On the Housing Crisis

Housing Shortage:
- Herbert Hoover that we’re short one million homes - Source
What’s at stake in these disputes is the structure of American civilization - Source
A “small c” conservative philosophy that a smaller local government is better and more responsive to its citizens than a bigger one further away. - Source
Housing is a “bundled purchase,” or a big decision governed by a million little variables: The number of bedrooms, the size of the yard, the quality of local schools, proximity to work, family and transit. Hanging over all of this is, of course, the price. - Source

Choice Variables:
- The level of government at which we choose to resolve a conflict shapes public opinion and the eventual outcome
- Where should the power to make land-use decisions lie?
- Everyone has a little NIMBY in them. It doesn’t have to be the part that wins.
- Washington, Oregon, California, Utah, Montana, and Massachusetts have, to varying degrees, pulled authority for land-use decisions up to the state level.
- In the U.S., moving decision-making from the hyper-local level to the state level is the first step to fixing the broken development process. This would ensure that a larger proportion of voters had a say, though an indirect one, in housing, transportation, and renewable-energy policy, because more people vote in these elections than hyperlocal ones. We have to let representative democracy actually work.
- On some level, Americans — with our unique system of federalism — have always voted with out feet.
Subjectivity:
- “Opposing a wind turbine because you think it might be ugly is not reasonable.”
Thesis: Homelessness is a primarily a function of the broader housing unaffordability crisis, which in turn is primarily a function of how difficult local governments have made building new housing in the places that need it the most.