In his new book The Human City, Joel Kotkin tries to use NIMBYism as an argument against urbanism. He cites numerous examples of NIMBYism in wealthy city neighborhoods, and suggests that these examples rebut "the largely unsupported notion that ever more people want to move 'back to the city'." … [Read more...]
The “Global Buyers” Argument
One common argument against building new market-rate housing is that there is an infinite supply of rich foreigners willing to soak up new supply. One obvious flaw in this argument is that housing prices do occasionally go down even in expensive places.But even leaving aside this reality, the … [Read more...]
Episode 02: Emily Hamilton on Land-Use Regulation and the Cost of Housing
When I was scheduling out the first few episodes of the Market Urbanism Podcast, it seemed natural to start with one of Market Urbanism's favorite topics: the relationship between land-use regulation and rising housing costs in American cities. This week I sit down with Emily Hamilton, a regular … [Read more...]
Does Home-sharing Create Negative Externalities?
A decade or two ago, a traveler who wished to stay in a city temporarily had no alternative to a hotel. Even if the owner of a house or condominium wished to rent out a room for a short period of time, the costs of advertising in a newspaper would have at least partially canceled out the … [Read more...]
Do The Rich Cause High Rents?
One common argument against building new housing is that new construction will never reduce housing costs, because the influx of ultra-rich people into high-cost cities creates an insatiable level of demand.I recently found a source of information that may be relevant to this argument: the … [Read more...]
Why No Micro-Apartments in Chicago?
Several cities have jumped on the bandwagon of building Micro-apartments, a hot trend in apartment development. San Francisco and Seattle already have them. New York outlawed them, but is testing them on one project, and may legalize them again. Even developers in smaller cities like … [Read more...]
Supply-And-Demand Denial And Climate Change Denial
I have criticized the idea that the law of supply and demand no longer applies to big-city housing (or, as I call it, supply-and-demand denialism, or "SDD" for short). It just occurred to me that there are a few similarities between supply-and-demand denialists and those who deny climate change. To … [Read more...]
So Much For The Foreign Oligarchs
One common argument against new housing in high-cost cities is that the rise of global capitalism makes demand for urban housing essentially unlimited: if new apartments in Manhattan or San Francisco are built, they will be taken over by foreign billionaires in quest of American real estate, who … [Read more...]