Here in Seattle, it seems like everyone is complaining about the development of condominiums. Did you hear? I said CONDOMINIUMS! How terrible.
KUOW, the local NPR station, has some anti-condo programs like this one. I don’t get it. I’m not a heartless person, but I don’t see how someone could feel that because they can afford to live in a certain place at a certain time, that they should be entitled to always be able to live in that exact same place for the exact same price. Certainly this is not so. Society does develop. We should be happy that housing prices are going up in Seattle. That is a sign that people are valuing this city, and are competing to be here. I would not want to live in a place where housing prices were dramatically falling. Such areas typically become slums.
This KUOW show features an individual who talks about being “fearful of dramatic change….with huge commercial office towers.”, and that Seattle must be “saved” from such. This KUOW show about having more urban density in Seattle features many local callers bemoaning new condo’s and other development. They are sad that old houses are being torn down and being replaced with new ones. Well, the last time I checked, Seattle is not an architectural museum. It is a city. Development is good. It means that the local economy is strong. If someone wants to preserve an old house, they should buy it and preserve it themselves. If anyone has seen Mega Movers on the History Channel, it shows how worthwhile old buildings can be moved to locations where they can be admired for history’s sake. I find that many individuals fail to realize that they are beneficiaries of a good, large economy (Seattle has a great variety of consumables from which to choose), and they need to pay for the market price of being conveniently located near such an economy.
Along with the sadness over the development of condo’s, is the sadness of old businesses being pushed out for new, fancy boutiques. An example would be this front page article from today’s Seattle Times. It describes a pawn shop going out of business. Within the first paragraph of the article, the phrase, “forced to close after 64 years in business.” is used. This is a prime example of purpose driven, manipulative lexicography. A sentence such as, “due to 64 years of cultural evolution, there is no longer sufficient market demand for a pawn shop in this location in Seattle”, paints a clearer picture. The word “forced” implies that some person or entity is out to get them. Note in the article that the pawn shop is one of two struggling old businesses on the street. The other is a porn shop. I suppose that a “save the porn shop” article would be morally confusing to those who want to patronize local businesses just for the sake of them being local.
As a society, we should be happy that a pawn shop is going out of business. It means the class of the area is improving. Hopefully the porn shop is on its way out the door, due to decrease in quantity demanded. I’m not heartless. I hope that the owners of these establishments find something equally productive to do, so that they can be self-sufficient. Seattle is a good city. There is a lot of opportunity available. There are always growing pains, but people either need to work harder/smarter, or accept the fact that they may be priced out by those who are more economically aggressive. Why do we want to hold on to all of the old cruft? Let’s move forward. Luckily the technology industry does not have these influences, or else we would all be working in Fortran, just to make sure no programmers were pushed out of the industry.
I would venture to guess, that if the attitudes that are present today were present in the ancient days, you would hear conversations like this:
“Look at this thing I made. It is round and I can attach it to my sled and the sled moves much more easily than just dragging it on the ground. I named it, the “wheel”.”
“Hmm…I don’t know about that. What are all the people going to do who make a living dragging stuff around? We should tax the wheel. Roughen the streets. Anything to discourage its use. Pretty soon we will have wheels everywhere, and all those old sleds will be gone. We don’t want that, do we.”
“On the contrary. I think wheels will be useful to society. Why don’t we make a business in building wheeled carts? Then everyone can have one. Maybe we could have a cart store here in the village, and maybe other cart stores in other villages as well.”
“Oh no you don’t. That would make you a chain store. Those are evil.”
“No, I’m just saying if the business plan works here, why won’t it work somewhere else? With more experience, we should be able to build carts at a lower price.”
“Wrong again. You need to stay here and drag stuff around. And make limited use of the wheel. And forget about those other villages.”
“So what will they do?”
“Re-invent the wheel”…
