Housing Is Scarce Because Property Rights Are Weak
The SCOTUS decision that enshrined zoning was incredibly unserious
Baby #3 is less than a month old so I will keep this short. Everyone is healthy, reasonably happy, and even sort of well-rested. This has been our least overwhelming newborn experience by far. The transition from two to three kids has been much less difficult than we were told to expect (I will probably regret writing that, I thought again, as I voice to texted this blog post on my phone with the baby on my shoulder).
The American Conservative has published ~2,000 words by yours truly about weak property rights as a driver of the housing affordability crisis, through David Cowan’s project The American System. Think Henry Clay crossed with progress studies.
Even with some foreknowledge, I was taken aback by the wooliness and unseriousness of the U.S. Supreme Court decision that upheld single-family zoning. In the 1926 case of Euclid v. Ambler Realty decision, SCOTUS infamously asserted that,
[V]ery often the apartment house is a mere parasite, constructed in order to take advantage of the open spaces and attractive surroundings created by the residential character of the district. Moreover, the coming of one apartment house is followed by others, interfering by their height and bulk with the free circulation of air and monopolizing the rays of the sun which otherwise would fall upon the smaller homes, and bringing, as their necessary accompaniments, the disturbing noises incident to increased traffic and business, and the occupation, by means of moving and parked automobiles, of larger portions of the streets, thus detracting from their safety and depriving children of the privilege of quiet and open spaces for play, enjoyed by those in more favored localities-until, finally, the residential character of the neighborhood and its desirability as a place of detached residences are utterly destroyed.
Translation: safe streets and quiet open spaces for children to play are a privilege reserved for favored localities. We must ensure the sun falls on single-family homes! What Fourteenth Amendment? The opinion drips with class prejudice and worse. It really does treat people like pollution. And rests on spurious arguments about traffic that we still encounter today as local housing advocates.
I am proud of the whole essay and hope you enjoy it. More to come in 2024.
If you enjoy this blog or want to work together, please contact lucagattonicelli@substack.com. I would love to write about a topic suggested by a reader. Visit YIMBYs of Northern Virginia, the all-volunteer grassroots pro-housing organization I founded, at yimbysofnova.org.