Affordable Housing

What’s one thing that would instantly improve your city?

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Back in the 1950s, the council house that I grew up in in Cork was built along with thousands of others. We didn’t need to buy it. We rented it from the council at a reasonable rate. Then, the councils sold off all the council houses. We bought ours (at least my parents did). But after than few affordable homes were built.

In Limerick, where I live now, and cities throughout Ireland, and maybe everywhere else, I’d like to see affordable housing built. I don’t want hard working people to subsidise people who won’t work. But maybe there should be different levels of housing. For criminals, perhaps we could build concentration camps. For people who do very little, we could give them very basic housing, and find work for them. And then, for poor people who work hard, we could give them more impressive homes.

Capitalism generally seems to work better than socialism, but maybe more housing should be in the hands of the government. Earlier in my life, people who didn’t work were prioritized over the working poor. But maybe now it’s difficult for everyone. I remember when young girls would deliberately have babies out of wedlock to be given a free home. I remember hearing of a couple with two daughters who were given a free home by the council. They split up and then they had a free home each. And both of their daughters had kids out of wedlock, so then the family had four free homes 😀. That’s the kind of thing that happens when you don’t reward good behaviour.

I even saw a show in a country (which I won’t name) where women would deliberately drink alcohol to ensure that their baby was born with disabilites – and then they’d get more money from the government. None of this is easy to manage, but I can’t understand why Ireland could build good affordable homes back in the 1950s, when we were much poorer.

I’m glad that I bought my own home back in the early 1990s. It wasn’t easy to pay for it, but it wasn’t impossible either. And I’m glad that heavenly homes are free – when we repent and believe:

John 14:2–3
“In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.”

2 Corinthians 5:1
“For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.”

Philippians 3:20
“But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ.”