Affordable Housing Needs Affordable Land

16 October 2008 - 11:00am

Witold Rybzynski details the vicious cycle behind the nation's shortage of affordable housing.

"The housing market is in tatters, and house prices continue to fall precipitously in many parts of the country, so it might seem a strange time to bring up the subject of housing affordability. But one of the reasons we are in this mess is that people bought houses they couldn’t really afford. At some point in the future, consumer confidence will be restored and people will start buying houses again. ­Pent-­up demand, and the inevitable delays in ­re­starting an industry that has seen the withdrawal of many home builders, will likely produce a spike in prices, and once again the affordability issue will come to the ­fore."

Source: The Wilson Quarterly, October 15, 2008
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Short of erasing existing political and jurisdictional boundaries, citizens and officials need to develop the capacity to work across boundaries according to the "problem-sheds" of the land and water issues we face in the 21st century.