you're not taking away anyone's agency by creating new options. of course you want to create options the very best you can, that people will be excited about. no one force people to move. 1/

imagining you are providing "agency" only by providing new housing where risk averse private money will provide it is dumb. you are providing agency by creating new options, the more and better you create the more agency. 2/

restricting to already desirable places restricts agency, cuz you just can't do it at scale. /fin

postscript: no polity ever does things perfectly. you do the best you can, but you'll overshoot or undershoot. if i had to pick a problem, i'd gladly take China's housing overshoot over our undershoot. ps1/

the fact that China's real-estate boom, no bubble, is collapsing means more of that housing will become available to people of lower means. ps2/

does that suck for the people who bought investment properties during the boom? yes it does. that will be its own political problem for the Chinese govt to deal with. ps3/

but the worst housing problem is scarcity of quality, well-maintained, reasonably located, transport served housing. i wish that we like China were dealing with the problems of overshoot. /psfin