alt Hacker NewsBecause:
> Rent-seeking is the act of growing one's existing wealth by manipulating public policy or economic conditions without creating new wealth. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rent-seeking)
Given that renting out property you own doesn't meet this definition it can categorically not be called rent seeking. I'm always shocked that people apply this definition exclusively to property rentals, and not VHS rentals, without seeing the hypocrisy.
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I fail to understand how your quote doesn't describe land lords? It is: 1. An act of growing one's own wealth (no other purpose to land lording) 2. It is accomplished by taking advantage of economic conditions (perhaps not "manipulating") 3. Does not create any new wealth.
And a little further down is this: > Rent-seeking implies the extraction of uncompensated value from others without making any contribution to productivity.
Which to me certainly sounds like someone who's only contribution is ownership.
Aren’t you exploiting the economic condition that housing supply is extremely low, and a lot of them vote to keep supply low and prevent new builds? I’m not trying to be facetious but I find it hard to believe that landlords don’t exploit economic conditions.
There’s no hypocrisy, of course. VHS tapes are not factors of production, which is the universe of discourse here.
Wild. It seems to be a very common misunderstanding too.
Googling it after reading Wikipedia shows that about half the sites out there talking about it are also using it wrongly.
Thanks for explaining!