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Yuppie Fishtanks: YIMBYism explained without "supply and demand"

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YIMBYism is the idea that cities need to build more housing in order to relieve upward pressure on rents. In Northern California, where I live, YIMBYs tend to get into fights with progressives about market-rate housing. YIMBYs don't want to build only market-rate housing, but they think market-rate housing has to be an important component. NorCal progressives, in contrast, tend to think that market-rate housing is bad - either they think it lures more high-earners into a city and pushes up rents ( induced demand ), or they object to private housing developers making profits, or market-rate housing just sounds like cities catering to the needs of richer residents instead of poorer ones. Instead, the progressives tend to support what they call "affordable housing" - either public housing, government-subsidized housing, or privately-subsidized housing mandated by inclusionary zoning . When defending market-rate housing, many YIMBYs appeal to the idea of supply and demand. If...
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Noah Smith's Japan Travel Guide

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Now is a GREAT time to travel to Japan. The country has really opened up, thanks to Abenomics, a weak yen, and the impending 2020 Tokyo Olympics. New technology has also made it a lot easier to get around the country, and to find cool stuff. Japan is in the middle of a huge tourism boom, and who knows how long it'll last, so you might as well be part of it. Go see the world, take a trip to Japan! Anyway, for a long time, people have been asking me for tips about what to do when they go to Japan. So instead of re-writing a list of recommendations every time, I thought I'd write a blog post. So here it is: Noah Smith's Abbreviated Illustrated Guide to Travel in Japan. This list is HEAVILY weighted toward the " urban Japan experience ", rather than touristy/historical stuff like temples, shrines, etc. or outdoorsy stuff like skiing and hiking. I've found that Japanese cities are the most distinctive thing about the country, and that people who do the "wander...
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Book Review - "The Space Between Us"

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"Hey, there ain't no space between us!" - a flight attendant who saw me reading this book This is a very important book about a very important topic (segregation and race relations). It is also a book that strongly agrees with my priors about how the world works. And not just my priors, but with my desires - I want  segregation to be a bad thing. So because I'm so biased in favor of this book's thesis, I'm going to try to be especially hard on it in this review. Just realize that that's what I'm doing here. You should absolutely read this book. The research it explains is eye-opening, well-executed, and very important for our national future. And the theory that Enos weaves to explain his observations probably captures important features of reality, and deserves to be a central part of our national discussion. Having said that, let me proceed to being overly critical. The Basic Idea A very simplified version of Enos' basic theory goes like this: Ra...
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