Surviving Capitalism (Not) : Rising Seas Pull Fort Lauderdale, Florida's Building Boomtown, Toward a Bust

We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Saturday, March 5, 2016

Rising Seas Pull Fort Lauderdale, Florida's Building Boomtown, Toward a Bust

Click here to access article by Katherine Bagley from Inside Climate News.

"All of South Florida is building like crazy, like there is no tomorrow, which is true, unfortunately," said Wanless, the University of Miami scientist. "The plan is to build these homes and sell them to the Iowa pig farmer who has worked all his life to retire here, or get a nice investment for his grandchildren. They are being hoodwinked."

This leaves homeowners and banks on the hook for countless dollars in lost property values.

"If we follow the federal government's estimates, we could be at 6.6 feet by the end of the century," Wanless continued. "That curve puts us at 2 feet by 2048. That's barely a mortgage cycle away."