Opinion
Stop calling it a housing crisis. Call it a policy
A crisis is something that happens to you. What we have is the predictable result of decisions made over thirty years.
Political editor
6 min read
A residential building site, one of few in the city this year.
We talk about the housing crisis as if it were a storm: sudden, external, nobody’s fault. It is none of those things.
It is the result of zoning rules, tax incentives and planning decisions, each made deliberately, most of them still in force.
Decisions, not weather
Rules that limit building height. Tax breaks that reward owning a second home. Planning processes that let a single objection delay a project for years. Each can be changed by a vote.
Calling it a crisis lets everyone off the hook. Calling it a policy tells us who can fix it.
What to change first
Start with the rules that cost nothing to scrap: parking minimums, height limits near stations and the ban on apartments above shops.
Topics
Daniel Szabo
Political editor
Daniel covers parliaments, coalitions and the policies that come out of them.
