The measure was one of a dozen unveiled on Monday by the country’s prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, as the government seeks to quell mounting anger over housing costs that have soared far beyond the reach of many in Spain.
Sánchez sought to underline the global nature of the challenge, citing housing prices that had swelled 48% in the past decade across Europe, far outpacing household incomes.
“The west faces a decisive challenge: to not become a society divided into two classes, the rich landlords and poor tenants,” he told an economic forum in Madrid.
The proposed measures include expanding the supply of social housing, offering incentives to those who renovate and rent out empty properties at affordable prices and cracking down on seasonal rentals. In Spain just 2.5% of housing is set aside for social housing, a figure that lags drastically behind countries such as France and the Netherlands, said Sánchez.
Even wealthy people aren’t going to buy a home they can only sell for half the price they paid.
I think you underestimate what it is to have so much money that you don’t have to care about how it’s spent. A billionaire could spend a million a day for three years and still be left with millions because of the interest they make.
The number of people who have so much money that they don’t have to care about how it’s spent are infinitesimal.
That number is increasing
That’s not how wealth concentration works.
The total number of billionaires keeps increasing, so does the number of people with hundreds of millions, that happens at the same time as the middle class is disappearing with most people becoming poorer.
Fewer people are becoming more wealthy.
There may be more billionaires but as a portion of the population that’s reducing.