pretty much all the arguing about careers and making a living is really due to cost of living which is due to this graph, and almost nothing else.
The red area is housing that doesn’t exist. It’s what 2008 caused us not to build. Solve this and you solve everything. pic.twitter.com/UwVq3Ir4Qc
— Simon Sarris (@simonsarris) January 17, 2025
In broad outline, I agree. Without that home-building gap Trump would’ve never had a chance. Building enough housing still would not have solved that many good jobs were shipped to Mexico and China and never replaced — but an adequate home supply would’ve made us far less likely to go off the rails as a country.
It wasn’t just the effects of 2008 that caused this gap. Around then, NIMBYs really ramped up their bullshit. In a very real sense NIMBYs might ultimately cause the destruction of the United States more than any other single factor.