Why is it that libertarians assume that suburban living is what people want? Sprawl is not a libertarian dream. No suburb was developed without massive federal, state, and local planning and spending. Second if we went on prices of real estate would that not show that people actually don't want to live in the burbs? The places with the highest prices tend to coincided with higher densities.
Now I would love to see a libertarian developed town or city. Where development was you know developed by individuals and not some arcane parking requirement or a planner that believes they know what the density should be for a city.
Please don't state Houston as a libertarian city it is nothing of the sort. And the fear of a gas station next to your home is overblown. Do you really think a business person is going to put a gas station on a low traffic street?
...I'm not really sure what we're talking about here, but I'd like to discuss the topic.
One thing to consider as we talk about prices: prices are wonderful, but they are highly distorted by governmental restrictions and requirements in the real estate market. As an example, you can produce a 1500 unit subdivision "out in the county" for the same amount of fees/hoops/trouble as you can a 15 unit re-use site in the city. That's going to skew prices and therefore development toward the suburbs, which is obvious: restricted supply equals higher prices.
I'm not quite sure what you mean by "libertarians assume that suburban living is what people want". Who's saying that?
If anything, I'd say that libertarians (myself included, as a town planner and a libertarian) would prefer less governmental restrictions on land use, and thereby greater freedom for individuals to choose where to live. That's inherent in the "liberty" of "libertarian": liberty for individuals to make their own decisions, free from coercion or restriction, so long as they don't negatively impact another individual.
Another gigantic price-skewing item is roads. Roads (and foolish expansions thereof to "alleviate congestion"--you just end up with more people living in the burbs until commute times get back up to their pre-congestion-alleviation states) subsidize suburban living, thereby further driving down prices outside the city.
Another price distorter (huge in my county): green space laws. Ironically, they more people to commute further to the next county without such laws, causing more pollution.
I've read what others find so offensive about suburban living, but I'd love to hear what the folks around here think.
Actually, most older towns are essentially "designed" (poor choice of words) along libertarian principles. People put businesses together for purposes of convenience and security, and (since it's as easy to build two stories as one) the second story served as housing for the poor. Roads were designed for convenience in transit and reduced burdens on landowners--as opposed to the winding roads often found in modern developments driven by zoning laws ("we can't get sewer service to you unless you develop this much land" and so on).
So what's the libertarian town? Interestingly, it's the interesting place to be.
btw...wanna see some libertarian roads?
here you go.
Anarchy! Chaos! --err...maybe not.
Brian, you may not be accurately representing libertarians. Libertarians are not against planning.
A libertarian town could be a planned town but it would not be planned by a central government.
Planning does not necessarily require government. As was the case before statism planning occurred between multiple parties. Can't other parties involve in development plan without government.
Libertarians comments about suburban living patterns, as Sowell argues, is typically in response to people's real wants and desires as oppose to coercion. It's an economic argument. No one is forced to live in the suburbs with the threat of being thrown in jail. Suburban living is a result of preferences because people are free to live other places: rural, urban, another country.
I don't think libertarians are against planning.
Sowell's argument is weak. Suburbs would not be developed with massive government intervention and zoning laws. Of course no one is forced to live anywhere by threat of physical harm, but in people can zone out "undesirables" by zoning laws or prices. To make the argument that real wants and desires developed suburbia in its current form is wanting.
I still want to see a charter libertarian city. I think it would be an amazing experiment. Better yet would be to have three or more of them competing against each other.
Ohh, ok. I may not be clear on what you mean.
Sowell's argument is not weak. It's simply economic. He's writing as an economist. If people did not want to live in the suburbs they would not live there. It's the classic public choice argument in economics regarding suburban housing trends. Remember that libertarians construct freedom of choice alone the lines of freedom from coercion.
What created the third way of suburban growth in Atlanta. The wants and desires of white people who did not want to live in a neighborhood with a bunch of negroes. There was real demand. If the white people (half of whom put their houses up for sale with 6 months of my parents integrating the neighborhood) wanted or desired to live near negroes they would have stayed.
Their wants and desires create demand that came into serious tension with legislative desires. Suburbia folks used their wants and desires to craft zoning laws. Sowell would agree that this is bad and a violation of freedom.
Sowell's economic argument about sub-urban sprawl is not wanting. It's a variation on the public choice argument (you know, the Noble Prize winning economic argument from 1986).
You said, "Second if we went on prices of real estate would that not show that people actually don't want to live in the burbs? The places with the highest prices tend to coincided with higher densities."
Sowell has written for years against zoning laws and does not see an problem with "sprawling" suburbs in terms of people opting out for urban or rural living.
It's true that zoning laws prevent free choice but it would not be impossible to imagine that, in a unregulated housing market, there might be some people who might prefer to live in the suburbs. For example, there are people here in New York who want their kids to play in a backyard and move to Jersey not because they can't afford the city, they want grass.
But an unregulated housing market in a city would be amazing to watch. I think would be surprised by what they saw. We can only hope. Of course, most libertarians wouldn't want any churches around.
Brian,
I am still a little unclear about what you are arguing. Are you saying that if it were not for government interference very few people would live in the suburbs? Are you saying that suburbs are harmful or undesirable for other reasons? Or are you just saying that libertarians are hypocrites for supposedly being "pro-suburb"? Not trying to be combative, just trying to understand.
And for the record, Anthony is absolutely right that many of us with children find suburbs very desirable places to live, even if they make our urban hipster friends wretch when they come to visit us:) (We cannot go visit them as often because there is nowhere to park and our kids cannot all fit in their hip, efficient studio apartments)
FWIW, our area is very diverse (our homeschool field trip coop has over 10 ethnic groups/nationalities for 17 families and my daughter's training squad in gymnastics has 13 girls from 9 ethnic groups). Also, David Brooks' "On Paradise Drive" is a nice little sociological examination of the suburbs/exurbs for urbanites who want to better understand us:)
Brian,
I too am a bit confused. You write, "Suburbs would not be developed with[out] massive government intervention and zoning laws." I'm not sure if you mean government intervention and zoning laws related to suburban areas is what leads to their development or if government intervention and zoning laws in urban areas is what leads to people settling in the suburban ones.
Also, regarding real estate costs, the fact that urban areas are much more expensive shows nothing about what 'libertarianism' should entail regarding development. That only shows that many people would like to live there, not that no one wants to live elsewhere.
I was not clear on my point. I tried to state that libertarians defense of suburbia in its current form is a problem. That suburbs currently structured as a product of government spending and laws. Suburbs are not undesirable they are a natural development pattern of cities.
I would guess that majority of American would choice to live in suburbs even without government intervention. I would also think they development patterns would look different. Example Wal-Mart would have smaller parking lots as Wal-mart would decided how many spots they need to serve their clients best.
All apologizes this week has been crazy, so my post was not well thought out.
That makes more sense, I did not know his argument was an extension of public choice theory. Though public choice theory is highly debatable even among "Noble" prize winners see Amartya Sen.
Paul Romer's talk on charter cities at TED is an interesting idea on how to implement a libertarian city. Watch here. I agree with him you cannot force libertarian ideas onto an already established city. It is better to establish a new city allowing people to move to it or not. This would be a live or die moment for the libertarian argument. The philosophy can be tested with a string of charter cities.
For some reason The Institute got dropped from my RSS. Ugh.
Initial thoughts (before reading the comments�)
1. Hong Kong is a libertarian city.
2. Movement to the burbs was a consequence of various economic interventions:
a. Rent control. �Nuff said.
b. Taxi medallions
c. Taxes
3. Libertarians get mixed in with Jeffersonians and you get the whole agrarianism thing.
4. Public goods are more common in cities. Libertarians think public goods are eeevil! Therefore cities are eeeevil. QED.
Okay, after reading the comments:
1. Zoning in suburbs comes after they stop being independent towns. That is, as people move to the burbs to escape rent-control, taxation, and integration**. It is usually proposed by incumbent landowning interests trying to maximize the value of their own land or resistant to newcomers destroying their old way of life. This especially makes sense for the small retail proprietor. He has a small monopoly in a thin market. If the market size grows and for whatever reason he cannot grow with it (decreasing returns to scale, say) it invites entry which will force his prices down. Perhaps he is in a small town to begin with because he cannot compete and his uncle was on the commissioner�s board, etc.
2. The suburbs grew as a consequence of government subsidization of roads, rails, etc.
3. Whatever intervention / zoning, etc exists in suburbs might be less than in burbs.
4. Some people like to hunt and fish. (De gustibus non desputatum est.)
5. Again, with the Jeffersonians, John Birch boys, deer hunters, etc.
**Integration of cities in most cases was the consequence of the opposite of racism. As blacks became more wealthy they desired to live in better parts of town, so they moved to Haarlem. But they were not really wealthy enough to afford it. So they moved 2 families into housing which previously housed only 1 white family. Allowing this change made economic sense to owners. If 2 black families offered to pay $60 a piece for a space previously let to a white family for $100, the owner has to require $120 from the white family to let them stay. But for $120, the white family can get a cottage in Jersey, so out they go. Racists pay most dearly for racism. (This example was given by Walter Williams in class.)