at the margin, of course particular institutions matter. there is a project on the verge of getting built that will with more favorable institutions but won’t without. but the question is quantitative. 1/

one position is basically lots of housing would get built if only, say, zoning laws were more friendly. another position is there aren’t so many projects so close to the margin, given the inherent difficulty of getting infill done in affluent, already desirable neighborhoods, against opposition. 2/

i think the second position is closer to accurate than the first. that doesn’t mean some good projects wouldn’t happen with less restrictive eg zoning laws that fail to happen under the status quo. /fin

I guess the fundamental dispute is between those who think the change has to do with particular institutions of local democracy vs preferences and enfranchisement of people that will find expression under nearly any stable economic order. @dsquareddigest.bsky.social and i think it more the latter.

(note that the old “growth machine” urban politics were not primarily infill of already desirable, prosperous, enfranchised neighborhoods. eventually austins become houstons or dallases as a matter of scale and already-developedness, despite friendly zoning regimes.)

“A key to the pathology of the radical right it offers both a powerful sense of aristocratic elevation and a deep sense of wounded victimization. While in many senses contradictory, this combined sense of being better and being wronged is exceptionally attractive.”

cc @poetryforsupper.bsky.social it’s interesting to contrast the hostility to Christianity in these thinkers, as a fountainhead of universalism and therefore democracy, liberalism, socialism, versus the role of evangelicalism today.