> but generally avoids the number one factor driving this development, which is middle class likes suburbs and continues to demand them.

The middle class can have suburbs, if they want, but they have to pay for them. Marohn's whole point is that cash accounting, federal grants, and other tricks are hiding the true costs of suburbs and keeping the price artificially (and unsustainably) low. And when prices are kept artificially low, of course there's lots of demand; that's a basic principle of economics.

But would the middle class still demand suburbs if they had to stomach the higher taxes to honestly pay for them? That is the open question.