It is good to know. They are behaving in a manner which would promote a feeling of threat in a target. Why do that other than because the organization feels threatened. Not an individual. A bureaucracy run amok.
Which angle are you looking at this from, and could you please avoid attempts to turn tables in future?
Well, that makes a bit more sense. That said, there are few things more dangerous in our society than when âthe Manâ feels threatened. Thatâs when shit starts to get ugly.
Iâd prefer âThe Manâ feel complacent right until we kick his door in.
So, the âtechnicalityâ is that he isnât on the lease and is enjoying the benefit of a artificially low rent due to NYCâs arcane rent control laws, a rent that should have adjusted once he took over the apartment.(I had a friend who had lived int he same apartment in Queens so long her rent was one fifth of a new tenantâs, one can only imagine how much of a break he was getting at other peopleâs expense )
Yeah, my heart is bleeding for his predicament. He is stealing from someone, lying (about who lives there) and otherwise benefiting financially at someone elseâs expense. Nice guy to be the Peopleâs Hero opposing corruption and unjust profits at othersâ expense.
Could be both police harassment and a landlord who wants to charge more than the rent-controlled rate. Not necessarily an either/or.
My understanding of NYC rent-control rules, is that if a leasing family member dies, then surviving family members are legally entitled to take over the lease and continue paying the same rent with the same protection.
If thatâs the case, then it appears David Graeber is in the right but being ousted due to a technicality, which is that no other family memberâs name was put on the lease when his parents died. He himself was 3 at the time.
He and his family have lived there since, so it is really surprising to me that the landlord was able to evict them that quickly - even if a court would rule in the landlordâs favor. Usually landlord/tenant disputes take much longer to resolve. So I do think a guess that the police were especially helpful to the landlord because of Graeberâs notoriety, is not entirely without basis.
That said, weâll have to see how it plays out in the courts. If Graeber is in the right, as it seems he is, I sincerely hope the landlord and all authorities involved are soon making the license plates for his Mercedes.
Sad to hear of these difficulties. His book really is amazing. The illuminating context he brings to all of history and culture is insightful, even in the rare cases when I disagree with some of his conclusions.
Something doesnât add up here. Graeberâs Twitter page says âLondon.â His Wikipedia page says he lives in London, where he is currently a professor. And before that (1998-2007) he was a professor at Yale, which suggests his primary residence was probably near New Haven â a couple hours away from New York.
âPrimary residenceâ is the keyword here. If the apartment in question was really the âfamily homeâ for 50 years, it was unquestionably rent-controlled and renting at far below market rent. New York City laws do indeed allow a rent-controlled apartment to be passed down from parent to child. But you donât get to enjoy that sweet, sweet below-market rent if itâs not your primary residence.
My guess is that heâs been using his rent-controlled apartment as an inexpensive pied-Ă -terre for years. This is unequivocally illegal, and highly unfair by most peopleâs moral standards â unfair to the landlord, of course, but also unfair to other renters who canât get apartments at reasonable prices in NYCâs incredibly tight market.
If that is in fact the case, I have zero sympathy for the guy. His eviction isnât the result of a âtechnicalityâ (not having your name recorded on a 50-year-old lease wouldnât be a reason for eviction in extremely tenant-friendly NYC); itâs the result of the fact that heâs been cheating the system for the better part of two decades and they finally caught up with him.
If it isnât the case â well, heâs got some explaining to do as to how he has had NYC as his honest-to-God primary residence while being a professor at out-of-state and out-of-country universities. Typically he would have to show that he holds a NY driverâs license, has always voted in NYC, gets his mail there, pays NYS and NYC taxes and files as a NY resident, etc. etc. and most importantly spends more than half the year living in that apartment, and has done so continuously the whole time.
My understanding of NYC rent-control rules, is that if a leasing family member dies, then surviving family members are legally entitled to take over the lease and continue paying the same rent with the same protection.
Apparently, succession isnât necessarily automatic.
http://metcouncilonhousing.org/help_and_answers/succession_rights#answer01
So if he was not living there in the two years prior to his parents passing away/moving out, then he would not be eligible. If he was, he would still have needed to get his name on the lease when he took possession and began paying rent. Thatâs not a minor technicality, itâs the process of succession.
While I donât find it too unlikely that foul play from the landlord was a factor, from the information we have available itâs equally possible that he didnât have the right (Did he seriously never move away from his childhood home as an adult? That would be exceedingly rare) or that he or his lawyer fumbled the process.
What Iâd be especially slow to conclude based on whatâs available to me now, is that any sort of conspiracy with law enforcement was involved. That just seems like a leap.
threads/stories where we donât know all the facts tend to bring out two camps, those that assume the best of the person in question and those that assume the worst.
i find these cognitive biases fascinating and often wonder if the parallel to the character of the person assuming, their life experiences, or the most likely, some combination of the two?
humans are fascinating. 
Good information in general. I will add that, in NYC, it is actually pretty likely for someone to never âmove awayâ and stay in the same apartment for decades. NYC has just about anything someone might want within its borders, all of it as easily reached from one apartment as another. Whereas a good cheap apartment is absolute gold.
Not that difficult, I had a professor who lived in New Haven and commuted to New York every day, Iâm sure there are people who go the opposite direction for Yale. They can work their schedules so theyâre only in town 4 days a week anyway.
You have a very novel definition of âstealing.â Heâs paying the rent heâs charged, by leaving the in the home he has lived in all his life. Having rent not go up while living in the same home youâve lived in most of your life, is the very reason why rent control laws exist.
But yes, as a landlord, I weep (WEEP, I say!) for my fellow bourgeoisie who were forced (FORCED, I say!) to purchase and rent out a rent-controlled building.
My default is that I assume shadowy conspiracies donât exist until I see good reason to think so.
Thatâs not really a cognitive bias, itâs the application of âEntities should not be multiplied unnecessarily.â
I understand holding onto a good cheap apartment. I think itâs probably at least slightly less common for fairly successful adults to continue living in their childhood bedrooms.
Less common these days, especially New York City, but I have friends who now own the family farm that they grew up in.
with the lack of information any assumption is based on a personal cogitative bias.
but yes, i too personally generally follow occamâs razor and usually tend towards the simpler of two explanations, that is my cognitive bias of choice. although i will add that lately the US government has shown itself completely capable and willing to engage in such seemingly unlikely behaviors, so while I donât go there without reason, i donât completely rule it out either. In this case I personally assume that the âtechnicalityâ was legitimately violated, he was likely in violation of some term of the agreement, but i wouldnât rule out that the investigation into his situation might have been maliciously instigated, iâm more middle ground then most of the two camps discussing here.
but again, personal opinions aside, i find it fascinating the spectrum of opinions on any subject were the information isnât readily available. those specific types of discussions are fascinating to me specifically because people weigh in based on their own personal raison dâĂȘtre. like i said humans are fascinating.
It would be a rather boring discussion, wouldnât it, if we all just said âI donât really know what happened so I canât commentâ!
But, while it is true that we donât know all the facts, itâs not true that we donât know any of the facts. And partial information can form the basis of legitimate commentary. And in this case, it seems to me extremely likely that Graeber is in the wrong here. Iâll acknowledge that this is undoubtedly influenced by my own cognitive bias as a former NYC resident, and current out-of-stater who has to pay significantly more than a NYC resident would in order to maintain a pied-Ă -terre there. But letâs look at only the facts.
We have statements by one of the actors that, naturally, put that actor in the best possible light, as a victim of unfair persecution: âfamily home for 52 yearsâ, âevicted on a technicalityâ, âadministrative harassmentâ, âpolice intelligenceâ. Itâs all enough to make the blood boil â a clear case of the strong taking advantage of the weak â and indeed, that was my first reaction when I read the headline.
We donât have any statements by the other actor(s) â police, landlord, etc.
But there is some fairly solid external evidence available to us. Fact #1: The guy, by his own statements, and according to many trusted public sources, lives in London. Fact #2: It is illegal to hold the lease to a NYC rent-controlled apartment if it is not your primary residence. We donât have any direct statement that the apartment in question was rent-controlled, but we can infer with very high confidence that it is, because in NYC, any apartment where the same name has been on the lease for 52 years (which we know to be the case here, because he stated he was evicted because his parents never put his name on the lease) is definitely rent-controlled. So I donât see it as that important that we donât know ALL the facts. We know some pretty important ones.
I donât think itâs necessarily âassuming the worstâ of Graeber to point out that he was very, very likely evicted, not because of a âtechnicality,â but because he doesnât actually live in New York and is not legally entitled to a rent-controlled apartment. I make no statements about his character. I donât know the guy and I havenât followed his story, nor have I read his books (although Iâve been meaning to tackle âDebtâ). But I do think itâs important for people, especially those who may not be familiar with the way rentals work in NYC, to be aware of information that potentially changes the interpretation of the story
To wit: (1) the fact that the place was a âfamily home for 52 yearsâ is irrelevant if it wasnât his primary residence, and (2) there would be no need for âadministrative harassmentâ or âpolice intelligenceâ to get him evicted on a âtechnicalityâ â once the landlord simply realized that the guy lived in London, he could get an eviction (which, for a rent-controlled apartment, heâd be highly motivated to do). Open-and-shut case.
Certainly within the realms of possibility. Itâs a ~2-hour train ride each way; I do it myself almost weekly. But commuting is much less plausible for someone living in London, especially now that Concorde is no longer flying!
It certainly is a key point morally, if he was living in London as his primary long-term residence and the NYC was just his vacation place. If he was, then itâs not morally wrong for him to lose the apartment. Whatever the legal technicalities are.
Still could totally be selective enforcement also.
