As Washington debates how many hundreds-of-billions of the nearly trillion-dollar stimulus will go towards infrastructure or to other spending/tax cut schemes, pundits claim that spending billions on "shovel ready" public works projects can effectively create jobs that will lead to recovery. As … [Read more...]
Irrationality Towards Shortages
Brendan Crain at Where tipped me off to a great post by Ryan Avent at The Bellows. Here's a little snippet of Shortage:For whatever reason, we’re not built to naturally internalize negative externalities. When riding on a crowded highway, no one (no non-economist, at any rate) curses the … [Read more...]
Glaeser: Let Housing Prices Fall
Ed Glaeser gives three compelling reasons why the government should end their infatuation with high housing prices. (Nonetheless, some of the same politicians speak through the other side of their mouths about promoting housing affordability): Why We Should Let Housing Prices Keep FallingThere … [Read more...]
Russell Roberts on Government Intervention in Housing
Russell Roberts of George Mason University, CafeHayek, and Econtalk wrote of series of Cafe Hayek posts on the various federal interventions in the housing market:Housing markets without the benefit of hindsightFannie reaches its goals--sort ofZero Down!Fannie and Freddie's other … [Read more...]
Urban[ism] Legend: Density is Bad for the Environment
This is a topic I want to cover more thoroughly, but for now I present a one hour documentary video on green buildings for you leisurely viewing.I came across the snagfilms website from a recent Wall Street Journal article. Most of the documentary videos lean towards "progressive" tastes, but … [Read more...]
Rent Control Part 4: Conclusion and Solutions
Welcome to the final post in the series discussing the consequences of rent control. Thank you to the subscribers who have patiently awaited each new post. I hope everyone found it enlightening. If you haven't read the entire series, you can catch up with these links: Rent Control Part One: … [Read more...]