Home sizes are declining in the current housing market and CNN Money proclaims the end of the MacMansion. It always struck me as disappointing that we would have so many people building outrageously large homes while so many in the world suffer from homelessness. You can find some of my earlier comments here.
It's not something a person would want to brag about, but it seems I was quietly predicting the decline of the housing market during early 2007.
Big houses are a maintenance and cleaning headache. Cut the size and even the rich may find they have more time to play music and make art. They might also discover themselves as makers, put their own consumption in check and apply their spirits and energies toward the creation of community.
The downside is that when the upper classes stop buying McMansions, then the working classes lose work. We're always quick to denounce comsumption, but never seem to consider the people who build and maintain the big houses, boats, cars, and planes the rich buy. When they stop building 10,000 ft^2 houses, it's people trying to raise a family in a 1,000 ft^2 who get laid off.
ReplyDeleteYou are right about the way it works and we are too enamored with the lifestyle of the rich and famous to do anything about it.
ReplyDeleteThere are a few good examples, however. Brad Pitt is doing a pretty good job in New Orleans.