In a pair of posts, Scott Alexander goads his mostly-YIMBY readers by claiming to believe that density is likely to increase prices.To quantify his readers' views, he laid out a thought experiment in a Google poll, the results of which we'll no doubt see in a few days. You can see the poll … [Read more...]
Rent regulation in MoCo
In my home county, Montgomery County, Maryland, rent control is on the agenda after County Executive Marc Elrich and a county council majority each released competing proposals to cap annual rent increases.Adam Pagnucco responded with a series of posts at Montgomery Perspective about the … [Read more...]
Book Review: HIAHP
Gregg Colburn and Clayton Page Aldern's book Homelessness is a Housing Problem filled such a useful niche that even before I read it, I had started referring to it by acronym. But, like Missing Middle Housing, this book moved my priors in the opposite direction than the authors intended.As a … [Read more...]
Xiaodi Li, Misunderstood
Max Holleran's book, Richard Schragger's law review article, and randos on Twitter all find pessimistic views on housing supply from a paper by Xiaodi Li. But the paper is asking a narrow question and yielding an optimistic answer. This post tries to provide some context.EDITED 3/3: I've edited … [Read more...]
Should governments nudge land assembly?
For a reading group, I recently read two papers about the costs and (in)efficiencies around land assembly. One advocated nudging small landowners into land assembly; the other is an implicit caution against doing so.Graduated Density ZoningAlthough he's mostly known for parking research and … [Read more...]
Introducing Szymon Pifczyk
New year, new ideas. Market Urbanism is proud to welcome Szymon Pifczyk as a new writer who will bring new perspectives to this ever-evolving blog. Szymon's Polish-language Twitter handle is @sheemawn, which is a pronunciation clue. His English-language account is the popular @YIMBYPoland.Here's … [Read more...]
Are the new carbon footprint maps accurate?
It's pretty obvious that people use less energy when they live in urban areas versus suburbs: they take fewer and shorter drives and they heat and cool less square footage per person. But can that be quantified accurately at a local level and compared across disparate places? Maybe.A recent … [Read more...]
Wanted: Market urbanist research assistant
Ever wondered how you could make your urbanism hobby a full-time job? Come work with me & Emily Hamilton at the Mercatus Center's Urbanity project:Are you a gritty, liberty-minded researcher who is passionate about cities? This is a unique opportunity for an aspiring scholar to develop a … [Read more...]