Urban growth restrictions are the real reason housing is too scarce and too dear, writes property industry researcher Rob Burgess. Delayed decision-making, bureaucratic dithering, and the stubborn resistance of NIMBYs have all been frequently cited as...
Winnipeg is the most affordable major housing market in Canada. According to Wendell Cox’s 2024 International Housing Affordability report, the average price of a 1,500-square-foot home in Winnipeg is $310,000, compared with $1.1 million in Toronto and $1.4 million in...
Big Topics & Big Ideas
Say what you like about the coalition Government - and there are plenty of opinions - but it is clearly a Government determined to change New Zealand in the direction that it campaigned on, and quickly. The announcement made by Housing and Infrastructure Minister...
For the past 14 years, Vancouver surgeon Dr. Brian Day has led the charge for health-care reform, pushing for the right of patients to pay for private care if their health and well-being are threatened as a result of waiting in a stagnant and overburdened public...
The path to net zero, based on the much disputed belief that carbon dioxide is a pollution, is more steep and impractical than most people realize. Replacing fossil fuels with clean electricity will require much more power generation and a greatly upgraded grid to...
Big Topics & Big Ideas
Attempts to contain ‘urban sprawl’ have driven land prices sky-high. It’s time to abandon densification strategies.
Last week, Housing Minister Chris Bishop gave perhaps the most important speech by the new Government since the election. In a speech to the Wellington Chamber of Commerce, he said he wanted the ratio of house prices to median household income to more than halve to...
Acknowledgements Good morning. Can I start by acknowledging Simon and the team at the Chamber. Thanks for the invitation to be here today. Introduction In October last year New Zealanders voted for change. The Coalition government was elected with a clear mandate to...
The tourist-oriented city of Kelowna, British Columbia, has self-destructively voted to prohibit any new short-term rentals in residences. Even the provincial government is not as draconian, giving dispensation to resort and tourist destinations. Nationally, the...
Brownstone Institute
Much of Seoul is a sea of high-rises. And not just Seoul: Busan and other cities in South Korea have lots of high rises. More than half of all South Korean households live in high rises, and well over 60 percent live in some kind of multifamily housing. South Korea...
Excessive government regulations and land use restrictions are the most documented drivers in our housing affordability crisis right now. So, why, pray tell, is Premier Wab Kinew thinking of adding more regulations to fix a problem caused by excessive regulations? It...
The latest Demographia report on housing affordability in Canada, which I produce for the Frontier Centre for Public Policy, reveals that over half of the 46 Canadian housing markets we assess are severely unaffordable. In fact, Vancouver and Toronto rank as third and...