Not really, though it depends on what you are building. A large portion of the US is at risk for strong seismic events, and this is reflected in the regulations

Not really, though it depends on what you are building. A large portion of the US is at risk for strong seismic events, and this is reflected in the regulations for building materials. We learned it the hard way. Building with brick and stone to earthquake standards is quite expensive, it doesn’t make sense. If you see brick or stone in a modern building, it is applied as a facade over a wood or steel frame. Parts of the US were originally built with brick and stone but were destroyed in earthquakes. Civil engineering, along with the ample availability of timber, changed the way the US designed buildings. New England, which does have a lot of stone and brick construction, suffers damage when they experience the rare, moderate for the US (M5-ish) earthquake. Earthquake safety and cost will never recommend brick and stone in most of the US. They are more likely to switch to steel than brick. There are a lot of brick houses, I grew up in some, but they were built before modern seismic codes. Parts of the US people don’t think of as being earthquake prone have surprisingly large earthquakes. For example, severe earthquakes in New Madrid Seismic Zone[0] in the southern Midwest. In the US, learning the extent of seismic activity in North America was often paid for in blood. Like Japan, everything modern is engineered for it. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Madrid_Seismic_Zone https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Madrid_Seismic_Zone