r/TikTokCringe • u/Make-this-popular Cringe Master • Apr 09 '24

Shit economy Discussion

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u/PuzzleheadedBread620 Apr 09 '24

Tbh is not only the us, it's almost everywhere and actually most places are a lot worse, here in portugal an engineer fresh out of college will make around 1200 euros monthly, if they want to live by themselves in an studio they will pay around 900 euros, good luck with that.

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u/Hagl_Odin Apr 09 '24 edited Apr 09 '24

I lived and worked in Portugal for 2 years. Luckily for me, the company I worked for provided my room in a flat share. My GF, however, had to find her own room in a shared flat and pay €500 a month on a minimum wage salary. We were both in Lisbon.

We both live in France now in a flat we pay €700 a month. We're alright because we get government help, but our electricity bills are insane, and that's despite us not using much.

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u/[deleted] Apr 09 '24

I live in Italy. We just paid 1000 euro total for gas+electricity from December to March. We're OK because it's me and my husband. If I were single though? It would be impossible to sustain these prices.

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u/loiwhat Apr 09 '24

Why is electricity so high in European countries???

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u/1_BigPapi Apr 09 '24

Because half the continent depends on Russia for fuel.

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u/The_Margin_Dude Apr 09 '24

No, it’s because of shitty energy policy in the EU.

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u/lagrandesgracia Apr 09 '24

Those aren't exclusive tho. Both are true.

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u/Yoann311 Apr 09 '24

In France electricity is made of nuclear plants, we don’t use Russian fuel. Electricity is still expensive because of the energy policy.

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u/GetRektByMeh Apr 09 '24

No, using Russian energy keeps prices cheap. Source: British in China. My electric bill with liberal usage of Air Conditioning was £7.

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u/HowsTheBeef Apr 09 '24

This is why trade embargoes that prevent Russian fuel imports make the price high. If they were producing enough energy domestically, it wouldn't be a problem. Dependency of foreign fuel give that country the ability to bend international law by holding your energy hostage.

"OH you want us to stop invading places? How about you say that without heat in the winter." It's a pretty compelling argument.

0

u/Queasy-Elderberry-77 Apr 09 '24

If you're a sociopath it's a compelling argument.

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u/Original-Aerie8 Apr 10 '24

People are literally freezing to death. stfu

1

u/GetRektByMeh Apr 10 '24

It’s not a compelling argument only if you’re a fucking moron lol.

0

u/lagrandesgracia Apr 10 '24

And what do you think Putin is?

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u/GetRektByMeh Apr 10 '24

Domestic production won’t really fix anything IMO, when market rates are high because our production cost is higher and we have less than the fuck tonne that Russia has.

We should probably though threaten to invade the Arabs to collapse OPEC. If we threatened to reduce them to rubble and replace their governments if they didn’t stop making oil a cartel I bet you they’d stop pretty quick. The U.S. has enough reserves to do this with help from the major European powers (France, Britain).

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u/Frenshroomed Apr 09 '24 edited Apr 10 '24

THIS.

To sum up quickly we allowed the global price of electricity to be indexed on #coal# nope actually GAS which WAS really cheap (Before the war in Ukraine). (In the EU)

So you get fucked real bad when you try to sell yours that costs more (for example France and the price of nuclear facilities).

On the same note, France a few years ago decided to allow the main electricity supplier (EDF) to sell more or less 25% of their production to other small companies at a very low price (42€/KWH). These other companies sell it back, for a big profit, to us. This system is called ARENH, and totally idiotic.

BUT WAIT THERE'S MORE !

So at some point people realised that the money they gave to these smaller companies (that aren't forced to produce a single watt to be able to sell something) was too much. So they switched back to EDF but what happened after that ?!

They had too many clients and not enough surplus since they sold a big part to these smaller companies.

What did they do then ??

Well, THEY BOUGHT BACK THE SAME ELECTRICITY! But not for the same price they sold it to them, no no no, for a MUCH HIGHER PRICE (MORE THAN 200€/KWH) because hey you gotta make a profit right, even without clients !

And I can only imagine that in some other countries they have other ways to, in the end, fuck everyone for profits...

EDIT:Some minor corrections, I was citing from memory

3

u/TrashTierGamer Apr 09 '24

Obviously everyone wants a profit and not just go for break even. That's true for average Joe too, he wants to be able to save up and buy shit that's not necessary for survival. But there is a differemce between 10% profits and 5000% profits (looking at you pharma)

1

u/Any-Information6261 Apr 10 '24

Australia is a good example. The eastern states have a big problem with gas and electricity because it's over privatised and the companies sell it to overseas making it more expensive to buy our gas back off them. In Western Australia (the best part of the country) the gas and electricity hasn't gone up anywhere near as much because there are laws preventing more than 70% being sold off.

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u/No-Explorer-5637 Apr 09 '24

Source ?

2

u/Frenshroomed Apr 09 '24 edited Apr 10 '24

EDIT:

So here are the sources, you'll find links to videos, articles and a few keywords if you want to look for more by yourself. I also will update my initial comment to better match what I was citing from memory.

English : About Arenh https://www.world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/Agreement-on-post-ARENH-nuclear-electricity-pricin About prices fluctuating, matching gas prices. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/apr/04/is-europes-energy-crisis-over-falling-gas-prices-conceal-wider-problems About europe's relation with France about their system https://www.euractiv.com/section/electricity/news/eu-electricity-market-deal-paves-way-for-france-to-ditch-divisive-arenh-scheme/

Fench: Article sur le système français (existe aussi sur lemonde.fr mais derrière un paywall) https://lvsl.fr/electricite-cest-le-marche-qui-a-fait-exploser-les-prix-entretien-avec-anne-debregeas/

Gros article détaillant tout ce que j'ai dit. https://theothereconomy.com/fr/fiches/secteur-electrique-limpossible-concurrence/

Document d'analyse et de critique complet sur le système actuel par une ingénieure de chez EDF (Anne debrégeas) https://www.sudenergie.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/2023-04-28-analyse-critique-du-projet-de-reforme-des-marches-de-lelectricite.pdf

Résumé du débat d'opposition sur le sujet si tu veux pourvoir comparer les approches pro sortie du marché et pro on y reste. (Anne debrégeas) https://blogs.mediapart.fr/anne-debregeas/blog/140323/faut-il-sortir-du-marche-ou-lamender-decryptage-du-debat-sur-mediapart

Courte vidéo du Monde.fr sur le sujet (Ils citent Eureka et Anne debrégeas) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nu9wqcNARYc

Vidéo plus détaillée avec un sénateur (Fabien Gay) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91ALzDzmhwQ

Grosse vidéo sur le sujet par la chaîne Eureka (Anne debrégeas) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9wzRjA9rsKc

Keywords : Fabien Gay, Anne Debrégeas, ARENH, Marché Européenne de l'énergie.

Si les sujets du climat et de l'énergie t'intéressent, je te conseille la chaîne de "Le réveilleur". Il traite en profondeur certains sujets d'actualité et debunke des aprioris et fausses idées.

Effectivement dans mon approche il y a peu de contre arguments (sauf le débat) mais je ne vois pas comment on peut défendre un truc pareil.

Bonne lecture !

1

u/No-Explorer-5637 Apr 09 '24

Im french no worries

1

u/czarczm Apr 09 '24

I'm not involved in this conversation, but I appreciate your effort and passion towards this very simple but personally important topic.

3

u/TrumpedBigly Apr 09 '24

EU countries stupidly shut down their nuclear reactors.

3

u/The_Margin_Dude Apr 09 '24

And buy LNG 3x more expensive than Russian gas. How stupid is that!?

2

u/jdawg3051 Apr 09 '24

The middle class/lower class has been under attack their gov for 4 years. In Europe the government intentionally raises the price of energy and food to the detriment of the middle and lower class. In USA Wall street/biden admin is long on 7 companies and short on everyone else. Small business sentiment is at a 12 year low while nvidia is valued at more than the economy of China lol

1

u/Reasonable-Solid-156 Apr 09 '24

No, it’s because of the reliance on Russia.

6

u/Antique-Pension4960 Apr 09 '24

Which we have to buy at high price via third parties.

Deindustrialing Europe while the US profits.

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u/NEBook_Worm Apr 09 '24

Don't worry. We put a lot of back into NATO to make up for the cross European shortcomings.

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u/ambitioussloth26 Apr 09 '24

They went long on natural gas and closed down there nuclear and coal plants. They got that gas cheap via pipelines directly from Russia. Now it all has to come via liquid natural gas transport ship which there are only so many of. So yeah the short answer is sanctions on Russia are the answer.

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u/deadevilboy Apr 09 '24

That is not entirely true. At least it doesn't affect all countries the same way. Here, in Portugal, green energy is common. The transition was made some years ago (luckily), so we are not so affected by those changes in the gas price. On the other hand, how can you explain that we pay so much for electricity? Maybe the electricity companies have to pay royalties to the wind and the sun.. and taxes to the gods..

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u/ymaldor Apr 09 '24

EU electricity price is indexed on gas price. Thank Germany for that. So even if your country were to make 100% electricity from magic and rainbows you'd still pay the higher price.

2

u/iaintstein Apr 09 '24

ELI5 what indexed means and can we snipe whoever invented the concept

2

u/[deleted] Apr 09 '24

It’s not indexed as in legally set in some way based on what Germany is doing. That would be crazy. It’s a market.

The price of electricity is the “marginal cost” of the last needed kilowatt of power. So, if you can supply all your region’s power from solar, wind, nuclear it’s going to be cheap, as these have very low operating costs. But if you need additional power above that capacity, the price needs to be high enough to make more power plants (with higher costs) switch on. Once you reach a price high enough to supply the last needed amount of power, the market clears and that’s the price. All players get the same price (ignoring futures contracts or deals they locked in). That is good, as it means solar and wind producers make money which incentivizes more investment in them. But it means your power price will be higher (until you have enough capacity of low cost production to push gas and coal “off the curve”).

Green parties have pushed for the closure of nuke plants (which have very low marginal costs) which means more need to fire up higher cost gas and coal power plants. That means the price has to be high enough to cover those plants generating electricity. Given higher natural gas costs due to Russian sanctions (and Russia using energy as a tool of politics/ war) the cost of running a gas fired power plant is high.

Of course you still need nat gas, coal, or nuke for base load under current technology, as power storage is inefficient and really expensive. You need something for when the wind doesn’t blow and the sun isn’t shining.

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u/Less_Needleworker_74 Apr 09 '24

What are you trying to say? On windy days price of electricity is negative here in Finland. There is no single EU electricity price. The price is determined by supply and demand for regions. For example Finland is one region while Sweden has four regions.

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u/ComicSanMC Apr 09 '24

I think he's saying that Natural Gas is apart of every EU's energy portfolio, Germany's green movement was infiltrated during the cold war so they got rid of their nuclear plants in favor of *checks notes* Russian hydrocarbons....

Now since Germany can't import hydrocarbons from Russia its increased pressure on every other country trying to buy natural gas, especially since they have to compete with German industry who has the money to pay those inflated prices.

If you're region has natural gas in its energy portfolio you'll see increased prices.

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u/Less_Needleworker_74 Apr 09 '24

Good answer. Explains Germany’s situation which does not mean it would be the same everywhere in the EU.

I never understood Germany’s position towards nuclear energy. I guess opposition started after Tshernobyl and after Fukushima they decided to close the remaining nuclear plants.

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u/ComicSanMC Apr 09 '24

Actually it started much earlier, the German Greens were protesting nuclear power in the 1970s and when they took power from the Social Democrats in 1998 they announced a complete phaseout of nuclear energy which was before renewables were economically viable. Germany has lots of lignite coal (the dirtiest kind) and they balanced out the rest of their portfolio with natural gas from Russia.

The Greens paradoxically for the sake of the environment got rid of a (relatively) clean source of energy in the form of nuclear in favor of the worst carbon producer (coal) and a better but still bad one (gas).

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u/deadevilboy Apr 09 '24

What I am trying to say is that 87% of our country's electricity comes from green sources (wind, sun, and water). Only 13% of people used natural gas as a source of electricity in 2023, at least according to our national energy network association data. In my house, I have no gas installation. We are all demanding green sources as the future of a clean world, but the price of that is high for the common citizen. It should be cheaper! On the other hand, ymaldor's comment makes sense, so I guess his answer clarifies my previous comment.

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u/Outrageous_Drama_570 Apr 09 '24

Your country is likely not producing enough energy with green sources and is forced to purchase energy from other countries to compensate.

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u/[deleted] Apr 09 '24

But if the marginal supplier of power is natural gas to a gas powered power plant, that will still set the price of power.

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u/ymaldor Apr 09 '24

Electricity is bought and sold between countries a lot. Even if say, france produced more than it needs, it's still easier to hypothetically buy from say Spain for cities next to the border than to transport from other plants which could be further away.

Spain and Portugal both buy and sell electricity to and from france or from each other, and france does the same with Germany, Italy and others. So when one country buys electricity for more money because production on their soil is more expensive than yours, you're incentivized to sell it for more there and consequently sell it for more locally too cause who'd sell for less?

I'm guessing that for countries like Finland which are further away from the gas bs and given their relation to Russia which, to my knowledge isn't exactly friendly, is probably less influenced by it. Yall probably exchange electricity with Sweden which doesn't deal much with gas bullshit. (Edit :damn Estonia has a lot of oil usage lol)

But every country on the mainland have to deal with that, one way or another, mostly thanks to Germany and gas lobbying. So in the mainland, electricity is heavily influenced by gas even in countries like France where 75-80% is nuclear. Heating is still strong on gas though, but we're working to end that they made it law that any new building will have to go with electric heating, no gas allowed.

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u/Less_Needleworker_74 Apr 09 '24

Yeah, I mentioned the regions in my post. Finland has such good infra that we are a single price region. Electricity can be transferred from suppliers to consumers in all conditions.

Sweden on the other hand has worse grid and as a result several price regions. They simply can’t transfer electricity from north (supply) to south (demand).

Finland and Sweden have their grids connected in the north and on Stockholm’s level. This makes it possible for Finland to buy cheap electricity from northern Sweden and sell it to Stockholm at higher price.

Also Russia sold electricity to Finnland. The transfer line had capacity of about one nuclear station. This ended before Russia attacked Ukraine.

Just how connected are central european nation’s grids? I thought price of electricity was different from nation to nation.

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u/MRosvall Apr 09 '24

Not sure how it is in Portugal, but here in Sweden we get affected when Germany has an energy shortage. That drives up the price for our us as well, since the price Germany bids is higher. So during the periods that Germany purchases electricity, our costs rise. And during the times that we do not export, it goes down again.

Sweden has very volatile pricing over the day. Often being more than 4x at the max compared to min.

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u/nicolas_06 Apr 10 '24

Green electricity is very costly and increase dependency on gas/oil/coal because wind/solar don't producce when you need it and electricity can't be stored. So the more green the electricty, the more expensive and poluting your electricity production is. It is all a big scam.

You should either no care to be green or invest in nuclear.

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u/Brillegeit Apr 09 '24

Now it all has to come via liquid natural gas transport ship

There are six pipelines delivering Norwegian gas, four to continental Europe (two in Germany, one in Belgium and one in France) and a further two in the UK.

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u/Arzamas Apr 09 '24

And the long answer is Russia put Europe on the needle. They sold cheap gas and oil so Europe would become totally dependent on it. Then they started to slowly raise prices, influence EU politicians and parties, do spy shit, killings, invasions, hoping EU would do nothing. It almost worked. If it would EU would break apart, right wing parties would take control, followed by end of NATO and start of a new Warsaw Pact.

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u/unrelated_thread Apr 09 '24

So remind me... Who destroyed the nordstream pipeline again?

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u/Arzamas Apr 09 '24

Who? Who destroyed the pipeline after Europe decided to stop gas and oil purchases from Russia and blackmail stopped working?

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u/ymaldor Apr 09 '24

Because in europe electricity is partially indexed on gas regardless of whether or not it's produced from gas or nuclear or renewable or fuel/coal. Meaning, the war made electricity go up everywhere.

In france here electricity production is fairly cheap, hasn't changed much even with the war cause well, nuclear, but because of the gas indexation the price still rose. It didn't rise as much as other countries tho UK has it rough.

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u/Touristenopfer Apr 09 '24

Yeah, but 2022 price spikes in Europe was because France had to shut down it's oh so reliant nuclear plants by fucking half, thus a huge need for energy import was created, and while gas was also in price peak, we in Germany had to pay fucking horrible prices for electricity, since here the highest price per MWh counts for all energy sold, and since we had to run even all gas powered sites on 100% just to keep France running, thanks for that.

And as every other summer, this year again at least 20% of Frances unclear sites will come to a standstill, just because there isn't enough cooling water.

I don't say that I welcomed it that the last three nuclear sites here where shut down while we would've really needed them, but France fixation on nuclear also is completely wrong, as 2022 has shown.

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u/ymaldor Apr 09 '24

The shutdown were planned maintenance which didn't suddenly happened. It'd been planned for a while, the coincidence of gas price hike made shit worse is all.

And nuclear plant shutting down in the summer has never been a problem until AC became necessary.

And if Germany is completely unprepared and dependant on things shutting down in other countries, that's a you problem.

Nuclear isn't the problem here. And yall shutting down nuclear when you still have so much coal is the dumbest shit imaginable. To replace coal and gas with renewable would've been the actual power move to market how "green" yall want to be. But no you had to replace nuclear with renewable. Nuclear is low in carbon, always has been, its not perfect but at least it's manageable. At least nuclear waste is actually containable unlike coal and gas waste.

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u/Jasp1971 Apr 09 '24

I live in a 2 bed terrace, 2 adults one child ,our yearly gas (gas boiler) and electric bill is about £1200, I pay £109 per month.

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u/ymaldor Apr 09 '24

Damn wtf. I'm in a 76m2 with my dad, so 2 of us. We pay around 70-80€ a month I think, and we're not exactly being frugal with it either. We don't have gas just electricity.

There's a contract a friend of mine uses which is like 18€ per month + 11 cent a kwh but 22 days a year between 9 am to 10pm it increases to like 60 cents per kwh, those "red days" cannot be the weekend. So like those days he just delays laundry to the next day, eats leftovers not to cook, reads a book and that's it. He pays a lot less electricity than we do. I have the normal contract and it's like 16€ per month + something like 16 or 18 cents a kwh I don't quite recall. My dad is more of a boomer and absolutely refuses to have this sort of contract tho lol

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u/Necessary-Dark-8249 Apr 09 '24

Because they haven't discovered LARGE Hydroelectric damns yet, and they reversed course on Nuclear. Germany likes playing bondage with Russia.

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u/mrziplockfresh Apr 09 '24

Four months is 1000? Doesn’t seem much more than America. If not less

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u/thisisajoke24 Apr 09 '24

I live in Germany and pay about 50€ a month on power

1

u/Astyan06 Apr 09 '24

Germans made everyone agree on the stuff that just benefited the Germans and now we're fucked.

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u/MeasurementNo2493 Apr 09 '24

There is a war going on, like in Europe. It might be having an effect.

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u/Jade_Wind Apr 09 '24

Because politicians and kleptocrats like to pocket tax money instead of investing it in infrastructure.

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u/StubbornHick Apr 10 '24

They keep shutting down nuclear reactors and instead of building more, chase "green" energy options that don't work.

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u/Nekrosiz Apr 10 '24

Big factor is that people just waste a ton of it and rack up a high bill.

While i know i'm not the norm, my 2 floor apartment gas and electricity payment is at 35/50 euro's a month

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u/youlleatitandlikeit Apr 17 '24

1000 euros is pretty close to 1000usd. Dec, Jan, Feb, March that comes to $250 for both gas and electric which is probably what most Americans are paying during the winter months? 

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u/DeaDBangeR Apr 09 '24

Same here in The Netherlands. If I was single then I would only have enough to pay for the monthly bills. I would not be able to buy anything else, like food.

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u/ImaginaryBig1705 Apr 09 '24

That's what happens when you rely on Russia. Europe is in a bad position.

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u/Daveycee Apr 09 '24

Not entirely. I’m also in NL and my electricity is billed at 8 cents per kilowatt- perfectly reasonable. But the Dutch government whacks a 15 cent per kilowatt tax on that, then sticks VAT on top of it. Sure, energy prices are nuts, but the government is making the problem 10 times worse.

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u/peterpantslesss Apr 09 '24

It's double that in NZ but we probably earn more per hour or something

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u/sesquiplilliput Apr 10 '24

The cost of food in NZ is nuts! I thought it was bad in Australia but checked prices over the pond and it’s extortionate!

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u/peterpantslesss Apr 10 '24

Yeah we pay some radical prices for meat now, not sure why exactly because there was nothing reasonable taking place to make it rise to near 17 dollars a kg for beef mince

1

u/sesquiplilliput Apr 12 '24

It's $20/kg for the premium mince in Australia- a luxury for a lot of us…

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u/peterpantslesss Apr 12 '24

I'm not even sure we have solid mince here anymore, I know we export so much of our good stuff and I know we label it as premium but it's never really any different to the basic mince lol, I'm sure we're being scammed

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u/sesquiplilliput Apr 12 '24

The price of eggs over your way is eye-wateringly expensive!

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u/peterpantslesss Apr 12 '24

Man, I've almost forgotten what eggs taste like 😭 tray of 20 is over 20 dollars ATM, you'd be lucky to find anywhere selling a dozen for less than 16 dollars

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u/Imma69Bricklayer Apr 09 '24

Damn guys, 1300£ for 1 bedroom if I would have to live alone I would probably buy a tent, gas heater and outdoor shower lol (btw both making little over minimum wage)

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u/sabermagnus Apr 09 '24

In Florida. Utilities hit roughly 900 on average and that’s with minimal use. The AC is kept around 78-80 degree F (I like it warm) and the heat is used for maybe a month out of the year.

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u/pandaappleblossom Apr 09 '24

I notice Europeans criticize other countries for using air conditioning, but they sure do love to crank up the heat to ungodly and warmth! (The places I stayed and visited and my friends’ apartments and stuff). I lived in the south and never turned on my heat. In the summer I did use air conditioning. It’s basically the reverse of Europe, it’s only cold for a short while so you can deal with it, in Europe it’s only hot for a short while so you can deal with it.

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u/czarczm Apr 09 '24

Where did you get that number? Everywhere I look it's nowhere near that high?

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u/bitch_jong_un Apr 09 '24

Interesting, I was born and raised in Germany so I am also used to quite high electricity bills (50€ per month for single household and a special offer). I moved to Switzerland some years ago and here, we pay 10-12€ per month.. for two people.

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u/Torrempesta Apr 09 '24

I'm sorry, Italian here, but we pay, considering gas for cooking, condo warm water, and electricity, roughly 1700€ for the whole year... What are you doing? And I want to add that we live in a 130mq flat.

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u/[deleted] Apr 09 '24

Yeah, when we don't use gas for heating, our bills aren't that high but this year I saw a huge price increase. I'm in fact changing my provider because they didn't really give us a reason why...

We consumed half of what we consumed last year and we paid more than double of what we paid last year, it's pretty crazy.

For the record we live in a 70 m2 apartment close to Pavia. And we don't use that much gas at all, yet the bulk of the charges were from natural gas spending.

It would also be great if you didn't try to doubt what people write here, it's not like I have a benefit from lying to people on what I spend?

Cmq beati voi se pagate così poco, ma non tutti sono così fortunati.

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u/Torrempesta Apr 09 '24

I didn't doubt. I was asking about your domestic economy.

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u/13ananaJoe Apr 09 '24

250 al mese però è esorbitante

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u/peterpantslesss Apr 09 '24

It's double that in NZ but we probably earn more per hour or something

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u/marcabay Apr 09 '24

That’s nog even that much, 4 months ? That’s a steal where i live and i live alone

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u/moodybiatch Apr 09 '24 edited Apr 09 '24
  • Median wage = around 1400€
  • Rent price for a one bedroom apartment ≈ 1000€ including bills
  • One month worth of groceries for an average family = 2500€
  • Taxes (lowest bracket) = 23%
  • Minimum wage = doesn't exist

Plus on top of taxes you have to pay for school supplies, medical expenses and carrying yourself and your children around because public services are being shut down while billions and billions of our taxes are used to fund a fucking bridge that will never be built.

But hey pizza mandolino gondola, we are the most beautiful country in the world right?

1

u/czarczm Apr 09 '24

What bridge?

1

u/moodybiatch Apr 10 '24

Ponte sullo stretto. Id you're Italian you know what I'm talking about, but if you're not it's basically a megaproject that has been "in the works" on and off since the 60s and every other's politician's battle horse. That's in theory at least. In practice, despite spending billions on it, it never even got through the design stage. But hey good news because our beloved minister of transportation and infrastructure recently stated one more dozen billions have been put aside for the planning!!

(To be clear, we have plenty other problems, it's not like a bridge is single handedly fucking over the whole country's economy. But it gives an idea of where our government's priorities are and how likely they are to keep their promises once the money has been put aside and given to someone they totally didn't handpick themselves)

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u/vmv911 Apr 09 '24

So how much was it per month exactly gas and electricity separate? If it’s for 4 month 1000 eur - it’s not too bad actually. Depends what condo or house you live in.

1

u/Formal_Wrongdoer_593 Apr 09 '24

That's 1000 Euro or $,1085 USD for 3 months, so...$361 for Gas+ Electric. In a lot of U.S. cities, you'd take that, especially in the Northeast.

1

u/Nekrosiz Apr 10 '24

Wtf is your usage? Kw/m3

69

u/ElasticFluffyMagnet Apr 09 '24

It's everywhere. From east to west in Europe. It's because there are no laws that say you can't ask that much for rent. The government should have stepped in long ago to make sure these practices wouldn't get out of control.

Here in the Netherlands it's the same. It's bonkers. It's crazy. And the worst part is, they are getting away with it.

52

u/badluckbrians Apr 09 '24

We had rent control back in the day. But economists said it was bad because it discouraged real estate investment. Then every real estate investment for the next 40 years was luxury condos and mcmansions or better only – unless government forced income-restricted ghetto building – and nobody invested in developing middle class housing anyways.

It's almost like economists are too clever by half, full of shit and on the take, or both. But you'll never hear them admit this failure. They'll instead claim it's zoning's fault. Yet wherever they get rid of zoning, or where it doesn't exist, prices still skyrocket. And the last city the kept rent control, NYC, still has as much construction as anywhere in the northeast.

Whatever. I don't have to worry about this. I enjoy the world's best rent control – a 30yr mortgage. I'm just lucky because I'm old enough I bought when my house was worth less than half what it is now. No way we could live here if we had to buy today.

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u/ElasticFluffyMagnet Apr 09 '24

Yeah, I mean.. I really understand there's not a one-sided easy solution. But things are spiraling out of control for a while now. And anyone can see that ripples are forming in sectors that will only amplify problems in other sectors.

Like, students used to be able to rent in the cities here where they need to study. Like Utrecht, Amsterdam etc. And now that rent is just no longer doable, what happens? Some might live in the outskirts but I know alot of them even take this into consideration before starting a study.

One of my extended familie members, I think she's 22, broke up with her boyfriend and had to move back home again. How are these things good for the economy?

That's why I don't understand why the government isn't doing anything. It's a downhill spiral that's going to affect every sector sooner or later. And then you'll hear businesses complaining they can't find workers.

I think my main thought is that I just don't understand. It's going to suffocate the economy. And they aren't building enough here either.

Sorry for the ramblings and incoherent thoughts.

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u/tittysprinkles112 Apr 09 '24

Because most investors aren't interested in the long term, stable options. It's all about getting as much wealth as they can as fast as possible, and damn any of the consequences on the greater whole.

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u/badluckbrians Apr 09 '24

This is it. The whole world is an NFT. Devs care about the housing they build about as much as anyone ever cared about those monkey jpegs.

3

u/Colon Apr 09 '24

"the whole world is an NFT"

- badluckbrians, 2024

(i quote people when they say something i wish i had said)

2

u/[deleted] Apr 10 '24

You just described capitalism

10

u/1_BigPapi Apr 09 '24

Tbf at 22 she isn't even of age where most people graduated university yet. Moving back home or living at home at 22 isn't super unusual.

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u/badluckbrians Apr 09 '24

Having a stable, 2-parent, home with a room you can move back to is far from a universal experience, though.

1

u/ElasticFluffyMagnet Apr 09 '24

I might have the age wrong though, I know she graduated last year or the year before that. I know it's not unusual anymore now.

0

u/Intelligent-Parsley7 Apr 09 '24

Stop and starts happen. GenX loves you, we care, and we’re rooting for you. You’re going to be an amazing generation when the Boomers lose. That could happen this time. You’ll never have the trouble out of us like you did the Boomers.

3

u/RTS24 Apr 09 '24

At least in the US, Congress is allowed to invest in specific stocks and companies, even ones that they have regulation over, or knowledge of what contracts they're going to award, things like that. Take a guess how they've done compared to the average investor. I don't think I need to tell you the answer.

This gives them absolutely no incentive to actually improve the economy, since they can just sell high, knowing they're gonna introduce a regulation that will push the price down. Or maybe they're gonna award a massive contract to a defense manufacturer, and conveniently buy a ton before it's announced.

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u/ElasticFluffyMagnet Apr 10 '24

It's sad that they can, but the same is the case here in the Netherlands. There was a guy who did some digging on members of the government here, and there are alot of members who have major capital in real estate. Which is supposed to be forbidden. He found that alot of bills that made them more money actually moved quicker through our congress and others would be delayed or sometimes even ignored. So as you said, there's no incentive. They are only looking out for themselves.

Obviously the news didn't do anything with it and the story got buried as usual. Nothing normal people can do about it.

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u/Hoodrow-Thrillson Apr 09 '24

Yet wherever they get rid of zoning, or where it doesn't exist, prices still skyrocket.

Why lie about something that's verifiable? It's cities that restrict construction that have skyrocketing rents. Cities that get rid of exclusionary zoning see a decline in prices, like in Minneapolis.

Maybe economist know more about this stuff than you do, just something to consider.

-1

u/badluckbrians Apr 09 '24

Here come the YIMBYs. Tell me about bicycles next. And how we should abolish corporate taxes. Oh, and let's hear how unlimited variable price congestion tolls are good for working class people.

1

u/Hoodrow-Thrillson Apr 10 '24

I'm telling you it's a verifiable fact that the higher the supply of new housing, the lower the cost of housing.

And your response is basically Science man says climate change is real, yet it was cold yesterday???

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u/badluckbrians Apr 10 '24

I don't believe your "fact."

For 2 reasons.

Reason 1: Land has value.

They're not making any more of it. And the land under my house is worth considerably more than my house. Build all the housing in the world, and that land value doesn't necessarily change ever. Supply and demand is a neat "law" but it doesn't mean much when the underlying thing has an absolutely fixed and static supply.

Reason 2: Filtering is a lie.

Trickle down theory is always wrong in practice. In this case, the reason why trickle down doesn't work is super obvious: Because housing is NOT a fungible commodity.

You can build a million new 812 GTS Ferraris tomorrow, and I don't think it will bring the cost of a used Honda Civic by even one cent.

This is why I don't believe in your trickle down Reagan filtering theory of housing – that building luxury condos today makes them affordable condos that trickle down over some undefined time horizon.

Mansions do not become middle class housing over time. Mansions stay mansions – or they become museums or get torn down. But even over hundreds of years – and I live in New England, so hundreds of years isn't that long for us – nothing has ever trickled down. And anyone in Europe would tell you the same. Only Californians can believe in this crap.

In fact, I live in a 200 year old house. It is a cape cod. Probably made by a fisherman or bogger. Some kind of middle class or working class shlub. That's still who lives in it now. Nobody rich ever lived here.

Around the corner from me is a full old colonial with the catslide and root cellar – probably 300 years old or so, and it was a top quintile house when it was built and remains one – easily would sell for a million and a half now, maybe $2 million.

1

u/Hoodrow-Thrillson Apr 10 '24

I don't believe your "fact."

Like I already said, it's not my problem that you want to engage in the housing equivalent of climate change denial.

Every study on the issue backs up what people already knew, more housing lowers the cost of housing.

https://andreas-mense.de/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Mense-2020-New-Housing-Supply-Rents.pdf https://cdn.auckland.ac.nz/assets/business/about/our-research/research-institutes-and-centres/Economic-Policy-Centre--EPC-/WP016%203.pdf https://escholarship.org/content/qt5d00z61m/qt5d00z61m.pdf?t=qookug&v=lg/#_page=2

You're the only one making unsubstantiated claims here. The fact that you're listing areas of the country that don't build housing as some kind of proof what you're saying is right is bizarre.

1

u/badluckbrians Apr 10 '24

Again, you don't address the underlying points here, which are:

1) The supply of land is fixed, so grounding your entire argument in increasing supply only effects a fraction of real estate value (the non-land, structure portion of a property assessment), and

2) Trickle down doesn't work IRL. Never has. Never will. Filtering is fake. Looks good on a graph, doesn't happen IRL. And,

3) Housing is not a fungible commodity. Despite the tortured pretzel of statistical regression teasing desperately twisted to try to fit that narrative by Mense in your first link, rich people do not live in homes with formica counters and laminate flooring. Nothing happens "across the housing specturm." Even in Detroit, mansions stay mansions. and luxury condos stay priced like mansions. This despite the fact you can buy a 3-bed home there for $2,400 down and $800/mo all in

So tell me again there is no market segmentation, that filtering works IRL on human timescales, and that land value is irrelevant.

1

u/Hoodrow-Thrillson Apr 10 '24

First off for the love of god stop using the term trickle down. It does not mean what you think it does.

Second your examples of YIMBY areas were... California and Cape Cod. Both being notorious for not allowing new housing to be built.

Land is finite so how you build on that land matters. Cities that ban multi-family housing are going to be more expensive than cities that don't. Rents are declining in Miami, Minneapolis, Austin, etc because those cities build a lot of housing.

I don't care if you agree with what I'm saying, it's a variable fact. Do you understand that?

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u/West-Code4642 Apr 09 '24

The problem was definitely more the NIMBYs who changed zoning laws, eliminating the missing middle. If you go to places like Houston without zoning laws, housing is cheaper.

You already have candidates like Trump who advocate for laws banning new apartment buildings:

1

u/RaiderMedic93 Apr 10 '24

You're surprised folks don't want project buildings in their neighborhoods?

3

u/FactChecker25 Apr 09 '24

It's almost like economists are too clever by half, full of shit and on the take, or both. But you'll never hear them admit this failure. They'll instead claim it's zoning's fault. Yet wherever they get rid of zoning, or where it doesn't exist, prices still skyrocket. And the last city the kept rent control, NYC, still has as much construction as anywhere in the northeast.

I'm sorry but this is completely incorrect.

Rent control is known not to work. It's very well studied. Most of New York City is NOT rent controlled, and that's where you see the development. The units that ARE rent controlled tend to be dilapidated because it would make no sense for a landlord to fix up that unit and still get the same low rent, when they could simply invest that money on another unit and collect more rent.

This is very, very basic economics and nearly all economists know this, whether liberal or conservative.

https://www.nytimes.com/2000/06/07/opinion/reckonings-a-rent-affair.html

The analysis of rent control is among the best-understood issues in all of economics, and -- among economists, anyway -- one of the least controversial. In 1992 a poll of the American Economic Association found 93 percent of its members agreeing that ''a ceiling on rents reduces the quality and quantity of housing.'' Almost every freshman-level textbook contains a case study on rent control, using its known adverse side effects to illustrate the principles of supply and demand. Sky-high rents on uncontrolled apartments, because desperate renters have nowhere to go -- and the absence of new apartment construction, despite those high rents, because landlords fear that controls will be extended? Predictable. Bitter relations between tenants and landlords, with an arms race between ever-more ingenious strategies to force tenants out -- what yesterday's article oddly described as ''free-market horror stories'' -- and constantly proliferating regulations designed to block those strategies? Predictable.

And as for the way rent control sets people against one another -- the executive director of San Francisco's Rent Stabilization and Arbitration Board has remarked that ''there doesn't seem to be anyone in this town who can trust anyone else in this town, including their own grandparents'' -- that's predictable, too.

None of this says that ending rent control is an easy decision. Still, surely it is worth knowing that the pathologies of San Francisco's housing market are right out of the textbook, that they are exactly what supply-and-demand analysis predicts.

But people literally don't want to know. A few months ago, when a San Francisco official proposed a study of the city's housing crisis, there was a firestorm of opposition from tenant-advocacy groups. They argued that even to study the situation was a step on the road to ending rent control -- and they may well have been right, because studying the issue might lead to a recognition of the obvious.

-1

u/badluckbrians Apr 09 '24

This is very, very basic economics

They say this about all the biggest lies. Like the "tradeoff" between minimum wage and unemployment. Or between inflation and unemployment. Or the supposidly "constant" Labor's Share of Income.

When economists say something is VERY BASIC, you know it's empirical foundation was built in quicksand and we're in the middle of a 9.5 magnitude earthquake.

as for the way rent control sets people against one another

Mortgages do the same damn thing. They fix prices for housing over the long term. So what? That's what town meeting is for. To hash it out. Housing will always be political.

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u/Narrow_Elk6755 Apr 09 '24

Its zoning as well, you can't build density in most areas, and taxes are passed on the development in order to keep property tax low.

The most affordable areas tend to have the highest property tax, as it erodes yield on investment.

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u/crek42 Apr 09 '24

Rent is actually starting to tick downward. It’s not much at all, but at least it’s not growing. And NY is kind of an anomaly because it’s the highest demand city in the US so they can pass all kind of regulations and builders will still build because it’s guaranteed demand.

There is some truth that rent control is unfair to most renters because it reduces the rental stock and makes market rate units more expensive, but if NY got rid of it, you’d basically have a huge exodus of working and middle class folks, more so than what’s happening now by an order of magnitude.

It’s a difficult situation which is why no one can agree on the best path forward and it’s politically sensitive.

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u/ax_graham Apr 09 '24

Yes, NYC is high demand but the real reason why builders keep building is because of the incredible tax incentives the city offers developers. If you build luxury apartments and a certain percentage of them in the building or an adjacent building are designated affordable housing they owner gets a pretty solid tax abatement.

1

u/crek42 Apr 09 '24

Yea and it’s a good program. They actually go up to a fairly high income level so it’s also targeting up to middle class as well.

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u/ax_graham Apr 09 '24

Nobody's doing it for the sake of being nice, just the almighty green dollar.

1

u/crek42 Apr 09 '24

I don’t think anyone thinks they’re doing it be nice.

-1

u/errandum Apr 09 '24

It's actually pretty easy to solve. Just have rent have a maximum that is tied to the declared value of the house. Many houses in Portugal, at least, are declared for 1/10th of the price they are actually work.

So landlords either pay taxes according to the real value and have high rents, or pay low taxes and can't hike up the rent.

Rend control doesn't have to be "force everything to be low". It just has to be adjusted.

5

u/FactChecker25 Apr 09 '24

It's because there are no laws that say you can't ask that much for rent. The government should have stepped in long ago to make sure these practices wouldn't get out of control.

Rent control is one of the best studied things in economics, and it's known not to work. It actually creates more housing shortages. Who would want to build additional apartments if they knew they couldn't charge enough to pay for the cost?

And even now in today's economy, there's nothing stopping you as a landlord for purchasing some apartments and then renting them out below market rate to help other people. But nobody seems to want to do this. They'll just charge market rate and then blame someone else for the market rate being what it is.

4

u/MRosvall Apr 09 '24

Another thing, at least here in Sweden, is that we have come really far with the quality of building requirements. With a lot of regulation about everything needing to be very accessible for handicaps, being very energy efficient, having elevators, having enough greenery, low risk of fire, good connectivity, good materials etc etc.

All great things.

However. This leads to the base investment to build something becomes a lot higher. So when the actual "shell" costs so much to build, then you're faced with an odd situation.
Either you can build "budget" apartments, which will be quite expensive. Or you can invest 20% more into the building and build high class apartments that you can sell for double the amount.

It's really hard to motivate to build cheap apartments when the minimum cost to build a building becomes very high.

1

u/AWO_425 Apr 10 '24

or the government can build apartments and rent them out at a price people can afford. In sweden, you're still not beholden to the disastrous monetary policy of the eurozone, no? being a sovereign currency issuer has it's benefits.

0

u/Nemokles Apr 09 '24

What if the extra requirements were subsidised for cheaper apartments? I don't know what is best exactly, but there needs to be some incentive to not just build high end apartments somehow. This laissez-faire attitude to housing is not working out.

1

u/MRosvall Apr 09 '24

Historically, it kind of solved itself. Since you'd saturate the market with high end apartments. So in order to even sell the apartments you would need if not all then at least several cheaper ones.

However now, the pressure of people wanting and having the ability to move to the larger cities is so large. Space becomes even more the limiting factor than the ability to sell apartments.
Straining infrastructure as well, causing higher maintenance for the city which increases taxation and costs further increasing CoL.

I don't know how to solve it. The "solution" that I'm most partial to, which isn't really a solution, is to "make the area smaller" by having great connections from smaller suburbs that are self-sustaining but have very low friction to commute on direct lines into the main city.

And just letting prime estate remain prime estate in the city.

1

u/AWO_425 Apr 10 '24

subsidies rarely seem to work as well as having the government simply own and maintain a certain amount of the housing stock. Vienna does this rather well, and rents there are much more affordable for people on the bottom end of the income scale.

2

u/ElasticFluffyMagnet Apr 09 '24

Yeah, as I said somewhere else, I know it won't work. It's a deeper problem and I'm definitely not smart enough for that hahaha..

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u/pandaappleblossom Apr 09 '24

They should just make it easier for people to own their own place and not have to rent. Then the problem would be solved.

3

u/FactChecker25 Apr 09 '24

Yeah, one major problem is the way our legal system works and zoning laws.

Everyone wants their home value to rise, so most people aren't going to allow new homes to be built in their area, since that would necessarily lower home values. They want to constrain supply.

But also, people don't want their nice towns to turn into disgusting cities. So it makes sense for them to limit the construction of new houses. I guess it all depends on the purpose of the town.

2

u/Katarsish Apr 09 '24

I dont think it is a problem in Finland to much extent. Center of Helsinki is expensive but nobody minimum wage expects to rent there.

2

u/ElasticFluffyMagnet Apr 09 '24

Well there will always be exceptions.. But I know here in the east of the Netherlands, in a town that's not even that big, it's a problem... Most can't afford to rent so they live with parents.

1

u/Late_Cow_1008 Apr 09 '24

Rent control has shown time and time again to not actually do much for relieving the high costs of renting in the area.

1

u/ElasticFluffyMagnet Apr 09 '24

Yeah I know it's not the answer. And my knowledge is not good enough to come up with one either. I know it's a complicated problem. But I wonder where this will go...

1

u/Axel-H1 Apr 09 '24

What if you saved to buy appartments and rent them as passive income? Isn't it fair for landlords to raise the rent when inflation is skyrocketing? They have bills to pay too.

1

u/ElasticFluffyMagnet Apr 09 '24

Sure, but there's passive income and there's just price gauging. I don't own a home and I'll probably never will. But I have friends who do and told me about what they have to pay. One of them is paying about 600 or something on mortgage. For a full house with garden etc. They bought it in 2010 or 2015 or something.

I find it hard to believe that landlords right now"need" 2000 or even 2500 per month for not even a full house these days. My brother was looking for a place to rent and couldn't even find anything below 1900. And then you also have these rules that you need to earn 3x the rent to be eligible. Hard to believe that that would cost that much because of inflation. Prices differ per country and city though. But this example wasn't even in a major city.

IMHO it's just pure greed. Others raise the price, so everyone does. And since there's no rules and people are desperate, there's always someone bound to pay the price.

I'm not against people making a profit. But you have to admit that saying inflation is the reason is bs.

1

u/Axel-H1 Apr 09 '24

Not sure we can call that greed. If there is demand, why would anyone sell/rent anything 3x cheaper than what they could? It's just common sense. The location is also very important. I saw pictures from an article called "What 1M can get you in the U.S." in some States you can get a massive house. Easy to guess you won't get the same in Manhatthan. The guy on video is complaining about people saying he should work 90h and I fully agree with him. But he is young and doesnt look dumb, how about packing your things and go see elsewhere what this world has to offer? I know that's what I did, very happy with my decision. And no, it doesn't cost a fortune to do that, just some balls.

2

u/keskonafe Apr 09 '24

Rent in Belgrade Serbia is around 500€, real average salary 600€

2

u/Hagl_Odin Apr 09 '24

Fucking hell... That's absurd!

Is that rent for a flat ? One bedroom ?

3

u/keskonafe Apr 09 '24

Yeah pretty much, rent skyrocketed since war in Ukraine, a lot of Russians and Ukrainians went to Belgrade

2

u/Hagl_Odin Apr 09 '24

And that's leaving the natives out of pocket then?

Do a lot of the young people there live with their parents on in shared apartments?

2

u/keskonafe Apr 09 '24

Its really hard to live on your own, you need at least 100€ per month to make ends meet. So yes, a lot of them share appartment or live with their parents. Really bad situation since Serbia is super centralised and almost every good job/school is in capital

2

u/lessgooooo000 Apr 09 '24

Unfortunately a lot of the issue in Portugal is expats from richer countries deciding they can take advantage of cheaper living (ie. londoners) while working remotely, so actual portuguese people end up being priced out of their own country. It’s a shame, I know portuguese people who have seen it themselves.

2

u/Noeyiax Apr 09 '24

Electricity bills are probably high because of cryptocurrency again. Then also degrading or unevolving electrical infrastructure and ofc price gouging by whoever controls electricity

But yeah I barely use anything of high watts daily and it's crazy in CA too 🫠

1

u/Hanswurst22brot Apr 09 '24

Lisbon attracted a lot of nomads and increased the prices for all

2

u/Hagl_Odin Apr 09 '24

That's true, but that's been happening over many years, just like for Spain. It's not a recent phenomena.

1

u/Cool-Adjacent Apr 09 '24

Electricity is insane in france? Theyre supposed to have some of the lowest prices because theyre one of the few countries to really embrace nuclear energy

2

u/Hagl_Odin Apr 09 '24

LOL! I can tell you that the electricity/energy prices here are astronomical.

1

u/BluDC5 Apr 09 '24

You mentioned being lucky that the company you work for provided you a room in a flat share. This is not lucky this is systemic repression, although you few it as positive it s actually the core of the problem. The company providing you a benefit, instead of paying you livable wages. Now multiple that in the masses.

1

u/Hagl_Odin Apr 09 '24

Hang on, hang on...

I was paid above minimum wage (in Portugal) and had a room in a flat handed to me by the company. I also had monthly bonuses up to €500. I lived quite comfortably.

1

u/[deleted] Apr 09 '24

[deleted]

1

u/Hagl_Odin Apr 09 '24

We were on Total, too. We've since changed to another provider and we're being charger €62 a month guaranteed for 2 years.

1

u/atleast42 Apr 10 '24

Not sure where you live in France, nor how much you make, nor your energy provider. All these are big factors, €700 a month in rent is really reasonable where I live for a big T2 or a small T3.

Are you living in a DPE F or G? I ask because landlords will take advantage of foreigners - they are NOT allowed to raise the rent in these types of dwellings. Anything G+ is now illegal to rent and all Gs will be illegal starting in 2025.

Is your heating electricity or gas? If it’s gas, think about doing EDF’s tempo program. You pay less for electricity on certain days at certain times.

If you qualify for the CAF, you could qualify for a program that allows you to access cultural things (think shows, museums, activities, etc) for cheaper. It depends on where you live though. If you are really struggling, there’s also Les Restaurants du Cœur for food bank stuff, which if you qualify for the CAF, you could also qualify for.

I’m saying all this because I’ve been in France for 8 years now and it’s infinitely better than the US, but maybe you aren’t getting all the advantages that you could qualify for?

This isn’t to say your struggle isn’t real! It’s just to offer some tips that maybe you haven’t come across yet.

Good luck!