And probably more racist.And moved on about my business.
Depending on the source, San Francisco's population is between 6.0 and 6.6% black vs. 14.2% for the country as a whole. S.F. city and county use zoning laws to keep black folks out.
The same goes for Seattle and Portland. Someone should do a story on it....
Well, there must be something in the air regarding the reality of big cities and a bit of honesty among journos writing about the current zeitgeist. There are some realities that should probably be faced.
On Monday we linked to "RIP, NYC's Middle Class: Why Families are Being Pushed Away From the City" by New Geography.
Yesterday The Atlantic published "Why Middle-Class Americans Can't Afford to Live in Liberal Cities" which we originally threw in the link-vault to use as background on another story but which I'll copy out here for the Trulia link:
Blue America has a problem: Even after adjusting for income, left-leaning metros tend to have worse income inequality and less affordable housing.
On April 2, 2014, a protester in Oakland, California, mounted a Yahoo bus, climbed to the front of the roof, and vomited onto the top of the windshield.
If not the year's most persuasive act of dissent, it was certainly one of the most memorable demonstrations in the Bay Area, where residents have marched, blockaded, and retched in protest of San Francisco's economic inequality and unaffordable housing. The city's gaps—between rich and poor, between housing need and housing supply—have been duly catalogued. Even among American tech hubs, San Francisco stands alone with both the most expensive real estate and the fewest new construction permits per unit since 1990.
But San Francisco's problem is bigger than San Francisco. Across the country, rich, dense cities are struggling with affordable housing, to the considerable anguish of their middle class families.
Among the 100 largest U.S. metros, 63 percent of homes are "within reach" for a middle-class family, according to Trulia. But among the 20 richest U.S. metros, just 47 percent of homes are affordable, including a national low of 14 percent in San Francisco. The firm defined "within reach" as a for-sale home with a total monthly payment (including mortgage and taxes) less than 31 percent of the metro's median household income.
If you line up the country's 100 richest metros from 1 to 100, household affordability falls as household income rises, even after you consider that middle class families in richer cities have more income. [The graph below considers only the 25 richest US metros to keep city names moderately legible within the computer screen.]
Rich Households = Unaffordable Houses?
The line isn't smooth—and there are exceptions—but the relationship is clear: In general, richer cities have less affordable housing.But there's a second reason why San Francisco's problem is emblematic of a national story. Liberal cities seem to have the worst affordability crises, according to Trulia chief economist Jed Kolko.In a recent article, Kolko divided the largest cities into 32 “red" metros where Romney got more votes than Obama in 2012 (e.g. Houston), 40 “light-blue” markets where Obama won by fewer than 20 points (e.g. Austin), and 28 “dark-blue” metros where Obama won by more than 20 points (e.g. L.A., SF, NYC). Although all three housing groups faced similar declines in the recession and similar bounce-backs in the recovery, affordability remains a bigger problem in the bluest cities....MORE
Finally, and probably of most interest to our readers, this morning's FT Alphaville post:
Affordable housing and the legit big-city whinge
Someone should probably do a story, eh?
Affordable housing and the legit big-city whinge
When city-dwellers moan about their high cost of living, they often elicit the unsympathetic retort that they should shut up and praise the ghost of Jane Jacobs for the cultural vibrancy of their neighborhoods, the lucrative jobs, and the artisanal pizza.
Living in a great city is a consumption good, you whinging ninnies — you SHOULD have to pay for it! Why do you think you’re entitled to live wherever you want?
Hey, fair enough.
But there’s a difference between grumblings about $5 cinnamon macchiatos and the more useful outrage about meaningful troubles that can be solved — a difference between #firstworldproblems and the healthier expression of annoyed patriotism towards one’s habitat.
I like living here and want to keep living here, which is why the problems I complain about aren’t enough to push me out. I’d rather stick around and see the problems solved. But those problems suck, so let’s start doing something about them.
To complain that rents, for instance, could and should be lower isn’t always a sign of yuppie entitlement. Nor is it mutually exclusive with appreciating the wonderful aspects of city life. Sometimes the gripe really is legitimate.*
A doorstopping thud of a McKinsey report dropped last week, canvassing the issue of insufficient affordable housing in cities throughout the world.
The biggest contributing problem is idle land, which can be freed for development with fairly straightforward, but always politically intractable, ideas. Amend anti-density zoning regulations. Loosen bureaucratic restrictions on new construction. Allow more building on government-owned land, or privatise it. Eliminate rent controls where possible.
The report included a useful, brief case study of New York City that makes plain the effects of insufficient affordable housing on its workers, a problem shared by so many of the world’s biggest cities.
A few excerpts follow, and we’ve bolded the highlights if you want to race through it:
We estimate that half of New York households cannot afford basic housing using 30 percent of their income. In New York City, median household income is $51,000. If we define low-income households as those earning 80 percent of the median, 1.2 million households (of about 3.1 million) would be classified low- income. …
We estimate that the affordability gap is about $18 billion per year (Exhibit 79). This represents about 4 percent of New York City’s GDP.
This ties well with current statistics, about 1.6 million households in New York City face housing challenges across different housing categories (Exhibit 80). About 55 percent of renters and 50 percent of households with mortgages are financially stretched, paying more than 30 percent of income on housing costs.
Housing issues affect low-income households disproportionately: 89 percent of households earning less than 30 percent of area median income are financially stretched by housing costs. Of households earning 30 to 50 percent of area median income, 83 percent are financially stretched by housing costs, and 66 percent of households earning 50 to 80 percent of area median income pay more than 30 percent of income for housing.......MUCH MORE
Someone should probably do a story, eh?
