Public Choice Links, 1/9/2026
John O. McGinnis on the affordability issue; Judge Glock on same; Dan Williams on Elinor Ostrom; Josh Barro on NY housing policy;
Housing, healthcare, childcare, education, and even electricity in some places all seem to be slipping further out of ordinary reach, even as the economy continues to grow.
Classical liberalism offers a straightforward diagnosis and an equally straightforward cure. Remove unnecessary regulations that constrict supply and withdraw subsidies that artificially inflate demand! Yet the year has also provided familiar public choice stories about the obstacles to these sensible solutions. Concentrated interests profit from regulation and subsidies, but their costs are thinly dispersed across millions of consumers.
Most of Spanberger’s affordability plans force average citizens to subsidize other groups, such as climate companies and smokers, through their regular purchases. Some of her plans would use government funds to subsidize consumers in general. Such subsidies drive up demand, and therefore costs, while also burdening taxpayers. For example, Spanberger wants to use Virginia tax dollars to underwrite health-insurance premiums on the Obamacare marketplace. Recent evidence shows that those subsidies, which Congress refused to extend last year, were riddled with fraud.
Elinor Ostrom - Governing the Commons. I was already aware of the core ideas in this book. However, people kept telling me I should read it (and Ostrom’s work more broadly) because it challenges my somewhat cynical understanding of the fragility of human cooperation. Such people are completely wrong! This brilliant book greatly reinforces my view that human cooperation doesn’t result from unleashing some inner “friendliness” or “altruism” but from complex, precarious systems of monitoring and incentives that align self-interest (more precisely, inclusive interests) with collectively-beneficial prosocial behaviour.
He also praises Mancur Olson.
Mamdani’s core observation is the same one we’ve heard from prior mayors: our city’s property tax system taxes rental apartments at a much higher rate than owner-occupied homes, which is an unfair burden on landlords and tenants. Fair enough. The problem is, to fix that unfairness, you either have to raise taxes on homeowners (hideously unpopular) or you have to cut property taxes overall (hard to do when you’ve also promised a raft of new spending programs). There’s a reason mayors tend to talk about property tax reform, ask a blue ribbon commission to look at what can be done, and then not do anything. The commission Bill de Blasio established to look into the issue literally issued its report with recommendations three days before he left office.
Mamdani also says he wants to help landlords with skyrocketing insurance costs, but to cut the cost of insurance you have to cut the cost of claims, and the reforms that would do this tend to draw a lot of opposition from trial lawyers and unions.
substacks referenced above:
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1) A structure that brings money into a state at the feds expense (ACA, Medicaid) is a recipe for explosive growth. The foxes are guarding the henhouse.
2) As I expected, Virginia's turn to the right was a limited COVID affair and we are back on track to be a state run by anti-white communists that literally want to kill my children.
https://virginiamercury.com/2025/10/05/beyond-disqualifying-jay-jones-controversy-jolts-virginias-pivotal-2025-elections/
I'm glad I left.
3) Capitalism for developers and communism for landlords does feel like something of a natural equilibrium. Baltimore for instance seemed perpetually stuck in that norm (high property taxes for general residents, special temporary tax breaks for companies willing to relocate HQs there).
Its long run viability is questionable, but the short run incentives make a lot of sense.
Question: what do housing, healthcare, childcare, and education all have in common? Hint, the answer isn't expensive or restrictive regulation. Housing in most of rural and smaller town America isn't costly because of regulation. In much of america it isn't even expensive unless we are talking about mcmansions. Same goes for childcare. In-home childcare is expensive too.
You have a different guess?
Ok, they are all labor intensive in an economy that is seeing productivity gains and reduced mg labor inputs in almost every other sector. Labor is becoming increasingly expensive and these four expenses still require lots of labor.
Yes, housing also requires land that is increasing faster the inflation in most locations seeing high housing cost.
Electricity is maybe more of a regulation issue but given the massive demand increases from data centers, it's not at all clear the situation would be much better with less/better regulation.