For a growing chorus of urbanists and city-builders, the key to rebuilding our cities, reigniting innovation, and improving productivity lies in getting rid of the onerous zoning codes and land-use restrictions that are holding back much-needed development—particularly housing—in leading superstar cities and tech hubs like New York and San Francisco.
In a much cited and highly influential study of a year or so ago, two economists, Chang-Tai Hsieh of the University of Chicago and Enrico Moretti of the University of California at Berkeley estimated that land-use restrictions reduced U.S. GDP as a whole by roughly 9 percent a year—roughly $1.5 trillion a year in today’s dollars. That’s a big bite.
