The Housing Crisis Is Solvable
British Columbia’s housing crisis is severe, but its root causes are familiar: exclusionary zoning, under-building, and chronic neglect of nonmarket housing. Economist Alex Hemingway’s proposals show how governments could reverse course, in BC and elsewhere.
British Columbia’s housing crisis reflects the same policy failures seen in high-cost cities around the world. The housing crisis persists not because solutions are unknown, but because governments refuse to act at the scale required. (SeongJoon Cho / Bloomberg via Getty Images)
The magnitude of the housing shortage is huge and the problems chronic, but the housing crisis is solvable.
Throughout British Columbia (BC) and Canada, the housing crisis is marked by high rents and prices, a scarcity of homes, displacement, homelessness, and the quiet exclusion of people from entire neighborhoods.
While a boon to some, high housing costs are a millstone weighing on many households, a drag on the economy, and a barrier to progress in a range of other policy areas including poverty, affordability, climate action, and childcare.
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