Eric Peterson, PhD, is a labor organizer in San Francisco. He also edits Market Failure, an occasional publication focused on housing.
On the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, socialist Dean Preston championed policies that tackled the gross inequality Silicon Valley brought to the city. That’s why he was targeted by tech capitalists like Garry Tan and Elon Musk last year.
Proposals for market-based solutions to the housing crisis have precedents in the elite-driven housing policy of the 20th century. Those policies favored business interests at the expense of poor and working-class people while worsening racial divides.
The long-running Netflix reality show Selling Sunset often veers into the territory of Real Housewives–style drama. But it also provides a close-up look at the investor-fueled irrationalities of the luxury real estate market.
How did a brand of gay-friendly values become synonymous with those most prized by capitalist urban redevelopment?