Market Urbanism

Liberalizing cities | From the bottom up

“Market Urbanism” refers to the synthesis of classical liberal economics and ethics (market), with an appreciation of the urban way of life and its benefits to society (urbanism). We advocate for the emergence of bottom up solutions to urban issues, as opposed to ones imposed from the top down.

Financing Suburbia: How government mortgage policy determined where you live

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The government exercises tremendous power over residential design in the US. Its influence is nearly invisible, because it works through complex financing programs, insurance incentives, and secondary markets. These mechanisms go unnoticed, but their effect is hard to miss—they remade the United … [Read more...]

Subsidizing Suburbia: A forgotten history of how the government created suburbia

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This is the first article of a five-part series on suburbia in the United States. In primary school, one of my friends lived in a duplex. This fact blew my mind. To my inexperienced 7-year-old mind, a duplex barely registered as a house. Her family shared a driveway with their neighbors, and their … [Read more...]

NIMBY Contradictions

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Ever since zoning was invented in the 1920s, homeowners have argued that limits on density and on multifamily housing are necessary to protect property values.  But today, urban NIMBYs seek to prevent new housing on the ground that new housing will lead to gentrification, which will in turn lead to … [Read more...]

Congressional Housing Subsidies Won’t Lower DC Housing Prices, But Liberalizing Zoning Will

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During his last days in office, former Representative Jason Chaffetz must have forgotten he is supposed to be a fiscal conservative. His recent comments that members of Congress need $2,500 stipends to afford housing in DC reflect a complete ignorance of both the reasons for high housing prices and … [Read more...]

More on “Empty Houses”

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I recently saw a Facebook post asserting that San Francisco has 30,000 vacant units, so therefore no market-rate housing should be built.   So I looked up Census data on these allegedly empty units. It is true, according to the Census Factfinder website, that there are 30,000 or so unoccupied … [Read more...]

The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America

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Richard Rothstein’s “The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America” should be required reading for YIMBYs and urbanists of any ideological stripe. Rothstein argues that housing segregation in the US has been the intentional outcome of policy decisions made at every … [Read more...]

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