Why not, you know, just not have the bad policies?

Amsterdam’s squatter wars are back – and wealthy Dutch homeowners have only themselves to blame

Senay Boztas

Those already on the property ladder are fuelling a shameful disparity. Until they wake up, the krakers will keep coming

Oh, right, so the bourgeois have to change their shameful ways otherwise the proletarian masses will do it themselves.

They are the byproduct of a crisis that has spiralled out of control, in which growing anger is justifiably focused on a startling and unsustainable unfairness….The return of squatting is a symptom of a public mood that is increasingly furious about the lack of solutions…..But barely a month goes by now without reports of riot police being called in to clear another squat…..With prices at their highest ever level and new rent-control laws in place, thousands of private landlords have been exiting the rental market…..Regulations attach strict price controls to rooms in shared houses, making landlords loth to rent…

Oh. So, why not reverse those bad policies of strict rent and price controls? So there are more willing landlords and thus more places for people to rent?

Hmm? You mean the point is to insist the bourgeois change their shameful ways and the proletarian masses rise up? OK, OK. There’s no other reason why anyone would impose policies as idiot as rent and price controls so we suppose that must be it.

Tim Worstall