Alex Armlovich

It's not complicated--it's a basic "P≈MC" approximation for any elastically supplied good in any open market free of regulatory capture

If supply skeptics were right that condo margins *never* fall at lim->∞, we'd have an infinite money glitch. Good problem to have & easy to fix! Alas, ~impossible

Glaeser formulated the ur-YIMBY math in the 2011 piece that started my career:

Gross margin for a 1200sqft condo on owned land in Manhattan was ~$500k in 2011. (~$500k marginal cost, >$1M sale price)

Absent growth control, unfettered construction would shrink margins til they drop to hurdle rate

AI discourse is hard because nobody wants to make fun of the next steam engine

But also the "Nothing ever happens meme" did actually work for the first 50y of the Industrial Revolution--the "Engel's Pause" in wages convinced early Marxists that capitalism might never raise wages above subsistence

An Austin or Minneapolis-scale YIMBY victory in California would cut poverty by as much as the Child Tax Credit

Already in Minneapolis, *unsubsidized market rate apartments are affordable at federal LIHTC rents*
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Great analysis here from @edmendoza.bsky.social & @pewresearch.org correcting a poorly framed Georgetown report

New housing construction moderates Class C rents the most!

<60%AMI families will always need income supports

But YIMBYism helps all incomes
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Google "Bunker Hill Houses mixed income inclusive redevelopment"

The good news on housing supply is that 485x, unlike 421a, exempts new supply from HSTPA

If that hadn't happened, we'd be looking at a St Paul-like crash in housing construction as uncertainty & equity risk premia blow out

There are real risks here! But there's also a team

I have made my views clear since July & again in December:

Zohran has already shown strong judgement combing NYC for the most serious housing leadership talent in the city

I was an early skeptic, but I have seen enough to have faith & give benefit of the doubt
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Please consider my departure letter highlighting my friend & now-former colleague @arpitrage.bsky.social 's housing quality rule, brilliantly adapted from an old RGB tenant rep idea.

Arpit's proposal would combine tenant protection with sustainable RGB cost-based guidelines for the first time 👇

As a city government nerd, it was a bucket list honor to have an office at 1 Centre St

But I'm excited to focus now on housing supply reform in my new role!

I have full confidence in @mayor.nyc.gov's pick for Deputy Mayor for Housing to navigate NYC's looming challenges & opportunities in housing

That said--Idk your local HUD office well but I suspect you could apply for an exception to the concentration rule if you did a >50% market rate, <50%PH proposal

You are doing a tremendous job at Bunker Hill (even in spite of the chunk the NIMBY neighbors took out of the deal)

It's an important demonstration project for teaching NYC advocates (on top of HOPESF & the UK's estate regen program)

You have my respect and my support 🙏

Keep up the great work

True! Gotta do mixed-income on-site, not 100% Section 9 (or 100% F2RAD)

The Chetty et al opportunity literature says that's optimal for children in public housing anyways--i.e. that's a bonus not a problem

I'm tired of undereducated literary Marxists posting Ross Barkan's profoundly confused NYT essay on Faircloth as the excuse for doing nothing

Buddy just Google it! You're nowhere near the Faircloth Cap yet bro!

(Let alone the more sophisticated CPE approach to non-Faircloth social housing)

The worst thing about the social housing advocates is that they don't know anything about social housing

I'm supposed to be a housing mod, not a prog!

Yet I have to secretly fuel the other side's arguments to help them with their ideas, because they don't even know how to start new public housing

-Boston has one of the planet's worst housing shortages

-Boston is still <1950 population; has vast spare infrastructure capacity

-Boston has a giant empty lot next to the train

-Boston has 3000 units of spare federal Faircloth funding for new public housing

=>Yet they're still doing nothing 🤷‍♂️

If Zohran gets more neighborhood rezonings lined up in his first year than Streets & Squares did in your first term, people are going to understandably wonder why that is!

Wu Backs Rent Control, Rejects Citywide Rezoning Boston's mayor threw her support behind a ballot question legalizing rent control, while rejecting any moves to legalize denser housing in single-family districts.

Michelle Wu seems like kind of a disaster for housing in Boston – very little progress on land use reforms, and supporting a quite draconian statewide rent control regime (rent hikes that can be below inflation, vacancy controls, only a 10-year exemption for new construction)? Yikes

The rent is too damn high! Tomorrow night FPI chief economist @emmurpheis.bsky.social joins @aarmlovi.bsky.social and Sam Mellins at Judson Memorial Church to discuss housing under Mamdani

Underrated tweet

Gerrymander Game: Interactive Electoral Districts Tool Learn how gerrymandering affects elections. Interactive game comparing single-member vs multi-member districts with real-time seat allocation results.

Proportional representation systems can't be gerrymandered. Don't believe me? Give it a try!

I made a gerrymandering simulator with an imaginary state under either single-member districts or multi-member proportional districts.

How much can YOU gerrymander?
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After Gov Hochul rescued the MTA, I was working on an op-ed on how (once congestion pricing launched) she was the most pro-transit governor in the country

The congestion pricing pause came in the middle of edits. I "paused" the op-ed, but I didn't lose faith or go nuclear etc. I knew we'd be back

Whatever else is happening in politics, I want to note that Sen Warren has been a great advocate of housing abundance

It's been my pleasure to work with her staff as they've co-developed the Build Now Act with Sen Kennedy—with endorsement by Ed Glaeser himself!—in Sen Scott's ROAD package

I took two trains at 3:30-4 on Wednesday that were so crowded that people got left on the platform. The MTA absolutely should not be placing any more orders for new trains that are not open gangway, the trains are way too crowded for them to drag their feet like this.

One regret: I wish I'd searched law literature for cites on how STV solves Voting Rights Acts electoral minority inclusion *and* avoids the toxic district-based remedy that California has (disastrously) pursued

I treated it as common knowledge but it needs proof & there are great cites!

STV is PR+RCV. We were trying to manage all the acronyms in an oped with tight word count

How a 1940 electoral system reform in Cambridge made its 2025 housing breakthrough possible   - CommonWealth Beacon This is more than just a housing “win.” It’s a triumph for Cambridge’s unique brand of representative democracy—one that balances citywide priorities with fair representation for diverse communities.

My colleagues @awjustus.bsky.social and @aarmlovi.bsky.social have a new article out connecting electoral design to local housing politics. They show how proportional representation in Cambridge has sidestepped the pitfalls of both district based and traditional first-past-the-post councils

One Weird Trick to defeat councilmanic prerogative

You may've heard that at-large city councils represent citywide interests but violate the Voting Rights Act, dooming us to single member wards with "member deference"

But!

Cambridge's "Single Transferable Vote" system, a type of citywide RCV, eliminates member deference without violating VRA!!

450 this year
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