{"id":135596,"date":"2024-11-25T07:40:10","date_gmt":"2024-11-25T05:40:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tietopankki.crnet.fi\/fi\/news\/tens-of-thousands-protest-high-rents-in-barcelona\/"},"modified":"2024-11-25T07:40:10","modified_gmt":"2024-11-25T05:40:10","slug":"tens-of-thousands-protest-high-rents-in-barcelona","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tietopankki.crnet.fi\/en\/news\/tens-of-thousands-protest-high-rents-in-barcelona\/","title":{"rendered":"Tens of thousands protest high rents in Barcelona"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mp_wrapper\">\n  <div class=\"mepr-unauthorized-message\">\n    <p>You are unauthorized to view this page.<\/p>\n  <\/div>\n  <div class=\"mepr-login-form-wrap\">\n            \n<div class=\"mp_wrapper mp_login_form\">\n                  <!-- mp-login-form-start -->     <form name=\"mepr_loginform\" id=\"mepr_loginform\" class=\"mepr-form\" action=\"https:\/\/tietopankki.crnet.fi\/en\/login-2\/\" method=\"post\" data-trp-original-action=\"https:\/\/tietopankki.crnet.fi\/en\/login-2\/\">\n            <div class=\"mp-form-row mepr_username\">\n        <div class=\"mp-form-label\">\n                              <label for=\"user_login\">Username<\/label>\n        <\/div>\n        <input type=\"text\" name=\"log\" id=\"user_login\" value=\"\" \/>\n      <\/div>\n      <div class=\"mp-form-row mepr_password\">\n        <div class=\"mp-form-label\">\n          <label for=\"user_pass\">Password<\/label>\n          <div class=\"mp-hide-pw\">\n            <input type=\"password\" name=\"pwd\" id=\"user_pass\" value=\"\" \/>\n            <button type=\"button\" class=\"button mp-hide-pw hide-if-no-js\" data-toggle=\"0\" aria-label=\"Show password\">\n              <span class=\"dashicons dashicons-visibility\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><\/span>\n            <\/button>\n          <\/div>\n        <\/div>\n      <\/div>\n            <div>\n        <label><input name=\"rememberme\" type=\"checkbox\" id=\"rememberme\" value=\"forever\" \/> Remember Me<\/label>\n      <\/div>\n      <div class=\"mp-spacer\">&nbsp;<\/div>\n      <div class=\"submit\">\n        <input type=\"submit\" name=\"wp-submit\" id=\"wp-submit\" class=\"button-primary mepr-share-button\" value=\"Log In\" \/>\n        <input type=\"hidden\" name=\"redirect_to\" value=\"\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135596\" \/>\n        <input type=\"hidden\" name=\"mepr_process_login_form\" value=\"true\" \/>\n        <input type=\"hidden\" name=\"mepr_is_login_page\" value=\"false\" \/>\n      <\/div>\n    <input type=\"hidden\" name=\"trp-form-language\" value=\"en\"\/><\/form>\n    <div class=\"mp-spacer\">&nbsp;<\/div>\n    <div class=\"mepr-login-actions\">\n        <a\n          href=\"https:\/\/tietopankki.crnet.fi\/en\/login-2\/?action=forgot_password\"\n          title=\"Click here to reset your password\"\n        >\n          Forgot Password        <\/a>\n    <\/div>\n\n      \n    <!-- mp-login-form-end --> \n  <\/div>\n      <\/div>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"smart_content_wrapper\">\n<p>A large number of Spaniards took to the streets of Barcelona on Saturday night to protest a housing crunch and the high cost of renting an apartment in the city. Tens of thousands of people clogged the streets of downtown Barcelona on Saturday to protest the rising cost of renting an apartment in the popular tourist destination. The protesters blocked traffic on main avenues in the city centre, holding up signs in reading \u201cFewer apartments for investing and more homes for living&#8221; and \u201cThe people without homes uphold their rights.\u201d They are demanding a 50% drop in rents and are calling for a strike if the housing situation does not improve. The protest&#8217;s organisers claimed that over 126,000 took part, while local police put their estimate at around 22,000.<\/p>\n<p>The high cost of housing has become a major issue in Spain, much like the housing crunch being experienced across many other parts of the world. The average rent in the country has doubled in the last 10 years &#8211; the price per square metre has gone from \u20ac7.2 in 2014 to \u20ac13 this year, according to online real estate website Idealista. The skyrocketing rent is even more severe in major cities like Barcelona and Madrid, while incomes, particularly for younger people, have lagged well behind.<\/p>\n<p>One protester said he is \u201cfrustrated and scared\u201d after being told by the owners of the apartment he had been renting for the past 15 years in Barcelona\u2019s city centre that he must move out. He believes that they plan to renovate the apartment and boost its price. Despite earning a &#8220;decent salary&#8221;, he feels he &#8220;may be forced to leave town&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>A Bank of Spain report says that nearly 40% of Spaniards who rent spend an average of 40% of their income on rents and utilities, much higher to the European Union average of 27%. Ignasi Mart\u00ed, a professor for Esade business school and head of its Dignified Housing Observatory stressed that \u201cWe are talking about a housing emergency. It means people having many difficulties both in accessing and staying in their homes.\u201d A major factor driving rental prices upwards has been short-term renters, including tourits. Generally, migrants to Spain are disproportionately hit by the high rents due to them not having enough savings.<\/p>\n<p>Spain is at the lower end of OECD countries, with under 2% of all housing available being public housing for rent (the OECD average is 7%). France is at 14%, Britain 16% and the Netherlands 34%. Carme Arcarazo, a spokesperson for Barcelona\u2019s Tenants Union which helped organise the protest, said that renters should go on a \u201crent strike\u201d and stop paying their monthly rents in a mass protest movement. \u201cI think we the tenants have understood that this depends on us. That we can\u2019t keep asking and making demands to the authorities and waiting for an answer. We must take the reins of the situation,\u201d Arcarazo said. \u201cSo, if they (the owners) won\u2019t lower the rent, then we will force them to do it.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><a rel=\"noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.euronews.com\/my-europe\/2024\/11\/24\/tens-of-thousands-protest-high-rents-in-barcelona\">Read more&gt;&gt;<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Source: <a rel=\"noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.euronews.com\/my-europe\/2024\/11\/24\/tens-of-thousands-protest-high-rents-in-barcelona\">Euronews<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>The post <a rel=\"noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/vastuullisuusuutiset.fi\/fi\/csr-news-en\/tens-of-thousands-protest-high-rents-in-barcelona\/\">Tens of thousands protest high rents in Barcelona<\/a> appeared first on <a rel=\"noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/vastuullisuusuutiset.fi\/fi\">Vastuullisuusuutiset.fi<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[4450,555,17057],"class_list":["post-135596","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-barcelona","tag-csr-news-en","tag-high-rent"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tietopankki.crnet.fi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135596","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tietopankki.crnet.fi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tietopankki.crnet.fi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tietopankki.crnet.fi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tietopankki.crnet.fi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=135596"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tietopankki.crnet.fi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135596\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tietopankki.crnet.fi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=135596"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tietopankki.crnet.fi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=135596"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tietopankki.crnet.fi\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=135596"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}