”.
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