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The Rent Is Too Damn High: What To Do About It, And Why It Matters More Than You Think by [Matthew Yglesias]

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Matthew Yglesias

The Rent Is Too Damn High: What To Do About It, And Why It Matters More Than You Think Kindle Edition

by Matthew Yglesias (Author) Format: Kindle Edition

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From prominent political thinker and widely followed Slate columnist, a polemic on high rents and housing costs—and how these costs are hollowing out communities, thwarting economic development, and rendering personal success and fulfillment increasingly difficult to achieve.

Rent is an issue that affects nearly everyone. High rent is a problem for all of us, extending beyond personal financial strain. High rent drags on our country’s overall rate of economic growth, damages the environment, and promotes long commutes, traffic jams, misery, and smog. Yet instead of a serious focus on the issue, America’s cities feature niche conversations about the availability of “affordable housing” for poor people. Yglesias’s book changes the conversation for the first time, presenting newfound context for the issue and real-time, practical solutions for the problem.

Print length

68 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Simon & Schuster
Publication date

March 6, 2012
File size

976 KB
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Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0078XGJXO
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Simon & Schuster (March 6, 2012)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ March 6, 2012
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 976 KB
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Print length ‏ : ‎ 68 pages
Lending ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled

Best Sellers Rank: #451,611 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #138 in Two-Hour Politics & Social Sciences Short Reads
- #283 in Urban Sociology
- #502 in Real Estate (Kindle Store)

Customer Reviews:
473 ratings

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Matthew Yglesias

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Customer reviews

5 star		68%
4 star		26%
3 star		3%
2 star		1%
1 star		2%

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Top reviews from the United States

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M. N. Martin

Love it

Reviewed in the United States on April 17, 2013

Verified Purchase

Great book. Unfortunately, people on team Democrat won't agree with the conclusion and people on team Republican won't even read it since it's by a 'liberal'. If, however, you approach it with a truly open mind and carefully and critically evaluate each of his arguments, I believe you'll agree with all of his conclusions.

If you've ever wondered why rent constitutes such a large share of your paycheck living in NYC or SF or LA or really any other big city, this'll tell you. Common misconceptions abound about high rents, high housing prices, and all the negative side-effects they wreak on our economy. Matthew Yglesias walks you through them from an economic perspective without all the economics jargon, but he doesn't treat the reader like an idiot. His explanations are thorough. He tackles the criticisms of his ideas. And I think you'd be hard pressed to decipher any sort of connection between his ideas and any particular political philosophy, which, let's face it, is kind of what people tend to complain about. He keeps it short and sweet rather than drawing the book out.

Among the friends and family members I've talked with about it, most of them seem to have a hard time believing that 'Cost of Living' doesn't factor into wages at all. But from an economic perspective this really shouldn't be very hard to believe since employers are not charities. They're trying to get the most value out of you for the least money possible. They'll pay you the market clearing wage and if that isn't enough to live comfortably on, well then *Amazon censorship* you. To be clear, 'housing prices' do factor into 'cost of living' and 'cost of living' does determine what constitues a 'livable wage'. But there's no particular axiom of economics that states that employers have to pay you a livable wage. People can work more than 40 hours a week. Or they can live in poverty and squalor. So high rents don't help to explain high wages. As you'll see in the book, there is a good explanation for high wages and Matthew Yglesias walks you through it carefully and caringly.

29 people found this helpful

Helpful

JustinHoca

Simple supply/demand explained clearly

Reviewed in the United States on January 1, 2014

Verified Purchase

This book does not deserve the disparaging ratings/comments posted on Amazon. It is a fine book written by a market urbanist who explains basic supply and demand very well.

I can sum the book up with a few quotes:

"The point is that there are many ways in which expensive land can contain large numbers of people. The question is whether we’ll adopt rules that permit this rather than sticking with rules that often ban row houses and multifamily structures, generally require low buildings and large amounts of parking, and typically prescribe minimum lawn sizes—even minimum apartment sizes...This directly reduces real wages by increasing the cost of living for people in high-income metro areas. It indirectly reduces real wages by preventing people from migrating to places where job opportunities are most robust...infrastructure improvements can and should be tied to a demonstrated desire to increase population density...Progressives and urbanists need to move beyond their romance with central planning and get over their distaste for business and developers. Conservatives need to take their own ideas about economics more seriously and stop seeing all proposals for change through a lens of paranoia and resentment. Last, politicians of both parties who like to complain about “regulation” and “red tape” ought to spend some time looking at the specific area of the economy where red tape and regulation are most prevalent."

Yglesias advocates deregulation of housing and zoning, and even hypothesizes that such regulations are what is contributing to the "Great Stagnation" popularized by Tyler Cowen. He aims to convince Progressives that this deregulation will lower rent in cities, shorten commutes, and improve the standards of living for people in the bottom end of the income spectrum. He criticizes conservatives for hypocritically opposing this deregulation. He explains ideas taught by Adam Smith and David Ricardo very clearly for the lay reader. In a perfect world, Yglesias would be appointed to be HUD commissioner.

4.5 stars. The only thing keeping this book from five stars is the lack of a bibliography for the economic studies Yglesias cites.

23 people found this helpful

Helpful

sien

A very good short overview on the rise in housing costs and its impacts

Reviewed in the United States on October 12, 2021

Verified Purchase

The Rent is Too Damn High (2012) by Matthew Yglesias is a good short summary of the US’s housing issues.

Yglesias makes the point that the modern economy tends toward services and those services are best done by people in the same area. More people would move to high wage places like The Bay Area, Los Angeles or New York. But they don’t because zoning has made housing in those places too expensive. Instead people more to the Sunbelt where there is ample cheap housing.

Yglesias also mentions the work of Ed Glaeser on calculating the cost of zoning.

At 80 pages ‘The Rent is Too Damn High’ is an excellent short overview of an important issue.

Helpful

brianrtw

Good book, good prescriptions.

Reviewed in the United States on March 24, 2020

Verified Purchase

Excellent book advocating for more housing to help reduce inequality and improve the lives of the less fortunate. We typically view housing development as serving special interests or wealthy developers, but blocking housing construction, especially dense construction, serves to hurt the less fortunate while maintaining a more fortunate elite by locking out poor people from better opportunities.

4 people found this helpful

Helpful

B. Hughes

Outstanding overview of our housing issues and policy

Reviewed in the United States on August 8, 2020

Verified Purchase

This book is full of insight and quality economic reasoning on a crucial issue for the American economy. Matt covers a lot of ground in a such a short book and rightly criticizes both sides of the political aisle. The arguments contained therein will be familiar to anyone following economics blogs, but are more eloquent and balanced. Highly recommended for anyone seeking to understand this issue.

2 people found this helpful

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

Vyas Saran

Good primer on zoning reg.

Reviewed in Canada on January 1, 2017

Verified Purchase

A fine way to get interested in the subjects of density, housing affordability, and zoning. Matt needs to update it with more political explanations for why we don't have what he's advocating.