Yoni Appelbaum on the real villians behind our housing and mobility problems

Summary

Over the past few decades, an astonishing pattern has taken place: Americans no longer migrate. From a peak of roughly one third of the country moving cities in a single year, today, migration rates have declined and are now in line with the Old Continent of Europe. The dynamism of the American economy was predicated on all kinds of people seeking out work and building families, but now that mobility is gone — and we need to find out why.Yoni Appelbaum, a senior editor at The Atlantic, just published his new book, “Stuck: How the Privileged and the Propertied Broke the Engine of American Opportunity.” In it, he explores the critical implications of a country that is no longer seeking fortune, from the decline of job growth and opportunities to the high prices of housing, and ultimately, the immiseration of the American dream. He lays down the blame on many, from Jane Jacobs and Robert Moses to communities that have made exclusion their modus operandi.He talks to me and Laurence Pevsner about why Jane Jacobs has gone from hero to villain in a generation, why the history of zoning portends further challenges to reform, how the abundance movement is changing the tenor of this debate, how Covid-19 acted as a natural experiment for mobility, and finally, some solutions on how to help Americans live where they want and build a more prosperous future.This interview has been edited for length and clarity. For more of the conversation, listen to the episode and subscribe to the Riskgaming podcast.Subscribe nowDanny Crichton:Yoni, you just published a book called Stuck, and what you're describing is not glue, but rather the American people. Why don't you talk a little bit about the book's purpose and what you found?Yoni Appelbaum:I started thinking about this book when I was living in Cambridge, Massachusetts more than a decade ago in an apartment that was already a little too small for my family and already cost a little bit more than we could afford.For more than 100 years ...