I’m from a country considered third-world and a common vacation spot for foreigners. One of our islands have a lot of foreigners even living there long-term. I see a lot of posts online complaining on behalf of the locals living there and saying this is such a bad thing.
Currently, I fail to see how this is bad but I’m scared to asks on other social media platforms and be seen as having colonial mentality or something.
In: Economics
The locals that are pushed out, where do they go?
Cost of living becomes higher, more workers are exploited, places that used to have affordable housing have their prices skyrocket and local people who have lived there for years find that they cant afford to live there anymore because they cater to expats/foreigners and tourists. Where will the locals go?
Not to mention environmental problems too such as pollution. This just scratches the surface of it.
Take Bali for example, they have a huge gentrification problem and it gets worse every year.
It really depends on what you mean by gentrification but the main issue is that:
As areas get more wealthy, it’ll cost more to live there. It displaces the people who were living there by pricing them out. More wealthy people then move in and change the character.
It’s partly an issue of change, people want the area to feel like it did for a long time. It’s also a question of economics. Is economics at all costs smart? And typically the answer is no for the people living there. Money might buy happiness and security but only to a certain extent
Old people hate it, and they’re also the ones that vote the most, so it becomes a massive media stink for political votes locally.
When the locals can no longer afford to live there, where do they go?
The primary problem is the increase in cost of living. If the neighborhood has more and more rich people, businesses realize they can jack up prices and those people will still happily pay. And now the previous residents have to pay the same overpriced prices as well. Not just daily goods, but house rental, store front rental etc.
Secondly, store front rental increasing means mom and pop shops can’t afford to operate there anymore and have to start moving or close down. Also, many richer folks wouldn’t go to the small corner stores and small restaurants cause of image, they’d prefer fancy chain stores and restaurants. So those move in and kick out the local shops.
In the long run, when rich people keep moving into gentrified neighborhoods, the poor people will have to move to somewhere with other poor people. And that creates slums, where infrastructure and maintenance is neglected. Local government would rather spend money in gentrified neighborhoods to appease the potential rich folks moving into the city than repairing roads in those slums
It is controversial. When there is disparity in wealth, things that may appear good also have some bad effects.
Economic development creates winners and losers. Even if everyone benefits, some benefit more than others. This leads to economic changes that are (or at least appear) less “fair”. This is made much worse when development happens quickly as in gentrification. People who are older, less educated or less lucky often cannot benefit as much from development and they can, in extreme situations, get “pushed out” of their neighborhood and society. Governments have to balance the desire for economic development and the situation of those citizens who don’t benefit as much – this is difficult to manage well.
Of course, in modern times, it is easy to highlight “injustices” or make a situation out to be worse than reality. But there is an underlying truth to some situations and it would be unfair to dismiss these accusations as groundless. The issues of gentrification exist but many don’t account for the benefits (better livelihoods, living conditions, lower crime, better health etc) and simply highlight the downsides.
The influx of wealth from elsewhere makes prices go up, *but not also wages*, and replaces a lot of the community essentials with much fancier but more specialized stores, leading to the community that was in an area getting pushed out because they simply can’t afford to live in their homes or buy food in their own area anymore.
The people moving in can afford the new prices and/or to travel further for their necessities, the community that was already there generally can’t and has their conditions in general get worse.
I live in Saint Petersburg, one of the most popular tourist destinations of Russia. Extremely popular among chinese tourists before COVID. And I happened to study and work in the historical city center — the most popular place for tourists. That means:
1) I could not find a decent apartment near my job/uni for a fair price, let alone in high season — all is reserved for tourists;
2) I could not by a car (bike is not an option cause weather) — overcrowded streets lead to traffic jams (1-2 hours to drive Nevsky Prospekt that is 5 miles long) and no parking spaces:
3) I could not even find a shop to buy lunch — all the cafes and restaurants work for tourists.
And taxes do not give any significant return from all of this.
You work hard to make your community nicer and safer and more prosperous. Then wealthier people start being attracted to the area (usually because to them it’s trendy and cheap) and you and your family get priced out of the housing and shopping and leisure and end up having to move out. Gentrification isn’t an inherent evil but combined with wealth inequality it punishes people for making the world better.
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