A couple of thoughts on economic development in Washington, DC

Every time I walk down a street here in DC, I marvel at the rapid rate of development, for everywhere you look, a new building is going up somewhere. Towering cranes stretch to the sky while men in hard hats hammer, drill, and screw concrete, wood, and metal together like a real life Lego set. But as all of these structures are erected, I can't help but wonder what havoc they are wreaking on the lives of some people in the city.

The corporations who are building the things are worse than landlords, because although a person pays for the condo, he has little control over what is supposed to be his own property. He is told what type of curtains he can put in his windows. He is told what kind of handle he is allowed to have on his door. He has to pay condo fees, which are akin to paying rent to live on your own property! But that is just the endpoint of the corporation's evils bestowed upon society. It begins with clearing people out of affordable houses, knocking those houses down, and building atop where homes once were. The longer I live in DC, the further away from the city center I have to live, because all of these new condos are pricing me out.

Who benefits from all of this so-called development? Are the residents of DC making more money than they were before hypergentrification occurred? There are two very distinct sets of people who live in this city - the born-and-raised and the revolving-doors. Without looking up statistics, I would guess that life for the born-and-raised hasn't improved dramatically since DC's development boom began. Us revolving door types, those who move in, move out, and move in again, are the ones who benefit, I guess. We've been to college and are working in policy-related jobs, which will always be there regardless of the economic state of the city. We work a few years and decide to buy a condo, selling it for profit when DC starts to make us feel claustrophobic, then buying a new one the next time we move back to DC.

I'm not at that point yet, nor do I even want to buy a condo, but my some of my friends are starting to think about it, eying the massive new construction sites with hope. All I can wonder is who benefits? Do we get anything out of it, or is it just the corporation who reaps the rewards?

(Photos of construction site on corner of 14th and P St. NW)