> Un-democratic in the sense that it casts out folks that don't live there, but democratic in the sense that the voices of those who own homes are clearly heard

> Un-democratic in the sense that it casts out folks that don't live there, but democratic in the sense that the voices of those who own homes are clearly heard. California’s housing crisis has given me a clear perspective on the debate between centralized and distributed powers, a topic I have long struggled to resolve. It harkens back to debates as old as federalism vs anti-federalism. States rights versus federal rights. Similarly, in this case, it’s about county rights versus the state’s right. Debates on this topic usually resolves around one or the other, leading to rather binary positions. But really, the discussion should be about the appropriate balance between the two. I find we are well informed about the tyranny of centralized power by the state. As a specific example, there is a narrative that the Robert Moses era of the mid-20th century lead to massive civil projects, such as freeways, that put the interests of the state ahead of individual neighborhoods, leading to destroyed and fractured communities. It appears there has been a political whiplash against this era which has lead us to the predicament we find ourselves with today, which is that powers are now heavily distributed. What can and cannot be built is now dictated by the counties and the neighborhoods within it. This is wonderful in the sense that you, as an individual property owner, have much greater control on what goes on in your community. But this also has a systemic effect of acting as a problem that the federalists originally warned about in their own debates, which is the tyranny of the majority. Because powers are so heavily distributed, it has lead to an artificially constructed zero-sum game, as you point out in your post, where everyone who owns a home is content and will do whatever they can to limit supply as doing so feeds their natural own self-interests. In this regard, I think it is clear that we have an improper balance between distributed and centralized power. I believe it weighs too heavily on the distributed side. This results in the trampling of interests of both developers, who wish to produce supply, and individuals themselves who wish to participate in the society, but cannot due to unaffordability. This is a shift in position that I would say is rather unique for me. I tend to advocate for the inverse, a reduction in centralized power. But in this particular case, I think centralization is an appropriate step. I also want to make one additional disclaimer. By centralization of power, I don’t mean the state should be involved in housing construction itself. This is a position often proposed by progressive advocates. Instead what I mean is that the state should have the power to override local interests so that the market can do its job, which is its interest to increase supply. In other words, the state should do what it can to remove the local bureaucracy that stifles development.