Strict zoning is what's killing cities like Detroit, even though there's no actual shortage of housing.
March 18, 2026
Original Paper
Rezoning The Rust Belt
SSRN · 6404960
The Takeaway
We usually think of zoning as a problem for expensive cities like San Francisco where it drives up rent. This paper shows that in economically stagnant areas, the same laws prevent small-scale 'fixer-upper' projects from being legal, effectively mandating that abandoned lots stay empty because building anything new is too expensive to comply with the rules.
From the abstract
Contemporary debates about land-use law treat restrictive zoning as a problem of expensive, high-demand markets. Economically stagnant or depopulated places are ignored, or assumed not to need regulatory reforms. These places' omission in this discourse is a mistake. In weaker markets, land-use regulations do not cause housing shortages, but they still impose frictions that seriously and unnecessarily encumber revitalization. This Article describes how land-use law impedes redevelopment, focusin