2019年4月12日 星期五

Germany to Decide if It Can Nationalize Private Property

www.armstrongeconomics.com

There has been a real crisis evolving in Berlin. When the Wall came crashing down, East Germany regarded that it owned all the property and thus sold vast tracts of apartments to major investors. Now 20 years later, the socialists are claiming this is not fair and the government should either buy the property back from these investors or confiscate it. There are many people on the left and in the Green Party who see nothing wrong with confiscating private property. Why should they pay for something they cannot afford to buy? Under their reasoning, there is some human right that should allow them to go into a car dealership and drive away with what they want because it is unfair that they cannot afford to buy it.

Berlin has been toying with the idea of holding a referendum on banning big landlords and expropriating their homes into social housing. This is part of a response to growing complaints in the German capital about the cost of living. The expropriated homes will be some 200,000 units that would then become government property, once again, and could be rented out for below market rates.

The danger of allowing private property to be seized without compensation is that it will be devastating for Germany and Europe as a whole. Real property is critical to confidence. If the state can even allow a referendum where the majority of people will be handed the property of the minority, this is really a return to the days of the Nazis. They could not borrow funds on the open market so they targeted the Jews and expropriated all their property. Of course, in those days they killed them. Today, they won’t kill the investors. They will just take all their wealth. It seems that allowing referendums to retroactively change the law is very dangerous. If anyone wants to know why the euro could collapse to new historical lows, put this one into your thinking cap and ask if you want to invest in something that can be arbitrarily confiscated.

5 則留言:

simon740@ymail.com 提到...

共產主義?

Lisa 提到...

D人唔去努力向上游, 自己賺錢買屋, 而只想搶人地資產, 是失敗者 !

Sam 提到...

好係大家可以無後顧之憂地為社會創造和做未必賺大錢的事,壞是養懶人。
可能他們吸收了華人世界經驗,知道如果由地產商主導社會發展的禍害(有房大富大貴,無房萬劫不復),所以嘗試一條新路。

JJ先生 提到...

confiscate 和 expropriate 很不同, 前者失去了擁有權, 後者仍有, 只是暫時由政府使用, 如戰時或經濟危急中, 老美二戰時也有, 只是戰後會賠償原擁有者.

在老美的資本主義世界眼中, 熊貓國都只是介膚之患, 西歐回歸到極左的老共世界, 才是他們的心腹大患. 首先快速跟熊貓國達成像樣一點的紙樣文章, 轉個頭來, 再要轉戰更大的對手, 其中包括咖仔.

JJ先生 提到...

永遠不要富可敵國, 有錢到跟社會上大部份的人發生衝突, 這個是死穴.

全球一體化, 造就了超富, 只是這些超富大多不能跟社會上其他人共同生存, 這個是世界上很多地方的大問題.

美國使用遺產稅, 加國使用漸進高稅率, 來抑制超富, 避免社會發生衝突. 但仍然有人能夠超富, 不過並沒有太跟社會發生太大衝突.

像 PAUL ELLEN 和 BILL GATES咁, 其財富跟社會進步和利益掛勾.