
Clever reforms can reduce the power of NIMBYs and cut housing costs - roymurdock
http://www.economist.com/node/21696949
======
ancap
The chief problem with the idea of NIMBY is that it is not really the
concerned party's back yard. A more accurate term for the concept might be
NIMNBY (Not In My Neighbors' Back Yard).

NIMBY is an affront to the concept of property rights. But, some say, the
concerned party has the legitimate concern that development on a neighboring
property will negatively impact the value of their own property. While an
understandable concern to have, it does not justify the prevention of allowing
the neighbor to develop on their rightfully owned property; just as company A
should not be allowed to prevent company B from creating widgets because the
extra competition will impact company A's bottom line.

~~~
ghaff
Backyard in this context means something more akin to neighborhood/city/etc.
as opposed to patch of green behoind hous

Many property rights are limited in various ways--often by zoning in the case
of land. And, typically, those limitations would be known at the time of
purchase. Most would agree some level of zoning is reasonable; no incinerators
or drilling for oil in residential neighborhoods for example.

I actually agree that excessive permitting processes that block otherwise
allowed development are often a problem. But some level of zoning (whatever
you call it) is effectively required for a functioning city or other
community.

~~~
Retric
Zoning is a wide topic. Requiring buildings to be safe for the area is one
thing. Forcing Residential and Commercial property to widely different areas
is a common if terrible idea.

Central planning rarely works well. At best zoning could penalize some types
of development to cover very real external costs, but not outlaw them.

~~~
davidw
I think most of us have some fuzzy concepts about some things being 'a step
too far', but I'll admit to not having a great idea where or how to draw the
line.

It would suck to have an outdoor, late night heavy metal venue open up in an
adjacent property, for instance.

OTOH, a lot of the limits on housing height and density and car requirements
seem like bunk to me. And I'd rather live closer than farther to basic
amenities like a grocery store, some restaurants, a small bar... stuff like
that. I loved that about life in Italy.

~~~
ancap
Your example is already a solved problem with the theory of homesteading.
Whoever homesteaded the property first has the right to enjoy their property
in the manner they originally possessed it. In this case, the outdoor, heavy
metal music would be a trespass upon adjacent properties (unless they received
an easement). Conversely in homesteading theory, if the outdoor, late night
heavy metal venue was there first, you could not move in adjacently and expect
to shut them down for excessive noise.

~~~
davidw
Ok, but what about...

Someone:

* buys an apartment and decides to turn it into an office for a few accountants.

* buys a house and decides to build a corner store, like this: [https://goo.gl/maps/jcHex9ndsFv](https://goo.gl/maps/jcHex9ndsFv)

* buys a house and tears it down to create a small used clothing store.

* buys a house and turns it into a small restaurant.

* buys a house and turns it into a bar.

My guess is that people are going to complain about some of these things, but
not others. However, if you don't allow anyone to change things ever, you get
a very rigid and brittle city. What would we do with the stables if they had
never been allowed to change into something else?

~~~
ancap
I'm not sure what the issue is with any of those scenarios. If someone
rightfully obtains a property they are in the same position as the original
homesteader.

~~~
davidw
So... the original homesteader builds a house somewhere.

Other houses are built nearby. It's a quiet neighborhood.

I buy the original homesteader house and open my heavy metal venue? And that's
ok? I bet the neighbors won't be happy.

I get the concept of "you _chose_ to build your house next to a heavy metal
venue and they were there first, so you can put a sock in it", but it's kind
of incomplete.

~~~
ancap
>I buy the original homesteader house and open my heavy metal venue? And
that's ok? I bet the neighbors won't be happy.

No, that's not ok. The neighbor's have homesteaded their property (or obtained
it from the original homesteaders) and the noise would be a trespass on their
properties.

~~~
davidw
How about a punk music bar that sees people coming and going at all hours.
It's soundproofed, though and let's say the patrons are fairly quiet outside,
although they sure look out of place in the neighborhood.

The neighbors would not be happy.

~~~
ancap
It's ok for neighbors to not be happy. I can be unhappy if my neighbor paints
their house chartreuse, but it doesn't mean I should have any say on what
color my neighbor's house should be. For those who want to ensure their
neighbor's home is not turned into a punk music bar, they can either buy the
neighbor's home and rent it out (kind of like Mark Zuckerberg does), form some
sort of HOA, or move into a neighborhood with an existing HOA.

~~~
davidw
Fine, but that's pretty far outside of the mainstream these days, so if the
neighbors don't like it, they can and will block it, unfortunately.

------
owlmonkey
TILT sounds like an interesting idea. In San Francisco I suspect our best bet
is through California State laws offering density bonuses or provide as-of-
right building in some form, that overrides local planning constraints. For
example, AB 2501 is currently in the local government committee but is being
voted on this Wednesday:
[http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?...](http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=201520160AB2501)

If you feel compelled like me to support more housing in the bay area, please
write or call these Assemblymembers in the local government committee and ask
them to support it before Wednesday at 1:30 pm Pacific, even if you're not in
their district:

Susan Talamantes Eggman (Chair) -
[http://asmdc.org/members/a13](http://asmdc.org/members/a13) Marie Waldron
(Vice-Chair) - [https://ad75.asmrc.org/](https://ad75.asmrc.org/) Luis A.
Alejo - [http://asmdc.org/members/a30/](http://asmdc.org/members/a30/) Susan
A. Bonilla - [http://asmdc.org/members/a14/](http://asmdc.org/members/a14/)
David Chiu - [http://asmdc.org/members/a17/](http://asmdc.org/members/a17/)
Ken Cooley - [http://asmdc.org/members/a08/](http://asmdc.org/members/a08/)
Beth Gaines - [https://ad06.asmrc.org/](https://ad06.asmrc.org/) Richard S.
Gordon - [http://asmdc.org/members/a24/](http://asmdc.org/members/a24/) Eric
Linder - [https://ad60.asmrc.org/](https://ad60.asmrc.org/)

------
PeterStuer
The article seems to have it arse backwards. Yes, a lot of times this is a
situation of "Distributed Costs and Concentrated Benefits", but with the
benefits going to the property developer, and the costs to the impacted
community. NIMBY is the catchy phrase constructed by marketing to discredit
serious concerns people have when they are on the receiving end of someone's
'unacounted externality'. Technology has made it marginally cheaper to
organize a resistance, but it is still an uphill battle because of the natural
imbalance in the cost/benefits situation.

~~~
jvm
I completely agree that development creates negative externalities which are
legitimate complaints for neighbors. However, restrictions on development
create a regressive tax in the form of high rents, which is, as the article
describes, distributed broadly. What's needed is some sort of cost-benefit
balance between the two.

For example, I rent a 400 sq foot apartment in SF for $3k. The operating and
capital cost of the physical apartment is probably on the order of $1000 (I
have rented similar places in Montreal, which has ample housing, for <$1000).
That means that the other $2000, or about 2/3 of my rent, is the result of
apartment scarcity caused by development restrictions. If new development is
more costly, we could imagine my rent would be $1500 at market equilibrium if
there were no barriers to development and the city was covered in high rises
from bay to ocean, so I am effectively paying $1500/mo for restrictions on
development.

Those restrictions have value in the form of reducing community impacts, so
the question becomes, should the community as a whole pay a 100% "tax" on its
rents to avoid additional development? The policy also closes off market rate
housing in the city to any who can't afford the rents, which could be a
feature or a bug depending on your outlook.

I believe there is a goldilocks regime between the two extremes that we should
strive for, but our current system doesn't provide a mechanism for us as a
society to make a balanced cost/benefit tradeoff.

~~~
hiou
Do you happen to have another example of an city with a similar weather and
employment profile that is significantly cheaper? Regardless of development?

Is there unanimous agreement that high rents(which are occurring throughout
the US and abroad right now) are solely due to lack of development?

~~~
aljones
You shouldn't be concerned about unanimity. You should be concerned if it is
true or not.

[https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CgXjY3cWIAAVfCM.jpg:large](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CgXjY3cWIAAVfCM.jpg:large)

Unfortunately we can't run experiments on this question. Every city is unique,
and people tend to think very special.

------
nwah1
Everyone likes the idea of carrots. But I prefer sticks.

Landowners get windfall gains from surrounding development and government
services. We should have a high land value tax, to tax these unearned gains,
which would ensure that only people able to make productive use of prime land
will hold onto it.

For instance, a subway stop will boost the surrounding land value of every
property by hundreds of thousands of dollars, yet everyone else is footing the
bill for it. And worse, if the taxes are low enough, landowners can, in
effect, hold that prime land for ransom, and do nothing with it.
[https://vimeo.com/32548658](https://vimeo.com/32548658)

~~~
cyber
Excepting that in SF the "everyone" does not want the land owners to make
productive use of it: they want the status quo. (Well, the status quo of what
the remember as being the "high point".)

Having witnessed protests that occurred midway through the reconstruction of
offramps, (meaning an existing ramp was torn down, and they were half done
rebuilding it), it's not so much NIMBY, but NBAA: Never Build Anything,
Anywhere.

The only way that higher taxes would be beneficial is if SF landowners were
actually allowed the freedom to upgrade their properties. Zoning, especially
height restrictions (40' max over most of SF), as well as endless red tape,
make it really hard to make productive use of prime land. Regardless if it's
the original owner or new buyer _.

(_ A new buyer is granted some _slight_ advantage, but not enough to be
meaningful.)

------
dkopi
"Everyone in the city stands to gain from growth; productivity in skilled
cities rises with population, so when more people move in, all workers’
incomes should rise. But the gains from any particular property development
are relatively small and thinly spread, whereas the costs are highly
concentrated."

This sounds like yet another case of public choice theory:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_choice](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_choice)

------
tomohawk
We have planning at the county level. All that does is place power in the
hands of the powerful realtor/developer group.

As a result, local imbalances abound. If you live in an area where those sorts
of folks also live, it's really nice. If not, you get prison, dumps,
subsidized housing, etc built right next to you.

I can only imagine what this would look like if this was done at the state
level. Our state is solidly one party...

~~~
DavidHm
To some extent I believe that clustering of good (and bad) things is
inevitable when there is a central decision marker (or decision making body).

What I mena to say is once an area is nice (or has been designated as the next
"growth" area), then nice properties/malls/services etc are going to go there.
Industry buildings will cluster somewhere else, office buildings will cluster
in a 3rd area.

Of course, it sucks to be a resident in area that ends up being the low-value
one, but someone will end up having to get the short stick.

------
takno
You could just do more to encourage development of balanced countries by
deliberately skewing infrastructure investment to other places, and watching
people move out when large cities grind to a halt. Just because all the money
feels it wants to stay in London you don't have to _encourage_ it to

------
mattnewton
I'm skeptical that the bribes will be big enough to affect most land owners in
San Francisco, but I don't have any numbers handy about the average income of
the NIMBY's in that city. Just an intuition that they stand to lose far more
in property value than it is practical to pay them. Side note - Does anyone
know of a place to get that kind of information? Maybe it can be triangulated
from census data + some other source?

~~~
teacup50
The idea that upzoning decreases property values is a pernicious myth that
keeps being used to bludgeon these people as greedy NIMBYs.

Upzoning in response to demand increases property values. It's very simple:
you can charge more people high rent on the same plot.

This isn't guesswork, we have the numbers. Upzoning is financially beneficial
to existing home owners.

------
someguydave
I'm dubious that a few bribes will give pause to people who consider their
homes in jeopardy.

~~~
dingaling
I think the objective is to wash-out the casually-opposed with the bribe of
reduced property taxes, leaving the smaller hard-core opposition to be
tackled.

However they don't offer any novel ideas to address the often-genuine concerns
of that hard-core of 'NIMBYs'. Those are the ones opposed on principles or
personal experience.

For example in my neighbourhood the building of new developments had resulted
in hugely increased road-noise [0], to the extent that it's no longer pleasant
to sit in in the front garden. So naturally I'll oppose any further
development. No amount of trivial-tax-tinkering will convince me otherwise,
since it's my quality-of-life being affected.

[0] multiplied more-so by the fact that modern car tyres are much noisier, but
planning permission only considers the number of cars and not their cumulative
noise

~~~
Gibbon1
That's a good example of where orthodox economics breaks down; Money doesn't
substitute for a quiet garden.

~~~
AnthonyMouse
The problem is more that it could, but necessary amount of money isn't
feasible to pay.

Though on the other hand, that sort of problem _is_ solved by building taller
buildings, because then if you don't want to hear the traffic you can live on
the 20th floor.

~~~
teacup50
At which point you have a whole bunch of other problems, including not having
a garden in the first place.

That said, money does solve that problem too -- if a home owner accepts that
they're being pushed out by development, there's a pretty penny to be made in
selling out to developers.

------
gonzo
Talk about your clickbait headlines.

~~~
DavidHm
That's...the title of the Economist article.

Well, the subtitle, but the real title is "Terms of enlargement", which is not
really self-explanatory, is it?

~~~
chris_wot
It's not even clickbait. It's not sensationalist in any way really. It
actually captures in a one sentence summary exactly what the article is about.

I honestly think that there should be a reporting mechanism for folks to
complain about submarine articles, or click-bait headlines. So often I find
that they aren't the case and it adds zero to any actual discourse around the
subject matter itself.

I think if you have an issue with clickbait headlines you really should email
the site admins/moderators. They are pretty good about getting back to you,
mostly.

~~~
ghaff
"Click-bait" is another one of those terms that gets thrown around too far
regularly these days. MOST headlines are "click-bait" both online and in
print. Headlines are supposed to grab your interest whether because of the
topic itself, through clever wordplay (as the Economist tends to do), or
through perhaps less scrupulous means. If a headline is deceptive or otherwise
is misleading people (subject to the limitations of a short headline), say so
explicitly--don't default to click-bait.

~~~
chris_wot
Agreed. Even better than just saying so, it would be far more edifying for all
if the person making the claim would justify it with reasoning as to why the
headline is misleading!

Just using the words "click-bait" is even worse than a click-bait headline. In
fact, it just becomes forum-spam.

------
pwg
The article also completely ignores the effects of "easy money" in the price
inflation of housing costs.

By "easy money" I mean the period there where the banks would give almost
anyone with a pulse a huge size loan for a house purchase. Because everyone
was running around with an outsized "money press" in the form of their
approved bank loan value, they were quite capable of bidding prices up, which
is exactly what they did. Therefore, as to this cause of the price inflation,
it somewhat inverted the supply/demand curve in that prices rose to
accommodate greater supply of money in the hands of prospective purchasers.

Yes, building restrictions do play a part, but fully ignoring the effects of
using very cheap "other peoples money" for bidding on houses ignores another
significant factor in the inflation effect.

