How The History of the Silk Roads Effects Us Today

   

Views of history not taught to us in school

      Monday I received some literature, that I believe was approved by the City of Palm Springs and sent to every resident, regarding Proposition C. Proposition C is about restricting homes that can be listed as AirBNB residences. The city, as all governmental agencies, is bemoaning the issue that they say will create an unfriendly environment for tourists who might find other places to visit (read spend their money elsewhere). The owners of neighboring homes and those in condo complexes want even tougher restrictions because of the noise, congestion and turmoil short term rentals cause.

     It is a lose-lose proposition for both sides. Those that purchased, on the cheap, foreclosed houses during the Great Recession and are trying to turn a fast buck and those who purchased their homes as, well, homes, a place to quietly live, for many, their last years in retirement. 

     When I saw a TV ad the following night talking about what the city has done with stricter rules, closing down problem homes, the reduction of police calls ... you know the drill, I began to wonder. I considered my growing up and wondered when did a home become something that needed to be monetized? What was wrong with hotels and motels? And from the horror stories that are also related on the nightly news, newspapers and on the web about what happens in some of these AirBNB homes, who would ever rent to strangers?

     Cities, states, countries, governments can never resist the idea of gathering more money. Many are learning to play the game of scare tactics ... not unlike the leaders that are elected in them. Palm Springs has a long history of tourism as close reading of the Sunday Desert Sun will attest. For the city to blatantly say no one will come, well, there have been no statistics about the ratio of AirBNB visitors to those staying in hotels and motels. Palm Springs is filled with them and more are being built all over the Coachella Valley. Surely few of the 125,000 visitors coming to two three-day weekends of the Coachella Music Festival and 100,000 the following weekend for Stagecoach stayed in a home. The entire valley has at best 500,000 residents.

     In a country where nearly every entity is deeply in arrears regarding their pension plans, does a small city like Palm Springs need more employees that puts their pension plans deeper in debt? You might question that a city has to create a department to monitor short term rentals to begin with. A recent ½% sales tax was passed that, despite all the rhetoric, essentially tries to get those promises reasonably paid. This after years (read past newspapers) of deals the city made that have failed.

     Residents have recently been regaled with Spring Break events that culminated with it's demise after a riot in 1986. For several years the city made it more and more difficult for these antics to be repeated until by 1990 students went somewhere else. Did the city suffer that much? At all?

     I can remember being in Palm Springs for Village Fest, a weekly Thursday evening street fair crowded with residents and visitors long before AirBNB. Where did the tourists come from? Where did they stay?

     I'm reading an amazing book by Peter Frankopan. His THE SILK ROADS: A New History of the World recounts the history that we were never taught. I learned, for the first time, that the Roman Senate issued edicts on the excessive wearing of silk in around 5 A.D. For those not in the know, all silk until it was finally made in Europe in the 16th century, came from China. 

     What really caught my eye though was his recounting of the British East India Company and its problems in the 1700's. Due to rapid expansion, wars, bribes and such, the company found itself insolvent. The Brits, in their wisdom, felt the company was "too big to fail." Sound familiar? Their solution, as the solution of most governments is, was to tax, in this case tea. And guess whose tea was going to be taxed? You guessed it, the American colonies. They resisted saying that it was taxation without representation. We all know what followed.

     Frankopan's argument is that events in one part of the world have historically had effects in other parts. Winners write the history's we read and learn. His book shows over and over again how this was and is still, today, true. Yet, as Santana so wisely observed, "Those that forget history are condemned to relive it." I might add that it's hard to forget what you were never taught.

     The trade wars that followed the Great Depression are considered, by many, for being the cause of much that followed. To protect us from having to experience this again, laws were put in place that were followed until the late 90's. Alan Greenspan helped in their dismantling by saying these laws were never used, were not needed and restricted the flow of money. He also said that the whiz kids on Wall Street should be able to monitor their own behavior. We all know what happened next.

     Most of my friends hate history. I can see their eyes glaze over what I recount some fascinating, to me, book regarding things that happened and then relate how they are being repeated today. And yet, we are increasingly finding that we are reliving the past, yet again.

     In closing, I have not made my mind up about Proposition C. I can see both sides of this issue and wonder, how much are we willing to give up for the pursuit of money. Does everything we do and see need to be monetized? I moved to Palm Springs to get away from Los Angeles, San Francisco, even San Diego that were once sleepier and calmer. Does Palm Springs want to be yet another extension of the megalopolis that is Los Angeles? More importantly, will we allow many of those AirBNB homes, many owned by residents of other cities, be the tail that wagged the dog? I guess we will find out the night of June 5, 2018.