Yes, I'm sure. First, that FT article is terrible. It uses a "desirable 20 sq km slice" of Tokyo as a proxy for the city's population growth, but in reality th

Yes, I'm sure. First, that FT article is terrible. It uses a "desirable 20 sq km slice" of Tokyo as a proxy for the city's population growth, but in reality the city's population growth, by its own accounting, was flat from 1977-1997: http://www.metro.tokyo.jp/ENGLISH/ABOUT/HISTORY/history03.htm http://www.metro.tokyo.jp/ENGLISH/ABOUT/HISTORY/history03.ht... Even since 1997 Tokyo's population hasn't grown quickly, going from 12M to 13.5M (12.5%) in 18 years (0.65%, annualized). By comparison SF is a boomtown, having grown by nearly 6% since 2010 (1.2%, annualized; that's nearly twice the rate of Tokyo over the same period): http://sf.curbed.com/2015/2/4/9995388/sfs-population-is-growing-way-faster-than-its-housing-stock http://sf.curbed.com/2015/2/4/9995388/sfs-population-is-grow... Instead, the FT article manufactures a lie by explicitly comparing the population growth in one ward of Tokyo (again, Minato) to that of all of SF over 20 years. It uses this unfair comparison to conclude that SF is growing more slowly than Tokyo. It's possibly the most egregious example of cherry picking I've seen in the press in years. So the FT article is not to be trusted. But what about that "astonishing fact" about housing starts being more numerous in all of California? Turns out, it's way less astonishing when you realize that Japanese homes are essentially disposable - the average lifespan of a Japanese home is 38 years (compared to 100 in the US). There's no market for used homes in Japan, and homes become worthless after 15-30 years: http://freakonomics.com/podcast/why-are-japanese-homes-disposable-a-new-freakonomics-radio-podcast-3/ http://freakonomics.com/podcast/why-are-japanese-homes-dispo... A culture of disposable homes is obviously going to have more construction than one where homes are treated as investments. But what about this zoning change that fixed everything, and made Japan safe for development again? Oh...that law was passed in 2002, and it mostly had to do with encouraging re-development of blighted spaces in cities across Japan, as well as improving infrastructure and safety: http://www.toshiseibi.metro.tokyo.jp/pamphlet/pdf/udt2013english.pdf http://www.toshiseibi.metro.tokyo.jp/pamphlet/pdf/udt2013eng... It does some useful things - like establishing a class of apartments with no key money or ridiculous deposit requirements - but it's wishful thinking to suggest that this law, passed in 2002, suddenly made Tokyo real estate affordable. My argument stands. If you want to know why Tokyo land prices have stayed flat, look at the economy. Japan has been struggling to find growth for nearly two decades, its population is flat/declining, and it is struggling with deflation. Everything else is a detail.