Let market forces determine affordable housing                  

-By Joseph A. Lypowy

Published in the Ocean County Observer 05/02/04 www.ocobserver.com

In the April 27 Observer, there was an article describing how Mayor Paul Brush, along with a group of
local affordable-housing advocates, have proposed that Dover Township participate in a plan titled
Workforce Housing. Brush also was recently interviewed on CN8 News promoting the same scheme.
Brush already has received some criticism in a local issues Web site stating that the term Workforce
Housing sounds elitist. I personally think it sounds like the name of some kind of "Big Brother"
socialist concentration camp.

In all fairness to the mayor, I do agree with his position on the Epstein property, that it be allowed to
be developed as a large-lot, low-density housing project. As I have pointed out in this forum in the
past, large-lot housing is the way to go when it comes to preserving open space without further burdening
the taxpayers and contributing to government land grabs, which parallel in theory with communist
deprivatization policies. I also agree with the mayor that the proposed $700,000 homes on the Epstein
property would bring positive ratables, although his motives might be more influenced by the fact that
the developer is a Democratic Party supporter.

Back to the subject of affordable housing, of course everyone wants affordable housing. The question is,
are you going to achieve affordable housing by the natural free-market system, or are you going to do it
with communist-style subsidized housing using wealth redistribution schemes and pay-to-play urban housing
contractors?

In my opinion, any responsible worker who works full time should be able to own his own home if he
desires to. There are numerous factors that are attacking universal home ownership, such as government
land grabs removing land off the market, ever-increasing taxes, low wages being perpetuated by illegal
immigrant labor, excess exportation of American jobs through globalized trade and escalating insurance
costs.

The proponents of Workforce Housing stated that affordable housing can be built in Dover Township using
federal grants and the usual liberal "projects."

According to a 2003 report by the Carnegie Endowment concerning the results of the North American Free
Trade Agreement legislation, it reads, "In all three countries, the evolution of wages and household
incomes since NAFTA took effect has been toward greater inequality, with most gains going to the upper
percent of households and higher skilled workers."

According to the same report, NAFTA also had created a recessionary deflation of the Mexican peso,
exacerbating the influx of illegal aliens, who also are placing a strain on local affordable housing
stock while deflating wages for American workers.

The real way to produce non-high-density affordable housing is to free up private land and zone it for
low-density building with property taxes based only on the structure.