[extropy-chat] re: World's most and least expensive cities

[Amara Graps]

Robert Bradbury:
>Amara:
>>  Another anecdote: A man who manages
>>  the CNR network at my location lives in Milan and commutes, and he
>>  says that my town of Frascati (population 15,000) is more expensive
>>  for flat rentals than Milan! :-(

>Amara, this doesn't make sense.  I've been to Italy [Rome, Florence,
>Genova, Venice] (in the mid'70s and mid'80s) and to Heidelburg (in the
>mid '90s).  None of those locations are exactly screaming out for lack
>of surrounding land on which to build apartments.  (I'd guess that
>for Genova and Venice, maybe Heidelburg one might argue for geographic
>barriers -- but given modern transportation systems these and the
>fondness for trains in Europe this should be a significant problem.)

Hmm. Heidelberg. Look at a map of the city. On one side is a small
mountain. On the other side is the Neckar river. And on the other side
is that large land area where no streets are marked. That part is the
American military base. In addition to the physical barriers, you'll
find building laws that are similar to Boulder, Colorado, which
places strong limits all new buildings, in order to preserve the
natural beauty of the city.

During my first two years working (as PhD student) in Heidelberg,
I did live a distance away in a small village, where flats were
cheaper and more available, but the tradeoff was a three-hour daily
commute by trains and buses, and a flat that grew fungus on the walls
up to the height of my waist.

>There is not exactly a lack of laborers for construction given immigration
>from Africa (or is there???).

Immigration ??!! Italy and Germany doesn't want immigrants of any
kind (including older, female, educated astrophysicists who carry US
and Latvian passports :-( ). Both countries have passed a spate of
new laws in the last two years that strongly limits immigrants. For
example, in Germany, if you've been recently educated at a German
university (in other words, the government paid for your education),
but you're not a German citizen, you're placed in an immigrant
category that is no different from a person who is educated
elsewhere.

Even the ten 'new EU' members are limited- Yes, they can move
more-or-less freely (the Schengen Agreement doesn't apply to the ten
new countries, but the border guards wave you through without
inspection once they see the country of your passport). But the
existing phobic-EU member countries passed new laws last winter that
limit the number of new EU citizens to actually work (the laws
of Italy are those I know best, since I'm trying to use only
my Latvian passport now).

But those new laws don't stop many people (including moi *) from
trying, nor does anyone in Italy know what to do, now that the
permesso di soggiorno (permit-of-stay) system has collapsed. There
are hundreds of thousands of people walking around with expired
permessos. (Maybe someone should tell the EU that Italy's borders
are porous?)  So the immigrants _are_ here, mostly illegally. Are
they working? I don't know. I am (two fulltime jobs).

>So something strange is going on (bureaucracy? politics? culture?) if
>there is a lack of affordable housing.  Or is wood based housing in
>the U.S. really *that* much cheaper than brick or concrete based
>housing in Europe?

My experience in my part of Italy about why the lack of housing is
1) a huge number (65% say) of Italians live in their own owned flats
2) political, and 3) the standards of remaining available flats are
poor.

Regarding 1): Flats are many Italians' life investment because they
don't trust -- for good reason -- banks and other financial
mechanisms.

Regarding 2):  Some years ago Italy had laws that favored the renter
so much that renters could continue to live in someone's flat under
absurd conditions. The biggest result was that flat owners couldn't
get renters, who didn't pay their rent, to leave. It took years in
many cases for flat owners to get their flats back. Now they don't
want to rent them any more. I see these empty flats around my town
(Frascati). To try to rent them, you must take it upon yourself to
find the owner and ask if they are willing to rent, which might be
difficult if you don't know the neighbors in that neighborhood who
could tell you who is the owner. If you're a new resident or a
foreigner: 1) you wouldn't know about these empty flats, 2) you
might have language communication difficulties, 3) you are 'foreign'
to the neighborhood, and sometimes/often not welcome (Italians face
this too).

Another political facet is the tax laws for property owners. The
taxes are so high for property owners, that many Italians find
creative ways to compromise, or else work around the laws. The
result is an extremely high rent cost for flats, or else a rent
contract that is illegal. In my six months of searching, I didn't find
a flat owner willing to give me a legal contract. One could say,
'OK, that is Italy, accept it, all Italians do', but for immigrants
this is a major problem. You cannot own a car, get a bank account, a
credit card, telephone, other utilities unless you have an Italian
Identity card, and you cannot get an Identity card unless you have a
residenza certificate. You cannot get a residenza certificate unless
you have a legal rent contract (and a permesso di soggiorno). On the
day, last summer, that I showed my papers to the polizia to get my
residenza certificate, I was lucky to have an Italian friend with me
who could convince them that my unregistered rent contract was not a
problem, and they looked the other way.

Regarding 3: the standards of the remaining available flats are
poor: you might expect this of a location that has been occupied for
two thousand years. Roman columns appear suddenly in flats (they are
prized, in fact), and other building structures are unsound. Finding
a flat with good wiring for electricity and phone and a good system
for heating is a big accomplishment.

A rather long answer to your queries, Robert, but I hope that this
describes better the living situations I experienced.


Amara



==================================================================

(*) sent to two newspapers last week: Corriere della Sera and
La Repubblica, and no reply. I don't think "Letters to the
Editor" exists in Italy. :-(  )



Caro Sig. Berlusconi,

ho ricevuto una sua lettera che afferma che tre anni fa lei mi
scrisse per chiedere il mio voto. In verita', tre anni fa risiedevo
in Germania, dove lavoravo come astrofisica all'Istituto Max Planck
di Heidelberg. Nella sua lettera, lei elenca i risultati raggiunti
dal suo governo per motivarmi a votare per Forza Italia. Voterei
volentieri, se potessi, ma sono una cittadina statunitense che passa
larga parte del suo tempo lottando contro le restrizioni imposte
dalla nuova legge Bossi-Fini sull'immigrazione. Il mio permesso di
soggiorno deve essere rinnovato ogni anno dalle Questura di Roma, la
quale impiega almeno undici mesi per evadere la pratica, durante i
quali non posso espletare il mio lavoro al CNR, lavoro che
richiederebbe mie continue missioni all'estero, impossibili senza
permesso.

Che buffo paradosso, quindi, ricevere nella mia casella delle
lettere una missiva da un primo ministro che chiede il voto ad una
persona che non puo' votare; un primo ministro le cui leggi
impediscono a quella stessa persona di svolgere, in questo paese, il
proprio lavoro scientifico.


Cordialmente,

Amara Graps, PhD

-- 

***********************************************************************
Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario, CNR - ARTOV,
Via del Fosso del Cavaliere, 100, I-00133 Roma, ITALIA
************************************************************************