Creating New NIMBYs Won’t Solve the Housing Crisis

Economist Joe Cortright wrote in his City Observatory blog last week about the defeat of SB-827 in California. California State Senator Scott Wiener’s bill was intended to legalize apartment construction near transit hubs, and preempt the local opposition that has kept developers from building housing throughout the state. Advocates of low-income housing opposed the bill due to a fear that new apartment construction would take place exclusively in low income communities, as it has in the past. Cortright argues that given the choice between an affluent area and a lower-income area, developers generally would opt to build housing where people have more money to spend. According to Cortright, the goal of equity is better served by building more housing everywhere, rather than by empowering more communities to block new construction projects. Read more.