Planning policy, planning practice, and housing supply

This paper outlines a brief history of planning policy in Englandas it relates to housing. It discusses briefly the issues raisedby a plan-led system, and the uncertainties of household projections.Evidence on the relationship between house prices and housingsupply, and on house-builders’ landbanks, suggests thatplanning constraints are a key factor behind the long-term upwardtrend in house prices (though over shorter periods other factors,such as long-term real interest rates, will be more important).It concludes that the environmental constraints on additionalhousing supply, albeit important, can be overstated. While thereare serious adverse social consequences of the way in whichthe English housing market works today, it is not yet clearthat the (largely welcome) policy steps taken over the past3 years will prove sufficient to resolve this problem.     

Discussion of 'Financial innovation and European housing and mortgage markets', by David Miles and Vladimir Pillonca

Although their paper stresses the potential merits of a particularfinancial innovation—a form of shared-ownership indexedcontract—Miles and Pillonca surprisingly neglect the roleof differential surges of financial innovation in explainingcross-country differences in house-price inflation. The risk-reducingpotential of their favoured instrument deserves further analysis,not least because of the sizeable political risk involved: theexperience of several other countries that have used indexedmortgage contracts shows their limited robustness to macroeconomicshocks.     

改革和完善我国农村建设用地流转制度的思考

我国现行法律对农村建设用地进入市场采取了分类严格限制的办法。伴随工业化和城市化的进程,土地的价值不断提升,“小产权房”等农村建设用地隐性市场大量存在,现行的农村建设用地流转亟待改革和完善。农村建设用地市场必须在政策和法律上寻求根本突破,必须从根本上改变土地制度的二元性,统一城乡土地市场,充分保障农民在集体建设用地流转中的权益。     

论"为学日益,为道日损"之相关性

对于老子的"为学日益,为道日损",以往人们的解释是:"为学"表示外在知识的积累,"为道"表示内在精神境界的修养,把二者对立起来.其实经一系列论证,二者是相关的.学习这一中国古老的朴素哲学思想,可启迪今人之心灵,共创美好的和谐社会.