EU membership enjoys strong approval in new member states largely thanks to the economic firepower they have gained. Euronews Business takes a closer look at the GDP growth story in the new accession states since the bloc’s historic enlargement in 2004.
Every country should heavily tax non-resident property owners. They should also increasingly tax every property someone owns over 1, to the point that owning more than 3 homes becomes completely unrealistic for most and middle class landlords disappear.
Everyone should own their own residence (or have the opportunity to). Housing prices would collapse if they weren’t being used as a financial vehicle for investments instead of housing that degrades without upkeep.
I believe those are every societies largest priorities.
Often these landlords incorporate though. They have well paid real estate and inheritance lawyers on their payroll, looking for every opportunity to snap up properties - be it apartments or land - on the market for development.
This problem can be solved by good lawmakers, good public servants, and a good amount of public will.
If I had to take a crack at it, it sounds like this would be solved with taxing corporations as landlords in a similarly punitive way. I’m fine with one corporation owning one apartment complex as a service for transient people, but I’m not okay with a corporation owning multiple properties and making their bag entirely via enshittifying people’s housing and jacking up rent.
If we’re worried about a person having ownership in multiple companies that each own one apartment, we can solve that too. Again, I’d focus on tracing back ownership of these assets and taxing those individuals accordingly. If a person owns 10% of 20 companies that own an apartment building each, they should be taxed like they own 2 apartment buildings. Abstraction and obfuscation should not be a successful defense against supporting the society one is a part of. We all have to do our part, and we will be better off if we did both as individuals and as a collective.