"Socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor." MLK Jr.

In 1930, Homer Hoyt’s One Hundred Years of Land Values in Chicago invented red-lining, where the government and banks cut the poor off from loans. Today, cities invest millions and billions into areas owned by the rich AND avoid poor areas, underinvest in their redevelopment, and continue to slight their real estate values. If real estate is most people’s greatest asset, picking ‘winners and losers’ and ‘robbing Peter to pay Paul’ continues to transfer wealth from the poor (today, through sales taxes which are always rising) to the wealthy (who seek even lower property taxes).

Being kept from traditional banking with cheap rates, the poor have historically been pushed to predatory lending. These impossible loans are rarely understood and are often more hurtful than any temporary relief they provide. Regularly, these loans are used to pay for health and life emergencies which are caused by a society that doesn’t provide for the basic health needs of a modern industrialized and developed state. When these loans fail, people often lose whatever property they have and often much more.

As debt and slavery are history’s two greatest themes, even greater than agriculture, civilization, and warfare, ownership of object(s) and one’s bodily self are the driving force of our human pursuit of happiness. As ‘self’ is one’s first property, habeas corpus (“you have the body”) is the legal requirement for the government to demonstrate that it possesses a person’s body in its custody for legal reasons.

‘Humans with bodies’ try to shelter/house their bodies in homes and their neighborhoods of those homes fight to funnel urban financial resources to their areas and away from others. More money for the rich and less money for the poor, became the mantra of the elites who sought to join their wealth with public money to further grow the values of their properties.

Martin Luther King Jr was a Baptist and so was his father. His father visited Martin Luther’s home in Wittenberg, Germany. Martin Luther King Jr. slept in Mahatmas Gandhi’s bedroom in India. Pluralism, as in E Pluribus Unum (as is on all US coins as America’s first national motto), invites us to mix opposites. Different social classes and religions find ways to ‘lift all boats.’ Universal health care does that. Cross city community investment does this. Health and safety for everyone! Once everyone has bodily security, everyone can pursue happiness and spiritual fulfillment.

Health, housing and happiness create a valuable LAND.