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Vizey's avatar

Excellent read!

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forumposter123@protonmail.com's avatar

Wonderful article.

I think a key to Singapore's success is its strong maintenance of public order. So much of "land value" is really "do well behaved people live here." In Singapore you know that no matter who your neighbors are things will be alright. In America we have a dangerous underclass and an awful lot of real estate speculation centers around who ends up with that hot potato. In America public housing has quickly collapsed into underclass housing, we couldn't run a Singapore type system.

I lived in Baltimore for a long time and Baltimore has insanely high property taxes, over twice what the surrounding county has. The high taxes mostly get squandered by the city government (no model of Singaporean competence). Meanwhile, there were huge issues with crime and underclass behavior. The result is that people left the city to settle in the county.

I'd say what Singapore has accomplished is a package deal. It didn't run a certain kind of property use scheme. It had a whole model of governance that made it work.

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