21st Century Luxury: Space

The limitedness of space, a future luxury by Octavia Mettenheimer

As the world population rises constantly and exponentially will do so in the future, space will become more and more a luxury. Already now the world is far too overpopulated resulting in all kind of shortages. We managed to flee the scarceness of space so far by building skyscrapers, enlarging the cities, increasing the transportation speed etc. However, there will be a limit to it. Especially the major cities are showing bizarre adaptations to this absolute basic need of life, to have room to live. The prices insanely high, so that no normal-wage person can afford a nice living. The best but most disturbing examples are the cage people of Hong Kong. Because the real estate prices and rents are so high, there is no other possibility for them then literally renting a cage. A 2sqm big box, that is their home. They share what seems to us still as small one-person room, with about 8 people, so that they can afford a housing at all.

Of course Hong Kong is an extreme example however, with increasing urbanization we can expect to see more of those horrible living conditions due to the limitedness of space. To afford an amount of space that can preserve your dignity will become a real luxury in the future. You can be assured that by then only the very rich people will be able to afford a room for each of their children left aside something like a living room or a real kitchen.