I fail to see how neo-lib doctrine has failed in this instance. If the middle class is priced out of a certain area, then fine, they go move somewhere else. W

I fail to see how neo-lib doctrine has failed in this instance. If the middle class is priced out of a certain area, then fine, they go move somewhere else. We see this in NYC today: lots of businesses and restaurants have closed shop and left Manhattan because the real estate values (rents) are too high, and the people who shop there are moving out. Instead, Brooklyn is now the hip place where all the good restaurants are opening, as rents are cheaper there. Many employers are moving over there too. So what exactly is the problem? There seems to be an underlying assumption to your writing that it's somehow a "disaster" if a city (or in this case, one district of a big city) loses its productive members and just has a bunch of wealthy people holding property there. Why is it? Sure, it sucks if you're middle class and can't afford the rent there, but you're free to move somewhere cheaper. Then businesses will have to pay higher wages to get service workers to commute farther, and if that fails, they'll just close shop or move to be near the workers. If it gets bad enough, the property values in the city (or district) will collapse, a bunch of rich bastards will lose a lot of money, and things will eventually return to normal. If there's any government intervention needed, it's to encourage companies to move to where the workers are, perhaps with tax deductions. But cities already do that kind of thing. And don't forget, cities are in competition with each other. So cities which do a better job of managing themselves and doing urban planning to make sure service workers can live there are going to do better long-term than cities which don't. So I can see how municipalities have a good argument for getting involved (just as they already do with things like zoning and permitting and construction approval) but I don't see how this is in the interest of national governments. If a bunch of stupid NIMBYs in one particular city want to price out all their janitors and convenience-store workers, and then they can't get anyone to clean their toilets and don't have any local restaurants or shops, then let them.