The High Cost of High-Cost Housing

Until COVID-19 there was no sign of the apocalypse he warns about. Also I am not sure if I believe it is “cheaper to provision infrastructure to dense areas”. I mean, look how California can (almost) afford to run high speed rail from Fresno to Bakersfield but the major demand centers of Los Angeles and San Francisco might as well be on the moon. Suburban and rural areas will bend over to accommodate newcomers whereas one thing that is dense in urban areas are all the entitled palms you have to grease to accomplish anything.

I wonder if the apparent high productivity of urban areas is an illusion. Google and Facebook are astride the world because of (1) two-sided markets and (2) buying up competition. If you doubled the housing supply in the Bay Area they could not double their revenue. The entitled attitude of many urban dwellers comes from looking at those skyscrapers that seem to hang in the air without any support —- I am not one of them, but many people think the whole finance sector is a scam.