FET (old posts)

There is a common thread between the boom in lumber prices in the U.S. and dynamic models of housing supply.  That common element is that lo...

The NSW government is proposing to give homebuyers the option to not pay stamp duty on their housing purchase and instead opt to pay an ongo...

I have fairly unique views on zoning, housing supply and prices. Here they are. Presentation slides covering similar issues can be downloade...

Let us start by assuming that the property system is competitive and see how far that gets us in making sense of property pricing. After all...

Yes In My Back Yard (YIMBY) is the belief that more housing density in your neighbourhood is good. But I argue that almost nobody who makes ...

1/8 One year ago, the left-leaning government of Berlin introduced unprecedented rent controls. Lots of economists warned against it. So wha...

In a podcast interview with the terrific Joseph Walker, geneticist Robert Plomin said something that stuck in my mind—"in a meritocrac...

George was concerned that property owners gained all the economic rents. But his logic relies on a quite arbitrary and limited concept of pr...

Anthony Downs and various others made the observation that “the equilibrium speed of car traffic on a road network is determined by the ave...

NOTE: This post was written in November 2020 for a magazine that later decided it was too controversial. Some notes to reflect new informati...