Abundance
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Ebook Opening Notes
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- Dedications from the authors to family members.
- Authorsâ note stating that some material previously appeared in work for The New York Times and The Atlantic.
- Introduction begins with the title âBeyond Scarcity.â
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3EK: To Annie, M oses, and Kieran: M y abundance
DT: To Laura and Isla
4Authorsâ Note
SOME OF THE DETAILS AND language in this book appeared previously in columns,
articles, newsletters, and conversations written and produced for the N ew York
Tim es and the Atlantic.
5Introduction
Beyond Scarcity
A Vision of 2050
- The global energy grid has transitioned from fossil fuels to a clean, cheap mix of solar, wind, nuclear, and geothermal power.
- Desalination technology and vertical farming have restored natural ecosystems by reducing the human footprint on rivers and land.
- Cultivated cellular meat and high-tech agriculture have allowed 25 percent of global land to be rewilded.
- Space-based manufacturing in zero-gravity provides affordable, life-extending medications delivered by autonomous drones.
- The integration of AI and labor reforms has significantly shortened the workweek and increased general prosperity.
Forty years ago, your parents cooled their bedrooms with joules dredged out of coal mines and oil pits.
YOU OPEN YOUR EYES AT dawn and turn in the cool bedsheets. A few feet above your
head, aďŹxed to the top of the roof, a layer of solar panels blinks in the morning sun.
Their power mixes with electricity pulled from several clean energy sourcesâ
towering wind turbines to the east, small nuclear power plants to the north, deep
geothermal wells to the south. Forty years ago, your parents cooled their bedrooms
with joules dredged out of coal mines and oil pits. They mined rocks and burned
them, coating their lungs in the byproducts. They encased their worldâyour world
âin a chemical heat trap. Today, that seems barbaric. You live in a cocoon of energy
so clean it barely leaves a carbon trace and so cheap you can scarcely ďŹnd it on your
monthly bill.
The year is 2050.
You walk to the kitchen to turn on the sink. Water from the ocean pours out of the
faucet. Itâs fresh and clear, piped from a desalination plant. These facilities use
microbial membranes to squeeze out the ocean salt. Today, they provide more than
half of the countryâs fresh used water. Previously overtaxed rivers, such as the
Colorado, have surged back now that we donât rely on them to irrigate our farms
and ďŹll our coďŹee mugs. In Phoenix and Las Vegas, previously parched cities are
erupting in green foliage.
You open the refrigerator. In the fruit and vegetable drawer are apples, tomatoes,
and an eggplant, shipped from the nearest farm, mere miles away. These crops donât
grow horizontally, across ďŹelds. They grow vertically on tiered shelves inside a tall
greenhouse. Banks of LED lights deliver the photons the plants need in precisely
timed increments. These skyscraper farms spare countless acres for forests and parks.
As for the chicken and beef, much of it comes from cellular meat facilities, which
grow animal cells to make chicken breasts and rib eye steaksâno live animals
needed, which means no conďŹnement and slaughter. Once prohibitively expensive,
cultivated meat scaled with the help of plentiful electricity. When your parents were
6young, nearly 25 percent of all global land was used to raise livestock for human
consumption. That is unimaginable now. Much of that land has rewilded.
Out the window and across the street, an autonomous drone is dropping oďŹ the
latest shipment of star pills. Several years ago, daily medications that reduced
overeating, cured addiction, and slowed cellular aging were considered miracle
drugs for the rich, especially when we discovered that key molecules were best
synthesized in the zero-gravity conditions of space. But these days, automated
factories thrum in low orbit. Cheap rocketry conveys the medicine down to earth,
where itâs saved millions of lives and billions of healthy years.
Outside, the air is clean and humming with the purr of electric machines all
around you. Electric cars and trucks glide down the road, quiet as a light breeze and
mostly self-driving. Children and adult commuters follow on electric bikes and
scooters, some personally owned and some belonging to subscription networks run by
the city. Another last-mile delivery drone descends from canopy level, pauses over a
neighborâs yard like a hummingbird, and drops oďŹ a package. These e-bots now
deliver a sizable chunk of online orders, reducing the drudgery of much human
delivery work.
Your micro-earpiece pings: a voice text from a friend and his family, on their way
to the airport for another weekend vacation. Across the economy, the combination of
artiďŹcial intelligence, labor rights, and economic reforms have reduced poverty and
shortened the workweek. Thanks to higher productivity from AI, most people can
The Choice of Scarcity
- Technological advancement and AI have the potential to drastically reduce work hours while maintaining pay and sharing collective profits.
- Modern infrastructure and transportation could be revolutionized, such as Mach 2 jetliners that utilize green synthetic fuels.
- The crises of the early twenty-first centuryâhousing, climate, and healthâare largely the result of 'chosen scarcities' rather than a lack of solutions.
- Well-intentioned twentieth-century regulations designed to protect the environment now paradoxically block the clean energy projects needed for the twenty-first.
- Societal progress is often hindered by ideological collusion and a system that prioritizes local interests over broader human advancement.
- Institutional renewal is a necessary labor for every generation to prevent past solutions from becoming current obstacles.
Recognizing that these scarcities are chosenâthat we could choose otherwiseâis thrilling. Confronting the reasons we choose otherwise is maddening.
complete what used to be a full week of work in a few days, which has expanded the
number of holidays, long weekends, and vacations. Less work has not meant less pay.
AI is built on the collective knowledge of humanity, and so its proďŹts are shared.
Your friends are ďŹying from New York to London. The trip will take them just over
two hours. Modern jetliners now routinely reach Mach 2âtwice the speed of sound
âusing a mix of traditional and green synthetic fuels that release far less carbon
into the air.
The world has changed. Not just the virtual world, that dance of pixels on our
screens. The physical world, too: its houses, its energy, its infrastructure, its medicines,
its hard tech. How diďŹerent this era is from the opening decades of the twenty-ďŹrst
century, which unspooled a string of braided crises. A housing crisis. A ďŹnancial
crisis. A pandemic. A climate crisis. Political crises. For years, we accepted
homelessness and poverty and untreated disease and declining life expectancy. For
years, we knew what we needed to build to alleviate the scarcities so many faced and
create the opportunities so many wanted, and we simply didnât build it. For years,
we failed to invent and implement technology that would make the world cleaner,
7healthier, and richer. For years, we constrained our ability to solve the most
important problems.
Why?
Scarcity Is a Choice
This book is dedicated to a simple idea: to have the future we want, we need to
build and invent more of what we need. Thatâs it. Thatâs the thesis.
It reads, even to us, as too simple. And yet, the story of America in the twenty-
first century is the story of chosen scarcities. Recognizing that these scarcities are
chosenâthat we could choose otherwiseâis thrilling. Confronting the reasons
we choose otherwise is maddening.
We say that we want to save the planet from climate change. But in practice,
many Americans are dead set against the clean energy revolution, with even liberal
states shutting down zero-carbon nuclear plants and protesting solar power
projects. We say that housing is a human right. But our richest cities have made it
excruciatingly difficult to build new homes. We say we want better health care,
better medicine, and more cures for terrible diseases. But we tolerate a system of
research, funding, and regulation that pulls scientists away from their most
promising work, denying millions of people the discoveries that might extend or
improve their lives.
Sometimes these blockages reflect differences of beliefs or interests. A
thousand square acres of solar panels can be a godsend to the city they power and
a blight to the community they abut. A seven-story affordable apartment building
in San Francisco means homes for those who would otherwise live hours from
their work even as it blocks views and clogs parking for those who lived there
before.
Other times, our crises reflect the overhang of the past into the present. One
generationâs solutions can become the next generationâs problems. After World
War II, an explosion of housing and infrastructure enriched the country. But
without regulations for clean air and water, the eraâs builders despoiled the
environment. In response, the US passed a slew of environmental regulations. But
these well-meaning laws to protect nature in the twentieth century now block the
clean energy projects needed in the twenty-first. Laws meant to ensure that
government considers the consequences of its actions have made it too difficult
8for government to act consequentially. Institutional renewal is a labor that every
generation faces anew.
But some of this reflects a kind of ideological conspiracy at the heart of our
politics. We are attached to a story of American decline that is centered around
ideological disagreement. That makes it easy to miss pathologies rooted in
ideological collusion. Over the course of the twentieth century, America
The Supply-Side Mistake
- Political polarization has split economics, with Republicans focusing on supply and Democrats focusing on demand.
- The right-wing association of 'supply-side' economics with failed tax-cut theories has made the topic disreputable for serious policy discussion.
- Conservative ideology framed production solely as a result of unfettered markets, ignoring areas where government intervention is necessary for supply.
- Democrats, influenced by the Reagan revolution, retreated to the demand side, focusing on vouchers and subsidies rather than direct production.
- A bipartisan consensus emerged that government is incapable of solving problems, leading to a focus on consumer goods over infrastructure and scientific breakthroughs.
- Modern progressivism primarily functions by giving people money to buy existing market goods rather than ensuring those goods are actually being built.
Itâs as if the nonsense of phrenology made it sordid for doctors to treat disorders of the brain.
developed a right that fought the government and a left that hobbled it. Debates
over the size of government obscured the diminishing capacity of government.
An abundance of consumer goods distracted us from a scarcity of homes and
energy and infrastructure and scientific breakthroughs. A counterforce is
emerging, but it is young yet.
The Supply-Side M istake
At the heart of economics is supply and demand. Supply is how much there is of
something. Demand is how much of that thing people want. Economies balance
when supply and demand meet and derange when they part. Too much demand
chasing too little supply causes shortages, price increases, and rationing. Too
much supply pooling around too little demand brings gluts, layoffs, and
depressions. Supply and demand are linked. At least, they are in the real world. In
our politics, they have been cleaved. Democrats and Republicans divvied them
up.
The words âsupply sideâ are coded as right-wing. They summon memories of
the curve that the conservative economist Arthur Laffer jotted on a napkin in the
1970s, showing that when taxes are too high, economies slow and revenues,
paradoxically, fall.1 This led, in part, to decades of Republican promises that
cutting taxes on the rich would encourage the nationâs dispirited John Galts to
work smarter and harder, leading economies to boom and revenues to rise.
Tax cuts are a useful tool, and it is true that high taxes can discourage work.
But the idea that tax cuts routinely lead to higher revenues is, as George H. W.
Bush said, âvoodoo economics.â It has been tried. It has failed. It has been tried
again. It has failed again. These failures, and the Republican Partyâs dogged
refusal to stop trying the same thing and expecting a different result, made it
vaguely disreputable to worry about the supply side of the economy. Itâs as if the
nonsense of phrenology made it sordid for doctors to treat disorders of the brain.
9But the conservative agenda did something else, too: it cast production as a
function of unfettered markets. Supply-side economics was about getting the
government out of the private sectorâs way. Cutting taxes so people would work
more. Cutting regulations so companies would produce more. But what of the
places where society needed a supply of something that the market could not, or
would not, provide on its own?
This is where you might have expected Democrats to step in. But Democrats,
cowed by the Reagan revolution and frightened of being seen as socialists, largely
confined themselves to working on the demand side of the ledger. When
Americans in 1978 heard that âgovernment cannot solve our problems, it canât
set our goals, it cannot define our vision,â the words didnât come from Ronald
Reagan. They came from President Jimmy Carter, a Democrat, in his State of the
Union address.2 This was a preview of things to come. In 1996, the next
Democratic president, Bill Clinton, announced that âthe era of big government is
over.â3 The notion that the US government cannot solve Americaâs problems was
not unilaterally produced by Reagan and the GOP. It was coproduced by both
parties and reinforced by their leaders.
Progressivismâs promises and policies, for decades, were built around giving
people money, or money-like vouchers, to go out and buy something that the
market was producing but that the poor could not afford. The Affordable Care
Act subsidizes insurance that people can use to pay for health care. Food stamps
give people money for food. Housing vouchers give them money for rent. Pell
Grants give them money for college. Tax credits for child care give people money
to buy child care. Social Security gives them money for retirement. The minimum
wage and the earned-income tax credit give them more money for anything they
want.
These are important policies, and we support them. But while Democrats
The Subsidy Trap
- Democrats focused heavily on subsidizing consumer demand for essential services while neglecting the actual supply of those goods.
- Subsidizing demand for scarce resources like housing and healthcare inevitably leads to skyrocketing prices and rationing.
- A blind faith in the private sector's ability to meet social goals led to a disregard for the regulatory and bureaucratic hurdles stifling production.
- The modern economy has created a paradox where luxury consumer goods are cheap, but the pillars of a middle-class lifeâeducation, homeownership, and healthcareâare increasingly unaffordable.
- Society has attempted to mask this affordability crisis through massive accumulation of student, medical, and housing debt.
But giving people a subsidy for a good whose supply is choked is like building a ladder to try to reach an elevator that is racing ever upward.
focused on giving consumers money to buy what they needed, they paid less
attention to the supply of the goods and services they wanted everyone to have.
Countless taxpayer dollars were spent on health insurance, housing vouchers, and
infrastructure without an equally energetic focusâsometimes without any focus
at allâon what all that money was actually buying and building.
This reflected a faith in the market that was, in its way, no less touching than
that offered by Republicans. It assumed that so long as enough money was
dangled in front of it, the private sector could and would achieve social goals. It
revealed a disinterest in the workings of government. Regulations were assumed
to be wise. Policies were assumed to be effective. Cries that government was
10stifling production or innovation typically fell on deaf ears. A blind spot emerged.
Political movements consider solutions where they know to look for problems.
Democrats learned to look for opportunities to subsidize. They gave little
thought to the difficulties of production.
The problem is that if you subsidize demand for something that is scarce,
youâll raise prices or force rationing.4 Too much money chasing too few homes
means windfall profits for homeowners and an affordability crisis for buyers. Too
much money chasing too few doctors means long wait times or pricey
appointments. This leads to the standard Republican riposte: Just donât subsidize
demand. Keep the government out of it. Let the market work its magic. Thatâs
fine for goods where access is not a matter of justice. If virtual-reality headsets are
expensive, well, so be it. It is not a public policy problem if most households
cannot afford a VR headset. But that cannot be said for housing and education
and medicine. Society cares about access to these goods and services, as well it
should. Democrats and Republicans passed policies into law that, collectively,
spend trillions of dollars helping people afford them. But giving people a subsidy
for a good whose supply is choked is like building a ladder to try to reach an
elevator that is racing ever upward.
The results of that mistake are everywhere. In 1950, the median home price
was 2.2 times the average annual income; by 2020, it was 6 times the average
annual income.5 Between 1999 and 2023, the average premium for employer-
based family health insurance rose from $5,791 to $23,968âan increase of more
than 300 percentâand the worker contribution to that premium more than
quadrupled.6 In 1970, the average annual cost of tuition and fees was $394 at
public colleges and $1,706 at private colleges. In 2023, it was $11,310 at public
colleges for in-state students and $41,740 at private colleges.7 Child care for an
infant and a four-year-old costs, on average, $36,008 in Massachusetts, $28,420 in
California, and $28,338 in Minnesota.8
An uncanny economy has emerged in which a secure, middle-class lifestyle
receded for many, but the material trappings of middle-class success became
affordable to most. In the 1960s, it was possible to attend a four-year college debt-
free but impossible to purchase a flat-screen television. By the 2020s, the reality
was close to the reverse.
We papered over the affordability crisis9 with low prices for consumer goods,
soaring asset values that kept richer Americans happy, and mountains of debt:
housing debt and student-loan debt and medical debt that kept the working class
11semi-afloat. This makes some sense of the last few decades of our economic
debates: a crisis of housing debt, a huge new program to subsidize health
insurance costs, debates about making college free and forgiving student loans,
endless rounds of tax cuts, proposal after proposal for the government to pay for
child care and preschool, a bubble in crypto that attracted so many investors in
part because it seemed like a rocket ship into wealth that anyone could ride.
The Shift to Supply
- The Obama administration's focus on stimulating demand during the 2009 crisis led Democrats to prioritize a 'hot economy' over joblessness during the COVID-19 pandemic.
- Massive fiscal stimulus combined with global supply chain disruptions triggered a return of inflation, shifting the economic problem from too little demand to too little supply.
- The Biden administration faced a stark choice between increasing the supply of goods or reducing demand by making Americans poorer.
- Persistent affordability issues and geopolitical tensions have led to a rethinking of globalization and a new focus on domestic manufacturing and infrastructure.
- A new political and economic theory is emerging that prioritizes the 'supply problem' over traditional demand-side management.
- Economic growth is fundamentally about radical change and divergence from the past, rather than simply making a larger version of the existing 'pie'.
âIf car prices are too high right now, there are two solutions,â Biden said. âYou increase the supply of cars by making more of them, or you reduce demand for cars by making Americans poorer. Thatâs the choice.â
But then came inflation. For years, the central problem in the American
economy was demand. We both reported on the financial crisis, and every
conversation with Obama administration economists was about how to persuade
employers to hire and consumers to spend. The 2009 stimulus was too small, and
while we avoided a second Great Depression, we sank into an achingly slow
recovery. Democrats carried those lessons into the COVID pandemic. They met
the crisis with overwhelming fiscal force, joining with the Trump administration
to pass the $2.2 trillion CARES Act and then adding the $1.9 trillion American
Rescue Plan Act and the trillion-dollar infrastructure bill on top. Democrats
made clear that they preferred the risks of a hot economy, like inflation, to the
threat of mass joblessness.
They succeeded. But solving the crisis of the pandemic economy created a new
crisis for the post-pandemic economy: too much demand. Supply chains that had
been battered by the pandemic and Russiaâs invasion of Ukraine began to break.
Inflation returned with a vengeance. The conversations we had with the Biden
administrationâs economists were different from the conversations with the
Obama administrationâs economists, even when they were the same people. They
needed companies to make more goods and make them faster. They needed more
chips so there could be more cars and computers. They needed ports to clear
more shipments and Pfizer to make more antiviral pills and shipping companies
to hire more truckers and schools to upgrade their ventilation systems. They
needed more supply and, if they could not get that, less demand.
âIf car prices are too high right now, there are two solutions,â Biden said. âYou
increase the supply of cars by making more of them, or you reduce demand for
cars by making Americans poorer. Thatâs the choice.â10
By 2024, the surge in prices had slowed. Inflation, as economists measure it,
had eased. But the broader affordability crisis that predated the bout of inflation
persisted. The fear that we did not or would not have enough of what we needed
settled heavily on politics. Policymakers began to rethink globalization, warning
that we could not depend on critical exports from China if conflict or crisis came
between our nations. Governors and mayors focused their attention on housing
12supply as homeless encampments spread across their streets. The Inflation
Reduction Act began the work of building the green infrastructure necessary to
migrate our economy to clean energy. The CHIPS and Science Act dangled tens
of billions of dollars to restart semiconductor manufacturing in America.
Whether these policies will work remains to be seen. That these policies represent
a break with recent decades of American politics is undeniable.
Politics is not just about the problems we have. Itâs about the problems we see.
The supply problem has lurked for years, but it has not been the core of our
politics. That is changing. A new theory of supply is emergingâand with it, a
new way of thinking about politics, economics, and growth.
Society Is Not a Pie
Perhaps youâve heard the clichĂŠ that the economy is a pie we must grow rather
than slice. It is hard to know where to begin with what this image gets wrong,
because it gets almost nothing right. If you somehow grew a blueberry pie, youâd
get more blueberry pie. But economic growth is not an addition of sameness. The
difference between an economy that grows and an economy that stagnates is
change. When you grow an economy, you hasten a future that is different. The
more growth there is, the more radically the future diverges from the past. We
have settled on a metaphor for growth that erases its most important
characteristic.
Dig within the equations that power modern economics and youâll find that
The Stagnation of Progress
- Economic growth relies on productivity, which is the ability to create more value and entirely new inventions using the same amount of resources.
- The period between 1875 and 1905 saw a radical transformation of the physical world, introducing everything from skyscrapers and cars to aspirin and recorded music.
- In contrast, the interval between 1990 and 2020 saw massive digital innovation but relatively stagnant progress in the physical and material environment.
- This slowdown in productivity and physical innovation has fueled political nostalgia and a loss of optimism about a better future.
- A 'post-scarcity' vision requires embracing emerging technologies like AI and gene editing to solve systemic challenges rather than just redistributing existing wealth.
When you passed into slumber, nobody had taken a picture with a Kodak camera or used a machine that made motion pictures, or bought a device to play recorded music.
growth comes from one of a few places. An economy can grow because it adds
more people. It can grow because it adds more land or natural resources. But once
those avenues are exhausted, it needs to do more with what it has. People need to
think up new ideas. Factories need to innovate new processes. These new ideas
and new processes must be encoded into new technologies. All this is grouped
under the sterile label of productivity: How much more can we produce with the
same number of people and resources? When productivity surges, what we get is
not more of what we had, but new things we never imagined.
Imagine going to sleep in 1875 in New York City and waking up thirty years
later. As you shut your eyes, there is no electric lighting, Coca-Cola, basketball, or
aspirin. There are no cars or âsneakers.â The tallest building in Manhattan is a
church. When you wake up in 1905, the city has been remade with towering steel-
skeleton buildings called âskyscrapers.â The streets are filled with novelty:
13automobiles powered by new internal combustion engines, people riding bicycles
in rubber-soled shoesâall recent innovations. The Sears catalog, the cardboard
box, and aspirin are new arrivals. People have enjoyed their first sip of Coca-Cola
and their first bite of what we now call an American hamburger. The Wright
brothers have flown the first airplane. When you passed into slumber, nobody
had taken a picture with a Kodak camera or used a machine that made motion
pictures, or bought a device to play recorded music. By 1905, we have the first
commercial versions of all threeâthe simple box camera, the cinematograph, and
the phonograph.
Now imagine dozing off for another thirty-year nap between 1990 and 2020.
You would wonder at the dazzling ingenuity that we funneled into our
smartphones and computers. But the physical world would feel much the same.
This is reflected in the productivity statistics, which record a slowing of change as
the twentieth century wore on. This is not just a problem for our economy. It is a
crisis for our politics. The nostalgia that permeates so much of todayâs right and
no small part of todayâs left is no accident. We have lost the faith in the future that
once powered our optimism. We fight instead over what we have, or what we had.
Our era features too little utopian thinking, but one worthy exception is
Aaron Bastaniâs Fully Automated Luxury Communism, a leftist tract that puts the
technologies in development right nowâartificial intelligence, renewable energy,
asteroid mining, plant-and cell-based meats, and gene editingâat the center of a
post-work, post-scarcity vision.11 âWhat if everything could change?â he asks.
âWhat if, more than simply meeting the great challenges of our timeâfrom
climate change to inequality and ageingâwe went far beyond them, putting
todayâs problems behind us like we did before with large predators and, for the
most part, illness? What if, rather than having no sense of a different future, we
decided history hadnât actually begun?â12
It is routine in politics to imagine a just present and work backward to the
social insurance programs that would get us there. It is equally important to
imagine a justâeven a delightfulâfuture and work backward to the
technological advances that would hasten its arrival. Bastaniâs vision is bracing
because it insists that those of us who believe in a fairer, gentler, more sustainable
world have a stake in bringing forward the technologies that will make that world
possible. That is a political question as much as a technological one: those same
technologies could become accelerators of inequality and despair if theyâre not
embedded in just policies and institutions. What Bastani sees is that the world we
14want requires more than redistribution. We aspire to more than parceling out the
present.
New technologies create new possibilities and allow us to solve once-
A Liberalism That Builds
- Addressing climate change while fighting poverty requires inventing and deploying plentiful, cheap clean energy.
- The market alone cannot distinguish between wealth from coal and wealth from battery storage, necessitating government intervention for social payoffs.
- Government is often both the problem and the solution, as seen in the failure to expand nuclear power despite its safety and low emissions.
- Technology is not neutral; it is infused with values and politics that shape the future possibilities of society.
- A lack of a program to harness technology for social change is a form of blindness that limits political vision.
- The authors advocate for a 'liberalism that builds' to solve core problems like housing, health inequality, and wages.
To take technology seriously as a force for change is to take it seriously as infused with values and, yes, politics.
impossible problems. In a world where many of the countries with the largest
greenhouse gas emissions are middle-income nations, like China and India,13 the
only way for humanity to limit climate change while fighting poverty is to invent
our way to clean energy that is plentiful and cheap and then spend enough to
deploy it. The only reason we have even the barest hope of avoiding catastrophic
warming is that the cost of solar power has fallen by 89 percent and onshore wind
costs by almost 70 percent in ten years.14 Californiaâs decision to ban the sale of
new gas-powered cars after 203515 would be unthinkable without the rapid
advances in battery technology.
Much that we need for the world we want we already know how to build. But
much that we need for the world we want still needs to be invented and improved.
Green hydrogen and cement. Nuclear fusion. Treatments for the terminal cancers
that overwhelm todayâs therapies and the shadowy autoimmune diseases that
baffle todayâs doctors. AI that molds itself to the needs of children who learn and
think differently. Markets will, we hope, proffer some of these advances. But not
nearly enough of them. The market cannot, on its own, distinguish between the
riches that flow from burning coal and the wealth that is created by bettering
battery storage. Government can. The market will not, on its own, fund the risky
technologies whose payoff is social rather than economic. Government must.
But let us not be naĂŻve. It is childish to declare government the problem. It is
just as childish to declare government the solution. Government can be either the
problem or the solution, and it is often both. By some counts, nuclear power is
safer than wind and cleaner than solar. It is inarguably safer than burning coal and
petrol. And yet the USâfacing a crisis of global warmingâhas almost stopped
building nuclear power reactors and plants entirely. Between 1973 and 2024, the
country started and finished only three new nuclear reactors. And it has shut
down more nuclear plants than itâs opened in most of our lifetimes.16 That is not
a failure of the private market to responsibly bear risk but of the federal
government to properly weigh risk.
To take technology seriously as a force for change is to take it seriously as
infused with values and, yes, politics. The relationship is bidirectional. It is not
just that the politics we have will affect the technologies we develop. The
technologies we develop will shape the politics we come to have. A world where
15renewable energy is plentiful and cheap permits a politics that is different than a
world where it is scarce and pricey. A world where modular construction has
brought down the cost of building opens different possibilities for state and local
budgets.
In 1985, the great technology critic Neil Postman wrote, âto be unaware that a
technology comes equipped with a program for social change, to maintain that
technology is neutral, to make the assumption that technology is always a friend
to culture is, at this late hour, stupidity plain and simple.â17 The corollary is also
true: to have no program to harness technology in service of social change is its
own form of blindness.
Too often, the right sees only the imagined glories of the past, and the left sees
only the injustices of the present. Our sympathies there lie with the left, but that
is not a debate we can settle. What is often missing from both sides is a clearly
articulated vision of the future and how it differs from the present. This book is a
sketch of, and argument for, one such vision.
A Liberalism That Builds
We are both liberals in the American tradition. The problems we seek to solve are
mostly problems that exist within the zone of liberal concern. We worry over
climate change and health inequality. We want more affordable housing and
higher median wages. We want children to breathe cleaner air and commuters to
The Pathologies of Liberal Governance
- The authors focus on the failures of the American left because they believe the right does not share the fundamental goal of decarbonization.
- California serves as a cautionary tale where total Democratic control has failed to solve crises in housing, homelessness, and infrastructure.
- Ineffective liberal governance provides a vacuum that right-wing populists fill by promising autocratic efficiency.
- Recent election data shows a significant rightward shift in deep-blue urban strongholds like Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York City.
- The authors argue that liberals must fix their own 'pathologies' to prove that democratic governance can still be effective.
Liberals should be able to say: Vote for us, and we will govern the country the way we govern California! Instead, conservatives are able to say: Vote for them, and they will govern the country the way they govern California!
move easily on mass transit systems. We have many disagreements with the
modern American right. But we focus, in this book, on the pathologies of the
broad left.
One reason for that is we donât see ourselves as effective messengers to the
right. There are people seeking complementary reforms in that coalition, such as
James Pethokoukis, author of The Conservative Futurist; the economist Tyler
Cowen, who has called for a âState Capacity Libertarianismâ;18 and the array of
policy experts organized in the Niskanen Center. We wish them well.
But we focus on the left for larger reasons. This book is motivated in no small
part by our belief that we need to decarbonize the global economy to head off the
threat of climate change. To the extent that the right simply does not believe this
âand in America, at least, it does notâit strikes us as naĂŻve to describe the
policies that would help Republicans build green infrastructure faster. It is folly
to expect a coalition that does not share our goals to do the work to achieve them.
16It is more interesting to ask, as we will, why it is often easier to build renewable
energy in red states than in blue states despite Republican opposition to the cause
of climate change.
Then there is the anger any liberal should feel when looking at the states and
cities liberals govern. One of us was born in California and lived there throughout
much of the writing of this book. Californiaâs most populous cities are run by
Democrats.19 Every statewide elected official in California is a Democrat.20 Both
chambers of the legislature are run by Democrats. And California is a land of
wonders. It leads the world in technology. It creates the culture that much of the
world consumes. It is astonishingly, breathtakingly beautiful. If it were its own
country, it would have the fifth-largest GDP in the world.
Liberals should be able to say: Vote for us, and we will govern the country the
way we govern California! Instead, conservatives are able to say: Vote for them,
and they will govern the country the way they govern California! California has
spent decades trying and failing to build high-speed rail. It has the worst
homelessness problem in the country. It has the worst housing affordability
problem in the country. It trails only Hawaii and Massachusetts in its cost of
living.21 As a result, it is losing hundreds of thousands of people every year to
Texas and Arizona.22 What has gone wrong?
Californiaâs problems are often distinct in their severity but not in their
structure. The same dynamics are present in other blue states and cities. In this
era of rising right-wing populism, there is pressure among liberals to focus only
on the sins of the MAGA right. But this misses the contribution that liberal
governance made to the rise of Trumpism. In their book Presidents, Populism,
and the Crisis of Democracy, the political scientists William Howell and Terry
Moe write that âpopulists donât just feed on socioeconomic discontent. They feed
on ineffective governmentâand their great appeal is that they claim to replace it
with a government that is effective through their own autocratic power.â23
In the 2024 election, Donald Trump won by shifting almost every part of
America to the right. But the signal Democrats should fear most is that the shift
was largest in blue states and blue citiesâthe places where voters were most
exposed to the day-to-day realities of liberal governance. Nearly every county in
California moved toward Trump,24 with Los Angeles County shifting eleven
points toward the GOP. In and around the âBlue Wallâ states, Philadelphia
County shifted four points right, Wayne County (Detroit) shifted nine points
right, and Cook County (Chicago) shifted eight points right. In the New York
17City metro area, New York County (Manhattan) shifted nine points right, Kings
County (Brooklyn) shifted twelve points right, Queens County shifted twenty-
The Case for Abundance
- Blue states and major urban centers are experiencing significant population loss, which threatens to shift the Electoral College and future political power to the right.
- Major cities like New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles are on track to lose half of their under-five childhood population within twenty years as young families flee.
- The authors argue that liberals must move beyond mere redistribution to provide effective government and tangible results to counter the rise of political strongmen.
- The 'Abundant Society' is proposed as a rejection of scarcity-based ideologies that seek to limit immigration or growth in the name of climate change.
- A distinction is made between a 'Consumers' Republic' and a 'Producers' Culture,' prioritizing the ability to build housing and energy over the ability to buy goods.
- Abundance is defined as a state where there are sufficient building blocksâhousing, transportation, and healthâto create a better future than the present.
We have a startling abundance of the goods that fill a house and a shortage of whatâs needed to build a good life.
one points right, and Bronx County shifted twenty-two points right.25
Voting is a cheap way to express anger. Moving is expensive. But residents of
blue states and cities are doing that, too. In 2023, California lost 342,000 more
residents than it gained; in Illinois, the net loss was 115,000; in New York,
284,000.26 In the American political system, to lose people is to lose political
power. If current trends hold, the 2030 census will shift the Electoral College
sharply to the right; even adding Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin to the
states Harris won wonât be enough for Democrats to win future presidential
elections.27
The problem is not just political. Young families are leaving large urban metros
so quickly that several countiesâincluding those encompassing Manhattan,
Brooklyn, Chicago, Los Angeles, and San Franciscoâare on pace to lose 50
percent of their under-five childhood population in the next twenty years.28
Democrats cannot simultaneously claim to be the party of middle-class families
while presiding over the parts of the country that they are leaving.
A good way to marginalize the most dangerous political movements is to prove
the success of your own. If liberals do not want Americans to turn to the false
promise of strongmen, they need to offer the fruits of effective government.
Redistribution is important. But it is not enough.
The Abundant Society
There is a word that describes the future we want: abundance. We imagine a
future not of less but of more. We do not subscribe to the seductive ideologies of
scarcity. We will not get more or better jobs by closing our gates to immigrants.
We will not turn back climate change by persuading the world to starve itself of
growth. It is not merely that these visions are unrealistic. It is that they are
counterproductive. They will not achieve the futures they seek. They will do
more harm than good.
The abundance we envision is not indiscriminate. It is not an omnidirectional
moreness. We take inspiration from People of Plenty, the historian David M.
Potterâs brilliant 1954 book on how abundance shaped American thought and
culture. âIf abundance is to be properly understood, it must not be visualized in
terms of a storehouse of fixed and universally recognizable assets, reposing on
18shelves until humanity, by a process of removal, strips all the shelves bare.â
Abundance, he said, is âa physical and cultural factor, involving the interplay
between man, himself a geological force, and nature.â29
The kind of abundance we seek differs from the kind of abundance our
generation has seen. Potter wrote of the way America was being âreoriented to
convert the producerâs culture into a consumerâs culture,â and the rupture
deepened in the decades that followed.30 American policy has been focused on
enacting what the historian Lizabeth Cohen calls âA Consumersâ Republic.â31 It
has been remarkably successful. Catastrophically successful. We have a startling
abundance of the goods that fill a house and a shortage of whatâs needed to build
a good life. We call for a correction. We are interested in production more than
consumption. We believe what we can build is more important than what we can
buy.
Abundance, as we define it, is a state. It is the state in which there is enough of
what we need to create lives better than what we have had. And so we are focused
on the building blocks of the future. Housing. Transportation. Energy. Health.
And we are focused on the institutions and the people that must build and invent
that future.
Letâs begin.
191
Grow
âGO WEST, YOUNG MAN, GO West. There is health in the country, and room away
from our crowds of idlers and imbeciles.â
The Urban Frontier Paradox
- Horace Greeley's life contradicted his famous advice to 'go West,' as he built his fortune and influence in the dense urban environment of New York City.
- While American mythology prioritizes the frontier, cities have historically been the primary engines of economic mobility and the transformation of resources into wealth.
- Early 20th-century thinkers feared that the closing of the physical frontier would lead to national stagnation and economic maturity.
- Modern economic growth is driven by ideas and technology concentrated in urban centers rather than the expansion of physical land.
- A severe housing supply crisis in high-productivity cities now prevents families from following Greeley's example of seeking urban opportunity.
- Since the 1970s, home construction has failed to keep pace with population growth, leading to astronomical prices in America's most vital economic hubs.
That we preferred the romance of the West to the math of the tenements is no new fact.
It is not clear if Horace Greeley, the newspaper editor and liberal presidential
candidate, ever uttered the advice so famously attributed to him. What is clear is
that he never followed it. Greeley was born in 1811 to a poor family in rural
Amherst, New Hampshire.1 He did not seek his fortune in the vast expanse of the
American West. He made his way to New York City in 1831. It was there, in the
teeming center of urban American life, that he built his wealth and his name,
founding the New-York Tribune, winning election to Congress, and losing the
presidency to Ulysses S. Grant.
The tension between Greeleyâs life and his legacy echoes that of the country he
loved. Americans have long lionized the frontier. But our futures have largely
been made in our cities. That we preferred the romance of the West to the math
of the tenements is no new fact. âWe often forget that the country as a whole
offered abundance in the form of fuel resources, mineral resources, bumper crops,
industrial capacity, and the like, and provided the city as a locus for the
transformation of this abundance into mobility,â Potter reminded his readers in
People of Plenty. âMore Americans have changed their status by moving to the
city than have done so by moving to the frontier.â2
But this is not the story America told itself. The western expanse lingered in
our mind as the true guarantor of our prosperity. Its settlement inflicted a kind of
psychic trauma. Europe had cities, too. What America had was openâoften
stolenâland. Without that, wouldnât we, too, fall into stagnation? The fear held
well into the twentieth century, emerging as a partial explanation for the Great
Depression. Senator Lewis Schwellenbach, a New Dealer who would serve as
President Harry Trumanâs secretary of labor, warned that âso long as we had an
20undeveloped Westânew landsânew resourcesânew opportunitiesâwe had no
cause to worry.â3 But those days were over. Alvin Hansen, an influential
economist, offered a more sophisticated version of this view. âWe are more or less
through the heavy task of equipping the continent with giant capital
expenditures,â he said.4 The Depression, in this telling, heralded a new normal: a
mature America could not expect the torrid growth of an expanding America.
But economies are not bounded by land. Ideas, and the technologies and
companies and products they power, draw the outer borders of growth. The land
that matters most is the land that aids in the fiery creation of the new. That land is
in the heart of our cities, not at the edge of our settlements. And that land reveals
the problem America faces now. A young family can still follow Horace Greeleyâs
advice and find a cheap home in the rural West. What they typically cannot do is
follow Horace Greeleyâs example and build a life in Manhattan, where the median
home now sells for $1.1 million. Or in San Francisco, where the median home
sells for $1.3 million. Or in Los Angeles, where the asking price hovers around $1
million. Or in Seattle, where the median home is over $900,000. Or in Boston,
where itâs $830,000.
Housing follows the laws of supply and demand. When supply is thick and
demand is light, prices fall. The average home in Cleveland sells for about
$115,000. When supply is tight and demand is hot, prices rise. That is the story of
the pricey, blue cities listed above. America used to be adept at building homes. In
1950, the US Census Bureau reported that America had added 8.5 million units
in the previous decade, even with the interruption of a world war. âThis is the
greatest numerical growth on record,â the authors announced.5 But in the late
1970s, home construction started to fall behind the pace of population growth.
New permits per capita declined in the 1980s and again in the 1990s. After the
Great Recession, the housing market crashed, and home construction in the
2010s was obliterated. Today, the average number of dwellings per thousand
The Closing Urban Frontier
- The United States suffers from a severe housing shortage compared to other developed nations, with only 425 houses per 1,000 people.
- Rising housing costs in 'superstar cities' have effectively negated the wage premiums that once attracted workers to economic hubs like New York City.
- A cultural shift has reframed cities as luxury products for the wealthy rather than engines of middle-class social mobility.
- The 'central paradox' of the modern era is that physical proximity has become more valuable even as digital communication has made distance irrelevant.
- Restrictive housing policies are described as 'closing the American frontier' by preventing people from moving to where opportunity is greatest.
New York was once where you went to make your fortune; it is now where you go to spend it.
people in the developed world is about 470, according to the OECD
(Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development). France and Italy
have nearly 600. Japan and Germany have about 500. The US has only about
425.6 Where did all the houses go? The answer is that they were never built at all.
The result is a housing crisis of staggering proportions. Almost 30 percent of
American adults are âhouse poorââspending 30 percent or more of their income
on housing.7 But that understates the problem. Housing costs are highest in the
superstar cities that now drive the economy. Millions endure multi-hour
21commutes, or far worse jobs, in order to live in a far-flung city where they can
afford a home. These choices are missed in raw estimates of affordability, but they
are a drag on the economy and an anchor on peopleâs lives.8
To immerse yourself in analyses of American housing is to drown in data. But
sometimes a number stands out. Here is one: The economist Ed Glaeser
calculates that, prior to the 1980s, wages in New York City were unusually high
even after correcting for the local cost of living.9 The city had its problems, but
most people would make more money by moving there. But that flipped. By the
year 2000, moving to New York meant, for most people, taking an effective pay
cut. Thatâs not because paychecks have shrunk but because housing costs have
risen. People now pay to live there; they arenât paid to live there.
âIf New York City is a business, it isnât Wal-Mart, it isnât trying to be the
lowest-priced product in the market,â Michael Bloomberg, then mayor of New
York City, said in 2003. âItâs a high-end product, maybe even a luxury
product.â10 New York was once where you went to make your fortune; it is now
where you go to spend it.
Comments like Bloombergâs are common: if you cannot afford to live in the
city, donât. Every so often, social media will convulse over some urbanite claiming
they canât afford a middle-class lifestyle on $450,000 a year or some similarly
princely sum. A common retort, even among self-styled progressives, is that they
opted out of a middle-class lifestyle the moment they opted into an apartment on
the Upper West Side. They chose to spend their money on an unattainable
luxury, no different than if theyâd purchased a speedboat or begun collecting
pricey art.
Too many have bought into a perverse inversion of what the city should be.
Cities are where wealth is created, not just where it is displayed. They are meant to
be escalators into the middle class, not penthouses for the upper class. But
through bad policy and worse politics, we are doing in the twenty-first century
what we so feared in the nineteenth: we are closing the American frontier.
W hy Cities M atter Now M ore Than Ever
A capsule history of the past few centuries of transportation and communication
technology might simply say this: we fought distance, and we won. In 1800, it
took a month and a half to travel from New York City to Chicago. In 1830, it
took three weeks. In 1850, it took two days. Today, a flight takes two to three
22hours. The telegraph and the telephone and email and teleconferencing made
further mockery of space. It is now faster to FaceTime family across the continent
than to rouse a neighbor across the street.
What are cities, at their most elemental? âCities are the absence of physical
space between people and companies,â writes Ed Glaeser in Triumph of the City.
They are the ancient answer to the difficulties of distance. But technology eroded
their obvious advantages. Cities should have languished. They have, so often,
been expected to languish. But they have stubbornly refused to accept their fate.
Instead, they thrived, attaining a centrality in modernity they didnât possess even
in antiquity. This, Glaeser writes, is âthe central paradox of the modern
metropolisâproximity has become ever more valuable as the cost of connecting
across long distances has fallen.â11
The Geography of Innovation
- The modern economy has shifted from producing physical goods to selling intangible ideas, services, and code.
- Manufacturing and innovation are deeply linked; losing production capabilities can lead to a loss of innovation primacy, as seen in the semiconductor industry.
- Technological advances that collapsed distance actually increased the value of cities by expanding the global markets for top-tier products.
- Productivity in large metropolitan areas is 50 percent higher than in smaller areas, even when accounting for IQ and education.
- Cities are unique ecosystems of people and practice that are nearly impossible to replicate or transplant through mere density.
America lost its primacy in semiconductor innovation because much is learned in the making of thingsâa theme to which weâll return.
In The New Geography of Jobs, Enrico Moretti, an economist at the University
of California at Berkeley, explains why. A century ago, the American economy
produced primarily physical goods. Now we make ideas and services. Some of
those are encoded into physical goods, but even then, production often happens
elsewhere. The iPhone made Apple, based in Cupertino, California, into the
most valuable company in the world even though two-thirds of the phones are
assembled in Foxconn factories in Shenzhen, China.12 Microsoft and Alphabet
mostly sell bits of intangible code. Teslaâs value lies in the software and battery
advances that have taken electric vehicles from the automotive equivalent of
granola to the sleek, fast cars of the future.
We do not trade in the fallacious belief that manufacturing and innovation are
distant domains. Taiwan started out manufacturing commodity semiconductor
chips that Intel cared little about. Over time, its lead in production allowed it to
develop advanced chips that American companies cannot yet replicate and that
American policymakers fear falling into Chinese hands. America lost its primacy
in semiconductor innovation because much is learned in the making of thingsâa
theme to which weâll return. The economic frontier is where new discoveries
allow for the making of new things that can be sold to ever more people.
The rising returns to innovation are a result of the same technological forces
that should have decimated the city. As distance collapsed, markets expanded. It
was once difficult to expand your business to another region. Shipping was costly,
and communication was challenging. That gave local producers a modest
advantage. The factory nearby might not be best, but it was close, and that often
made its products cheaper. Today it is routine for many businesses to sell across
state lines and national borders. Goods that can be produced anywhere can also
23be purchased anywhere. Omnipresence is yet easier for digital products, where all
thatâs needed is a download or the quick flash of an advertisement across a
browser screen. Less than half of Appleâs revenue comes from North America.13
Slightly more than half of Alphabetâs revenue is international.14 The same holds
for Tesla.15
Cities are engines of creativity because we create in community. We are spurred
by competition. We need to find the colleagues and the friends and the
competitors and the antagonists who unlock our genius and add their own.
âAmericans who live in metropolitan areas with more than a million residents are,
on average, more than 50 percent more productive than Americans who live in
smaller metropolitan areas,â Glaeser writes. âThese relationships are the same
even when we take into account the education, experience, and industry of
workers. Theyâre even the same if we take individual workersâ IQs into
account.â16
This is not a dumb gift of density. Jamming a mass of people into a chosen
place will not allow you to re-create what other groups of people have achieved
elsewhere, as the Soviet Union found out again and again. Cities are not
interchangeable. What each offers is a specific gift of the ecosystems of people and
practice it has nurtured. Once deep communities of interest and industry form,
they are difficult to dislodge, and they prove nearly impossible to replicate.
New York leads the world in finance. San Francisco and Silicon Valley lead the
world in technology. New York has tried hard to take Silicon Valleyâs crown. But
if you look for multibillion-dollar technology companies in New York, you will
find few of them. Where New York City has seen technological success is where
code serves finance: Bloomberg is a multibillion-dollar technology business built
around providing data to financial firms. Banks like Goldman Sachs and
JPMorgan Chase now employ thousands of software engineers.17 The same is
The Centripetal Power of Place
- Global industries remain rooted in local clusters because the frontier of ideas is best breached through close personal proximity.
- The concentration of generative AI companies in a few square miles of California demonstrates that digital businesses still rely on physical density.
- High operating costs in 'superstar cities' are offset by the concentration of talent and the rapid dissipation of knowledge over distance.
- Even frugal corporations like Walmart choose expensive hubs like the Bay Area when launching critical tech initiatives to ensure access to top-tier expertise.
- The post-pandemic era has seen a return to the office because remote work struggles to foster the trust and spontaneous collaboration necessary for innovation.
- Major tech firms, including Zoom itself, have mandated a return to physical offices, acknowledging that digital tools cannot fully replace face-to-face contact.
Those much-mocked Bay Area parties where young AI engineers gather in group houses to ingest psychedelics and contemplate the singularity matter.
true, in reverse, in San Francisco. There are successful banks and investment firms,
but they mostly serve technology companies.
The result is that even global businesses are rooted in local phenomena. Take
the rise of generative AI companies. Outside China, the industry is concentrated
within a few square miles along the California coast. OpenAI is not far from
Anthropic, which is a quick drive to Google, which is located near Meta. The sole
exception is DeepMind, which is based in London, but sold itself to Google in
part because it needed the computing expertise their Silicon Valleyâbased
engineers provided.
24Why doesnât Toronto or Atlanta or New York or Barcelona or Los Angeles or
Berlin have a major entrant in the industry? Why not build your AI behemoth in
Maui or Bali? These companies are feeding digital data to algorithms running on
off-site server farms. In theory, this arrangement should be possible anywhere. In
practice, the frontier of ideas is best breached by people who know each other
well and work with each other closely and who move between different
companies with different cultures and specialties smoothly. Those much-mocked
Bay Area parties where young AI engineers gather in group houses to ingest
psychedelics and contemplate the singularity matter.
âCompanies appear to locate in absolutely the worst places,â Moretti writes.
âThey pick very expensive areasâthe Bostons, San Franciscos, and New Yorks of
the world. With sky-high wages and office rents, these are among the costliest
places in America to operate a business. We would expect these cities to be
unattractive for firms, especially those that compete globally.â18 But theyâre not.
Itâs the firms that locate outside these cities that struggle. The money you save in
rent doesnât make up for the talent and knowledge that dissipate over distance.
Walmart is famously frugal, maintaining its headquarters in Bentonville,
Arkansas, and insisting top executives locate there, too. But when it wanted to
enter into e-commerce, it didnât pile software engineers into a new wing of its
headquarters. âInstead it chose Brisbane, California, just 7 miles from downtown
San Francisco, one of the most expensive labor markets in the world,â Moretti
notes.19
Walmart saw what many tech executives see. If you want the best software
products, you need to locate amid the best software engineers. Those engineers
arenât cheap to hire. But if a few dozen or a few hundred of them can build you
an e-commerce platform that you will use for millions or billions in sales, itâd be
foolish to locate elsewhere. Walmart now trails only Amazon in annual online
sales.
Some thought that the dislocations of the pandemic, combined with the rise
of videoconferencing, would finally sever the link between place and innovation.
Itâs undeniable that white-collar employees are more likely to work remotely, and
some have used this opportunity to move to smaller and cheaper cities while
clocking in for firms based many miles away. But Americaâs superstar cities still
draw many of the countryâs most talented workers. While remote and hybrid
work have stabilized at a much higher level than before COVID, it is notable that
in August 2023, the videoconferencing company Zoom announced that they
were demanding employees be in the office at least a few days each week. Eric
25Yuan, Zoomâs CEO, explained that it was too hard to build trust without
nearness. âTrust is a foundation for everything. Without trust, we will be slow.â20
Zoom was no outlier. Amazon and Meta and JPMorgan Chase and Alphabet
and Tesla and Pfizer and almost every other major company one could name had,
by mid-2023, announced a plan for employees to return to the office for at least a
few days a week. Remote work is a powerful force. But the centripetal power of
the city is stronger. âTo defeat the human need for face-to-face contact, our
The Paradox of the Metropolis
- Cities serve as dual engines for both technological innovation and economic mobility.
- High housing costs act as a barrier that prevents working-class families from accessing high-opportunity areas.
- The local service sector benefits from the wealth of high-productivity firms, but only if workers can afford to live nearby.
- Upward mobility in America has declined from a 92 percent certainty in 1940 to a 50 percent 'coin toss' for those born in the 1980s.
- Economic outcomes for children are heavily influenced by the specific 'innovation rate' and industry specialty of the neighborhood where they grow up.
- The historical convergence of income levels across different states has stalled due to housing prices gating off productive cities.
In forty years, the American dream went from being a widespread reality to a coin toss.
technological marvels would need to defeat millions of years of human evolution
that has made us into machines for learning from the people next to us,â Glaeser
writes.â21
This resolves the paradox of the metropolis: We vanquished distance for
shipping and sales. But innovation thrives amid closeness. Which is to say: it
thrives in cities. And because it thrives in cities, so does much else. Itâs in missing
how much else that we made a terrible mistake.
The Great Divergence
Cities play two roles. They are engines of innovation and engines of mobility.
High housing costs have blunted their role in innovation, but only modestly. The
richest firms and most productive workers can still afford to locate in expensive
zip codes. But high housing costs wreak havoc on the cityâs offering of
opportunity. Think of it as the firefighter test. Could a firefighter serving a city
afford to live in that city? If not, then not only is that firefighter going to be
forced into a longer commute or an economically strained life, but his children,
too, will be deprived of the awesome possibilities of the city their father works to
safeguard.
Most jobs arenât in firms like Google and Goldman Sachs. About two-thirds
of the jobs in the American economy are in the local service sector, and that
number has been steadily growing for fifty years. These are hairstylists and DMV
employees and nurses and line cooks and retail workers and real estate agents.22
They donât see the kinds of wild productivity improvements that tradable goods
do because, while one software programmer can write code for a million users,
one line cook cannot make food for a million mouths.
But these jobs pay better in dynamic cities. Those Googlers have money to
spend. And the consequences here ring out across generations. As the economist
Raj Chetty and his team have covered in several papers, upward mobility is in
26structural decline in the US. In 1940, a child born into an American household
had a 92 percent chance of making more money than her parents. But a child
born in the 1980s has just a 50 percent chance of surpassing their parentsâ
income.23 In forty years, the American dream went from being a widespread
reality to a coin toss.24
Mobility, Chetty found, is a product of place. A child born poor in San Jose
has three times the likelihood of ending up wealthy as a child born poor in
Charlotte. Among children who moved from a more economically stagnant zip
code to a richer neighborhood, Chetty finds that the likelihood of better
outcomes improves steadily with every extra year the child spends in their new
city, with the kids who moved earliest faring best.25
Chettyâs team also found that children who moved to a high-innovation area
when they were young are much likelier to patent inventions of their own when
they matured. The effect was specific to the specialty of the place: âChildren who
grow up in a neighborhood or family with a high innovation rate in a specific
technology class are more likely to patent in exactly the same class,â they write.26
But that depends on their parents being able to move to high-innovation areas.
In the past, higher incomes would attract them. In the present, sky-high cost of
living repels them. A 2017 study by Peter Ganong and Daniel Shoag reveals the
scale of whatâs lost when housing prices gate cities to working-class migrants.
From 1880 to 1980, the income gap between residents of different states closed
steadily each year. Today, that convergence has dissolved almost entirely.27
Ganong and Shoag estimate that Americaâs midcentury mobility accounted for
The Crisis of Blue-State Exclusion
- Rising housing costs in wealthy cities have effectively ended the historical trend of income convergence between rich and poor regions.
- Low-wage workers like janitors are now forced to migrate away from high-opportunity cities because housing consumes over half their income.
- Blue-state voters often exhibit 'operational conservatism,' supporting liberal symbols while using zoning policies to block the housing that would enable diversity.
- The decline of the Black population in San Francisco since 1970 illustrates the failure of progressive rhetoric to match material outcomes.
- Red states like Texas have become the primary beneficiaries of California's housing crisis by permitting new construction at significantly higher rates.
- This policy-driven reversal of mobility has transformed dynamic cities into engines of inequality rather than ladders of opportunity.
In many blue states, voters exhibit the same split political personality, but in reverse: they are symbolically liberal but operationally conservative.
more than a third of its midcentury drop in income inequality.28 Now it is gone.
This is the quiet destruction of an ancient path to opportunity.
Consider the fortunes of janitors and lawyers, Ganong and Shoag write.
Janitors and lawyers have long made more money working in New York than in
the Deep South. As a result, many migrated from the Deep South to New York.
But as housing costs in New York rose, the benefits of migration crumbled, at
least for the janitors. The lawyers still came out ahead, but the janitors saw
housing consume more than 50 percent of their paychecks.29 It used to be that
both high-wage and low-wage workers moved from poorer areas to richer ones.
By the 1990s, poorer workers were moving away from high-income areasâand
from the opportunities they once offered.
It is, then, no surprise that income inequality began rising in the â70s and
reached such striking peaks in recent decades. We took a process responsible for
27much of the march toward income convergence and threw it into reverse. We
made mobility into an engine of inequality, and we did it on purpose, using
policy levers that made life in dynamic cities too costly for the poor to afford.
But the âweâ here is hiding some uncomfortable culprits. It is liberalsâand
particularly a strain of liberalism that began to develop in the â60s and â70sâthat
bears much of the blame.
The Problem with Lawn-Sign Liberalism
There is an old finding in political science that Americans are âsymbolicallyâ
conservative but âoperationallyâ liberal.30 Americans talk like conservatives but
want to be governed like liberals. The Tea Partyâera sign saying âKeep your
government hands off my Medicareâ is perhaps the most famous example of this
divided soul. Americans like both the rhetoric and reality of low taxes, but they
also like the programs that taxes fund. They thrill to politicians who talk of
personal responsibility but want a safety net tightened if they, or those they know
and love, fall.
This dynamic is so well known, so easy to see, that we miss how often it gets
reality backward. In many blue states, voters exhibit the same split political
personality, but in reverse: they are symbolically liberal but operationally
conservative.
In much of San Francisco, you canât walk twenty feet without seeing a
multicolored sign declaring that Black Lives Matter, Kindness Is Everything, and
No Human Being Is Illegal. Those signs sit in yards zoned for single families, in
communities that organize against efforts to add the new homes that would bring
those values closer to reality. San Franciscoâs Black population has fallen in every
Census count since 1970. Poorer familiesâdisproportionately nonwhite and
immigrantâare pushed into long commutes, overcrowded housing, and street
homelessness.
Texas has been the single largest beneficiary of Californiaâs housing crisis. And
that is, in part, because Texas is Californiaâs mirror image on housing. The Austin
metro area led the nation in housing permits in 2022, permitting 18 new homes
for every 1,000 residents. Los Angelesâs and San Franciscoâs metro areas permitted
only 2.5 units per 1,000 residents.31 In our political typologies, it is liberals who
embrace change and conservatives who cling to stasis. But that is not how things
work when you compare red-state and blue-state housing policies.
28To be fair to California, change is messy and uncomfortable everywhere. Any
The Birth of Zoning
- Growing communities often resist densification because developers can profit more by replacing single-family homes with multi-unit buildings.
- Zoning emerged in the early 20th century, exploding from a handful of cities in 1916 to over 1,200 municipalities by 1936.
- The rise of trucks and buses broke the natural geographic barriers between industrial zones and residential neighborhoods, prompting homeowners to seek legal protection.
- Early zoning acted as 'good housekeeping' to separate incompatible land uses, but it was also frequently used to enforce racial and economic segregation.
- The evolution of zoning shifted from simple land-use separation to a powerful tool for antigrowth regulation that restricts housing supply today.
The community will soon wake to find that it is unrecognizable to itself.
growing community that likes itself roughly the way it is faces a problem. If more
people want to live in that community, then developers will build places for them
to live. Worse, they might build dense places for them to live. A plot of land that
houses a large single-family house could become a plot of land housing a small
building with six units. You can make more money, typically, selling homes to six
families than to one family, so itâs relatively easy for the developer to offer the
family living there now a good price for their home, raze the building, stack six
units atop each other, and make a profit. This can be done in many places at once,
fairly quickly, and the community will soon wake to find that it is unrecognizable
to itself.
But how do you stop people from selling homes they own and developers
from building on land they own and people from moving to a city they would
like to be part of? Who invented this whole business of cutting cities into âzonesâ
and creating rules about what can and canât be built there? The answer takes us
back more than one hundred years.
In the 1800s, no American city had zoning rules, the economist William
Fischel writes in his aptly titled book Zoning Rules! In the early 1900s, Los
Angeles adopted a small package of regulations that divided the city between
zones for industrial buildings and residential construction. New York City
followed, and soon enough, so did almost everywhere else. âEight cities had
zoning by the end of 1916,â Fischel writes. âBy 1926, 68 more cities had adopted
it, and between 1926 and 1936, zoning was adopted by 1,246 additional
municipalities.â32 The concept of zoning, unheard-of in 1900, covered 70 percent
of the US population by 1933.
Fischelâs explanation begins with trucks and buses, which forever changed the
spatial geometry of the city. Before big, gas-powered vehicles took over the streets,
it was easy to keep the different functions of the city separate. If you didnât want
to live near a manufacturing plant or the masses of workers who worked in it, you
could always live (or build) somewhere else. Trucks and buses changed that. âThe
truck liberated heavy industry from close proximity to downtown railroad
stations and docks,â Fischel writes.33 Factories could now be located anywhere.
Buses liberated urban workers, too. They didnât have to live within walking
distance of their jobs or on a streetcar line. They could reside anywhere, and
working-class apartments could be built anywhere. Homeowners could no longer
rely on geography to protect them from the people and producers they wanted to
avoid. If distance couldnât keep them safe, rules would have to do so instead.
29The first zoning rules did little to prevent housing construction at scale.
Instead they dictated what kind of buildings could go where. James Metzenbaum,
an Ohio litigator, compared these early rules to good housekeeping in the 1930s.
âIt keeps the kitchen stove out of the parlor, the bookcase out of the pantry,â he
said.34 Of course, the rules also often kept nonwhite Americans out of owning in
rich parts of the city.
But the American zoning experiment wasnât finishedânot even close. What
came next is what really put the clamps on housing supply: zoning as a form of
antigrowth regulation. It is this form of zoning that still governs cities and
suburbs today.
Two communities in California trace the rise of the antigrowth movement.
After World War II, millions of veterans returned from the European and Pacific
theaters. They started families in a hurry. Birth rates spiked, and young parents
balancing babies in their arms scoured the country for houses. No suburban
development epitomized this go-go era more than Lakewood, California, a
planned community built on open farmland just north of Long Beach. Between
From Lakewood to Petaluma
- Post-war California saw explosive growth, exemplified by Lakewood's construction of a new home every seven and a half minutes in the early 1950s.
- The 1971 Petaluma Plan marked a pivotal shift toward 'antigrowth liberalism,' introducing caps on new housing units and urban growth boundaries.
- Restrictive zoning and growth controls spread across the United States, with many regions banning apartments or limiting sewer expansions to halt development.
- California's housing production has plummeted since the 1960s, failing to exceed 150,000 new homes annually for over a decade despite population growth.
- The housing shortage has created a paradox in progressive areas where 'Kindness Is Everything' signs coexist with endemic homelessness and unaffordability.
- State analysts conclude that the primary cause of the current crisis is the long-term failure to build enough housing to meet demand.
In the same progressive zip codes where homeowners press signs into the soil of their front lawns bearing the message Kindness Is Everything, affordable housing canât be foundâand homelessness is endemic.
1950 and 1953, more than 17,000 homes went up.35 At its most furious pace, the
cityâs builders finished a new home once every seven and a half minutes.36
The houses sold almost as fast as they were built. On March 24, 1950, thirty
thousand people lined up to check out the inventory at Lakewoodâs grand
opening. In July, the first residentâa Navy veteran named Jim Huffmanâmoved
in with his family.37 Through the end of the year, twenty more families bought a
Lakewood home, on average, every day. By the spring of 1954, a sparse farmland
for sugar beets and lima beans had been transformed into one of Californiaâs
twenty largest cities.
Two decades later, several hundred miles north of Lakewood, another city
revealed how rapidly the politics of housing were changing. Petaluma is nestled in
the windy hills north of San Francisco, where a gap in the coastal mountain
ranges pulls cool, moist marine air into the farmland. Petaluma also saw its
population bloom after the war. But unlike Lakewood, the city became famous
for stopping growth rather than for welcoming it.
In 1971, city officials introduced the Petaluma Plan. It included a growth rate
cap of 500 annual new housing units and an urban growth boundary to prevent
sprawl. Despite facing several legal challenges, the law was largely upheld in the
courts. In the following decades, the Petaluma Plan offered a useful formula for
30Californians who wanted to freeze development in their neighborhoods, and
other cities quickly adopted its quota system for building permits.
Today, California is more Petaluma than Lakewood. In the 1950s and 1960s,
California routinely built more than 200,000 homes each year.38 Since 2007,
California has never once permitted more than 150,000 new homes.39 âIn Los
Angeles, fewer homes were built in the seventies than in the sixties, fewer in the
eighties than in the seventies, and fewer in the nineties than in the eighties, even as
the cityâs overall population grew,â the historian Jacob Anbinder writes in âCities
of Amber,â his study of the rise of antigrowth liberalism. In fact, Anbinder points
out, much of America has become more Petaluma than Lakewood.
A slew of new zoning laws in Westchester County, New York, reduced the
maximum permissible population of the county by 1.4 million people,
largely by banning forms of home construction other than large-lot single-
family houses. Bergen County, New Jersey, made it illegal by 1970 to build
apartments on all but 131 acres of land. A 1973 survey of city and county
governments found that one in five had passed laws in the previous two
years that limited new residential development by halting expansions of
public sewer systems. New York Cityâs first historic district was created in
1965; three decades later, more than fifteen thousand buildings were
protected from redevelopment by its landmarks law. By the nineteen
nineties, 71 percent of cities and 77 percent of counties in California
practiced some form of growth control, with hundreds of such measures
enacted in the eighties alone.40
In 2020, with home prices at record levels, the Petaluma Plan reached its logical
end point. For the first time in the history of the state, Californiaâwhich, as late
as the 1960s, was growing twice as fast as the rest of the countryâshrank. The
state is dominated by Democrats, but many of the people Democrats claim to
care about most canât afford to live there. In the same progressive zip codes where
homeowners press signs into the soil of their front lawns bearing the message
Kindness Is Everything, affordable housing canât be foundâand homelessness is
endemic.
31This Is Your State on a Housing Shortage
In 2015, when the California Legislative Analystâs Office investigated the cause of
the stateâs housing cost and availability crisis, the authors were unambiguous in
their diagnosis. âFirst and foremost, far less housing has been built in Californiaâs
The Housing Crisis Paradox
- California's housing production has lagged significantly behind states like Texas despite having a much larger population.
- The state disproportionately accounts for 50 percent of the nation's unsheltered homeless population, creating a visible dystopia in wealthy cities.
- Contrary to conservative arguments that 'unlivability' drives the crisis, high property values prove that demand for these cities remains extremely high.
- Common explanations like weather, social services, and drug policies fail to statistically explain why homelessness varies so much between regions.
- Data shows that poverty and unemployment rates are actually inversely related to homelessness levels across major American cities.
- Research suggests that individual vulnerabilities like mental illness do not predict mass homelessness as accurately as regional housing market conditions.
Tents line the buildings, feces line the sidewalks, needles crunch underfoot. This is not what anyone trying to preserve the idyllic conditions of Californiaâs central coast wanted. But it is what they got. It is what they made.
coastal areas than people demand,â they wrote.41 Little has changed since the
publication of that document. Since 2015, the state has authorized construction
on about half as many housing units as Texas, despite it now having 9 million
more residents.42
California has about 12 percent of the nationâs population, 30 percent of the
nationâs homeless population, and about 50 percent of its unsheltered homeless
population.43 To walk the streets of the Tenderloin in San Francisco or Skid Row
in Los Angeles is to tumble into the dystopia tucked amid the plenty of these
cities. Tents line the buildings, feces line the sidewalks, needles crunch underfoot.
This is not what anyone trying to preserve the idyllic conditions of Californiaâs
central coast wanted. But it is what they got. It is what they made.
Homelessness has been particular grist for conservatives who see, in
Californiaâs homelessness crisis, the roosting of liberal licentiousness. âFailure to
enforce basic standards of public behavior has made one of Americaâs great cities
increasingly unlivable,â wrote Heather Mac Donald, of the Manhattan
Institute.44 Mac Donald is mistaken. San Francisco is eminently livable, which is
why the average apartment sells for more than a million dollars. If San Francisco
were unlivable, and people ceased to want to live there, the price of homes would
plummet, and so too would the ranks of the homeless.
There have been many explanations offered for the severity of Californiaâs
homelessness crisis. Perhaps itâs the nice weather, which makes sleeping on the
streets comfortable even in winter. But then why is homelessness so much less
prevalent in Houston, where the winters are yet warmer? Perhaps itâs the
generosity of Californiaâs social services. Perhaps itâs liberal drug and policing
policies. Perhaps itâs something to do with mental health. Perhaps California is a
magnet of social-service compassion attracting all the rest of the countryâs
homeless.
In their book Homelessness Is a Housing Problem, Gregg Colburn and Clayton
Page Aldern test these and other explanations and find them worse than lacking.
When we tell the stories of the homeless, we focus on the individual events that
pockmarked a life path: the loss of the job, the workplace injury, the onset of
32schizophrenia, the first glow of an opioid high. But what Colburn and Aldern
wanted to understand is why homelessness varies so much across cities and
regions. If a driver of homelessness doesnât predict these differences, then it is
probably not a cause of mass homelessness. It might explain why an individual
became homeless in a particular place, but it cannot explain why one place has a
homelessness crisis and another does not.
And so they begin ticking through the list and testing them against the data.
An obvious place to start is poverty rates. Does more poverty predict more
homelessness? No. A number of cities with high rates of povertyâDetroit,
Miami, Dallas, Cincinnati, and Philadelphiaâhave low rates of homelessness.45
It is richer cities with low overall poverty rates that see more homelessness. A
similar story emerges for unemployment: homelessness is low where
unemployment is high and high where unemployment is low.46 Odd.
Then Colburn and Aldern move on to mental illness. It is hard to find reliable
data on the rates of mental illness across cities, but the US Department of Health
and Human Services does collect data across states. Here, too, the obvious
relationship eludes us. Homelessness is slightly less common in the states with the
highest rates of mental illness, and vice versa. Hawaii, which has among the lowest
rates of serious mental illness, has among the highest rates of homelessness.
Thereâs a slightly positive relationship between measured drug use and
homelessness, but not much of one: more drug use explains only about 5 percent
of the difference between places.47
The Musical Chairs of Housing
- Homelessness is primarily driven by housing availability and cost rather than individual pathologies like addiction or mental illness.
- The 'musical chairs' analogy explains that while personal vulnerabilities determine who loses the game, the lack of chairs determines that someone must lose.
- West Virginia has higher rates of poverty and addiction than California, yet California's homelessness rate is six times higher due to housing scarcity.
- Historically common low-cost options like boardinghouses were systematically eliminated by mid-century zoning laws and building codes.
- City planners and newspapers in the 1950s explicitly framed rooming houses as 'blight' that needed to be eradicated to protect property values.
- Modern homelessness is a policy choice resulting from decades of regulations that prioritized neighborhood aesthetics over affordable housing stock.
With ten chairs and ten people, everyone will find a chair when the music stops. That will be true even if one of the players is on crutches.
So what does explain homelessness? The availability and cost of housing.
When Colburn and Aldern begin testing these variables, their charts, which had
just been masses of disconnected bubbles, coalesce into lockstep lines. As the cost
of rent rises, so too does the number of homeless. As the vacancy rate plummets
âmeaning that the housing market is tight, with too many buyers and too few
sellersâhomelessness rises.
The way to think about homelessness, they write, is to imagine a game of
musical chairs. With ten chairs and ten people, everyone will find a chair when the
music stops. That will be true even if one of the players is on crutches. With nine
chairs, someone will inevitably be left out. Thatâs when individual life
circumstances begin to predict homelessness. If you live in a city with too few
homes, poverty and drug abuse and unemployment and mental illness make it
likelier that you will be among those who end up without a home. But the cause
of homelessness isnât the poverty or the addiction or the unemployment. All
33those conditions are far more prevalent in, say, West Virginia than in California,
and yet California has six times the per capita homelessness of West Virginia.
This leads to a reality many prefer not to acknowledge. If homelessness is a
housing problem, it is also a policy choiceâor, more accurately, the result of
many, many, many small policy choices. The writer Matthew Yglesias, who spent
a decade trying to persuade liberals of where theyâve gone wrong on housing,48
illustrated this nicely in a 2021 essay.49
Yglesias quotes the urban planner Payton Chungâs description of the 1951 sci-
fi classic The Day the Earth Stood Still, which features Klaatu, an alien, escaping
captivity at what was then known as Walter Reed General Hospital and moving
into a Washington, DC, boardinghouse at Fourteenth and Harvard Streets.
Boardinghouses were a common place for adults to live through much of
American history. They worked something like todayâs college dorms: The rooms
were small, the bathrooms and kitchenettes shared, and the cost was low. They
werenât as nice to live in as a single-family home with a detached garage, but they
were far nicer than a tent in the middle of an encampment in the dark of winter.
So where did they go?
The answer is that they were made, in most jurisdictions, functionally illegal.
By the 1950s, rooming houses were already a target for city planners looking to
maintain high home prices and orderly neighborhoods. âIf rooming houses are
permitted to spread to the cityâs one-and two-family neighborhoods, there is not
much use in talking brave words about fighting blight,â wrote the St. Louis Post-
Dispatch in 1957. âRooming houses are not compatible with one-and two-family
districts. When the rooming houses come in, the families move outâand the
whole area starts down hill.â50
A report from the American Society of Planning Officials that same year
offered guidance to planners looking to creatively rid their cities or
neighborhoods of such nuisances: âZoning is not the only tool available to
control the blighting effects of rooming houses. Housing codes in an increasing
number of cities require that decentâthough often minimalâstandards be
maintained in them. Besides protecting the roomers, enforcement of these codes
can do a great deal to assure that rooming houses do not harm districts in which
they are properly located.â51
Over time, planners did exactly that: Zoning and building codes required
homes to be built with ever more features and amenities. Minimum parking
requirements were added and maximum residency limits appeared. Some of this
34was done to upgrade housing stock or protect health and safety. Some of it was
done to eliminate entire forms of housing that gave the poor or the unlucky a
continued toehold in richer neighborhoods. Does it really âprotect the roomersâ
The Rise of Housing Scarcity
- Urban planning over generations has systematically eliminated low-cost housing options, effectively pushing the 'down-and-out' onto the streets.
- Cities inadvertently created homelessness crises by hoping that those who could not afford expensive housing would simply leave the area.
- Existing homeowners often benefit from housing scarcity, as it increases the value of their primary financial asset.
- The 1970s marked a turning point where housing shifted from a utility to a primary investment asset, with prices beginning an inexorable upward march.
- Federal policies like the thirty-year fixed-rate mortgage acted as a hedge against inflation, incentivizing the accumulation of wealth through property.
- Housing wealth is uniquely problematic because it merges financial interest with sentimental attachment and the basic human need for shelter.
What lender in their right mind would hand out thirty-year loans on fixed terms to virtually anybody with a job?
to move them from a boarding home without parking spaces to a tent beneath the
overpass?
âIt took a while, but over the generations, the planners have been very
successful at mostly eliminating the accommodations for down-and-outers with
the consequence that if you are down and out in a city where real estate is
expensive, you end up on the street,â Yglesias writes.52
The point is not that cities wanted the homelessness crises they now face. They
didnât. Their hope was that people who couldnât afford the kind of housing they
allowed would leave. Many did exactly that, of course. But some had nowhere else
to go. Others needed to stay near their families or jobs. And these policies did not
generate crisis in a single year, or even a single decade. It took time before choices
to limit housing led to mass homelessness. But it is not surprising that choices to
limit housing led to mass homelessness. And it is not even surprising that cities
often choose to limit the forms of housing, or even the amount of housing, that
can be built nearby. After all, if you already own a home, scarcity makes the asset
you own all the more valuable.
W hat Happened in the 1970s?
Thereâs an odd website called WTF Happened in 1971? Itâs a long stack of charts,
gathered magpie-like from all manner of books and papers and articles, recording
the many ways society began to tilt on its axis as the â70s dawned. The most
convincing of them are economic: starting in the â70s, wages began to stagnate,
inequality began to soar, inflation began to rise, and housing prices began their
inexorable march upward.
Our favorite of these charts shows how many years an average wage earner
would presumably need to save to buy a home. In 1950, itâs 2.3 years. In 1960, itâs
2.6 years. In 1970, itâs 2.4 years. But then something happens. By 1980, itâs 3.8
years. By 1990, itâs 5.4 years. By 2000, itâs 7 years.53 And this forward march is
hiding the regional differences: that home you could buy with 2.4 years of labor
in 1970 was in a different kind of city than that home you could buy after even 7
years of work at median wages in 2000.
35Real wages stagnated over these decades, but they didnât fall. The action was in
housing prices, which rose and rose. This was something new. Prior to 1970,
housing wasnât a prime asset. You bought a home to live in it. But that changed in
the 1970s. Inflation was part of the reason. One of the main aims of federal
housing policy has been to make possible the thirty-year fixed-rate mortgage, a
peculiar financial device that wouldnât survive a day in the economic wild. What
lender in their right mind would hand out thirty-year loans on fixed terms to
virtually anybody with a job? But the federal government backed those mortgages
and made the interest payments on them into large tax deductions, and so they
became the cornerstone of the American housing market. But they became
something else, too: a hedge against inflation. A fixed-rate mortgage holds
payments flat on an appreciating asset. While inflation eats away at the real value
of those payments, the value of the thing the payments are going towardâthe
houseâjust goes up and up.
From 1955 to 1970, owner-occupied housing held at about 21 percent of total
household net wealth.54 Between 1970 and 1979, it climbed to 30 percent of net
wealth. For those who owned a home, it was much more of their total wealth
than that. But a home is a peculiar form of wealth. You typically need to live in it.
Selling stocks or bonds liquidates an asset you donât use in your day-to-day life.
Selling a home liquidates the place you sleep, the walls within which you may
have raised your children or grown to adulthood yourself. Financial interest
merges with sentimental attachment and daily need. But it gets worse, as Fischel
explains:
It is worth a moment to consider how financially problematic an owner-
occupied home was at the beginning of the twentieth centuryâand
The Homeownership Asset Trap
- Treating a primary residence as a wealth-building asset creates a high-risk, non-diversified portfolio vulnerable to local neighborhood shifts.
- Homeowners manage financial risk by using zoning laws and parking requirements to restrict local housing supply and maintain high property values.
- There is an inescapable paradox in American policy: housing cannot be both an affordable basic need and a high-return investment vehicle.
- The shift toward 'homevoter' politics pits incumbent owners against newcomers, incentivizing the exclusion of lower-income residents.
- Post-civil rights era zoning regulations, such as large minimum lot sizes, replaced explicit racial discrimination with economic barriers to entry.
Homeownership works for some because it cannot work for all.
remains to the present. An investment advisor whom you have consulted
looks at your middle-income portfolio and tells you that you should put
almost all of your liquid assets in a single investment. It is not a diversified
mutual fund; it is a single firm, and the firm makes only one product in a
single location. It has a great upside in that its returns are almost entirely
untaxed under federal and state income tax laws, and it insures you against
rent increases by the landlord. But its asset value is subject to a multitude of
risks. Not least are those from the neighborhood and the single
municipality in which the firm is located. Bad events next door, down the
street, at the school district, and in city hall can put your life savings in a
tailspin.55
36In the â70s, rising inflation and slowing home building turned the homes people
did own into the center of their wealth. But how do you protect the value of that
asset? You can insure a home against fire, but you canât insure it against rising
crime rates or local schools slipping in quality or a public housing complex being
built down the block.
To manage those risks, you need to control what happens around your home.
You do that through zoning and organizing. You do it through restricting how
many homes and what kinds of homes can be built near you. You do it by making
the minimum allowable lot sizes bigger and the parking requirements more
expansive because both those rules ensure that only wealthier people will be able
to buy into your community. You do it through organizing at planning meetings
to defeat proposals for apartment buildingsâtheyâll change the character of the
neighborhood, and think of the traffic!âand refusing to expand sewer systems to
areas where developers might want to build new homes.
In her essay âThe Homeownership Society Was a Mistake,â Jerusalem Demsas,
who covers housing at the Atlantic, traces the politics of treating homes as assets.
Housing is often spoken of as a safe investment, but itâs not. Homes rise in price
when there are too few of them to go around. The greater the gap between supply
and demand, the higher the returns for homeowners. âAt the core of American
housing policy is a secret hiding in plain sight,â she writes. âHomeownership
works for some because it cannot work for all. If we want to make housing
affordable for everyone, then it needs to be cheap and widely available. And if we
want that housing to act as a wealth-building vehicle, home values have to
increase significantly over time. How do we ensure that housing is both
appreciating in value for homeowners but cheap enough for all would-be
homeowners to buy in? We canât.â
The logic of this is inescapable, and the politics it creates predictable. â[A]
homeâs value is directly tied to the scarcity of housing for other people,â Demsas
says. âThis system by its nature pits incumbents against newcomers.â56
The â70s were a period of ferment for this form of politics. The run-up in
housing prices was part of it. But Fischel emphasizes a few other forces. The
Interstate Highway System, coupled with the growth of car use, allowed people to
live farther from their workplaces than was possible even a few decades before.
Then came civil rights legislation that made it illegal to directly discriminate
against homebuyers based on race. Communities that wanted toâin the sanitized
language of real estateââpreserve their characterâ needed to find other means by
37which to do it. And they did, through rules like setting a large minimum lot size
for new construction.
âLot-size requirements forced developers to build fewer and more expensive
homes, in turn guaranteeing that the homes would be sold to wealthier, whiter
buyers,â writes Anbinder. He quotes a homeowner in Greenwich, Connecticut,
giving up the game in 1967. âItâs like going into Tiffany and demanding a ring for
$12.50,â said the homeowner. âTiffany doesnât have rings for $12.50. Well,
The Diseases of Affluence
- Economist William Fischel argues that exclusionary zoning is driven by homeowners' materialist desire to protect property values under the guise of public concerns like traffic and crime.
- The 1970s housing politics represented a shift where the solutions of the New Deal eraârapid growth and expansionâbegan creating the environmental and social problems of the next.
- President Lyndon B. Johnson's 1964 'Great Society' speech highlighted the 'despoiling of the suburbs' and the erosion of nature as the hidden costs of American industrial success.
- John Kenneth Galbraith's 'The Affluent Society' critiqued the paradox of private luxury existing alongside public squalor, such as polluted streams and decaying infrastructure.
- Modern American liberalism evolved into a movement with a 'divided soul,' caught between the need for continued growth and the desire to preserve the environment and community character.
The family which takes its mauve and cerise, air-conditioned, power-steered and power-braked automobile out for a tour passes through cities that are badly paved, made hideous by litter, blighted buildings, billboards, and posts for wires that should long since have been put underground.
Greenwich is like Tiffany.â57 If you zone Greenwich so the only people who can
afford homes are multimillionaires, then only multimillionaires will live in
Greenwich.
Fischel is an economist, so he takes a materialist view of what was happening
here. To him, the core of the story is home prices, and the desire of homeowners
to keep those prices rising, and everything else was more or less a rationalization.
âEconomic advantage is a powerful private motivator, but it plays poorly in
public discourse,â he writes. âIt is considered gauche (I have tried it) to mention
in a public meeting that a particular public policy will raise or lower home values,
even though what is acceptable to mentionâtraffic, crime, walkable streets, local
pollutionâpretty clearly maps onto home values. Something less obviously
selfish is required to get other community residents to rally around the cause.â58
But while there was plenty of selfishness in the housing politics of the â70s,
something less obviously selfish was going on, too. Something noble and even
necessary. The story of rising housing prices in America isnât a simple morality
play of greedy homeowners and feckless city planners. This is a story, at least in
part, of how the solutions of one era created the problems of the next.
America the Ugly
In May 1964, Lyndon B. Johnson stepped onto the podium at the University of
Michigan to deliver that yearâs commencement address. The president began with
a capsule history of the country he now led. âFor a century we labored to settle
and to subdue a continent,â he said. âFor half a century we called upon
unbounded invention and untiring industry to create an order of plenty for all of
our people.â But the age of untrammeled growthâthe whirlwind economic
expansion that the New Dealers had set into motionâwas revealing its limits.
What was the cost of all this plenty?
38âThe catalog of ills is long: there is the decay of the centers and the despoiling
of the suburbs,â he said. âThere is not enough housing for our people or
transportation for our traffic. Open land is vanishing and old landmarks are
violated.â
Worst of all, expansion is eroding the precious and time-honored values of
community with neighbors and communion with nature.âŚ
We have always prided ourselves on being not only America the strong
and America the free, but America the beautiful. Today that beauty is in
danger. The water we drink, the food we eat, the very air that we breathe,
are threatened with pollution. Our parks are overcrowded, our seashores
overburdened. Green fields and dense forests are disappearing.
A few years ago we were greatly concerned about the âUgly American.â
Today we must act to prevent an ugly America.59
The problem the New Deal faced was straightforward. People had too little and
they needed much more. But by the time Johnson took office, the difficulties of
deprivation had been joined by diseases of affluence. In his 1958 bestseller The
AďŹuent Society, John Kenneth Galbraith described an America cosseted by new
comforts yet unable to shake a sense that something had gone fundamentally
awry:
The family which takes its mauve and cerise, air-conditioned, power-steered
and power-braked automobile out for a tour passes through cities that are
badly paved, made hideous by litter, blighted buildings, billboards, and
posts for wires that should long since have been put underground.⌠They
picnic on exquisitely packaged food from a portable icebox by a polluted
stream and go on to spend the night at a park which is a menace to public
health and morals. Just before dozing off on an air mattress, beneath a
nylon tent, amid the stench of decaying refuse, they may reflect vaguely on
the curious unevenness of their blessings. Is this, indeed, the American
genius?60
Modern American liberalism may have been born in the New Deal. But it was
reborn in its aftermath. It matured into a political movement with a divided soul.
The Toxicity of Growth
- Postwar America saw a fundamental ideological shift from growth-oriented politics to an antigrowth movement concerned with societal well-being.
- Rapid technological and industrial expansion led to extreme environmental degradation, including rivers catching fire and lethal smog events.
- The physical transformation of the country was unprecedented, with car ownership and air travel evolving from non-existence to mass-market ubiquity in seventy years.
- Rachel Carson's 'Silent Spring' served as a catalyst, articulating existing public anxieties about chemical pesticides and ecological stability.
- The environmental movement culminated in the first Earth Day in 1970, which remains the largest single demonstration in American history.
- A rapid legislative response between 1966 and 1973 created an 'arsenal' of federal laws designed to protect the environment and empower local citizens.
America in the 1950s and â60s was paradoxically the richest superpower in world history and functioned as a kind of mass-industrial conspiracy to kill its own residents.
Much of midcentury liberalism evolved in reaction to the excesses and
consequences of New Deal liberalism. âOne of the most consequential conflicts
in postwar America was between two systems of values,â writes Jake Anbinder in
39âCities of Amber.â âAn older growth politics which extolled the benefits of
metropolitan development, and a newer antigrowth politics which rejected the
idea that such development improved society.â61
It is hard, now, to imagine how quickly the built environment of America
changed in these years. In 1900, there were scarcely 8,000 cars in the entire
country.62 By 1970, 118 million cars sluiced through a nearly completed
Interstate Highway System. In 1900, no one had ever flown in an airplane. By
1970, millions of passengers boarded wide-body jetliners like the Boeing 747 to
travel across the oceans to thousands of airports around the world. To a previous
generation, this technology would have been indistinguishable from sorcery. As
every reader of fantasy novels knows, great magic carries a terrible price.
In 1943, Los Angeles residents woke up to air so dark and noxious that they
feared the Japanese had launched a gas attack.63 Five years later, a lethal smog in
Donora, Pennsylvania, caused by industrial pollutants from zinc-smelting plants
and a temperature inversion that trapped toxins in the air64 killed twenty people
and sickened thousands.65 In New Hampshire, the Merrimack River, lined with
textile mills in Manchester and Nashua, ran in different colors by the day, as dyes
and chemicals dumped into the river tinged the water red, then green, then
yellow.66 In Cleveland, Ohio, on June 22, 1969, oily waste and debris were
ignited, possibly by a flare thrown onto the Cuyahoga River, sparking a fire as tall
as a four-story building.67 In Pittsburgh, midcentury drivers had to use their
windshield wipers to clear away the soot so they could see the road.68 America in
the 1950s and â60s was paradoxically the richest superpower in world history and
functioned as a kind of mass-industrial conspiracy to kill its own residents.
The toxicity of growth triggered a reaction among intellectuals and, later,
within government. In 1962, Rachel Carson, a marine biologist suffering from
breast cancer, published Silent Spring, which argued that chemical pesticides were
devastating our ecosystems and destabilizing the biosphere. The book is broadly
credited with founding the environmental movement, but like any founding
document, it hit a nerve because it concretized anxieties that already existed.
Environmentalism soon permeated the broader culture. In the late 1960s,
Gaylord Nelson, the senator from Wisconsin, who had been closely watching the
student-led protests around the Vietnam War, was inspired to channel that energy
and enthusiasm to protest on behalf of the environment. He hired a young
activist named Denis Hayes, who came up with the idea of a walkout on the first
day of spring, which they would call Earth Day. On April 22, 1970, more than 20
40million peopleâroughly 10 percent of the US populationâpoured into the
streets. It was the largest single demonstration in American history.
Between 1966 and 1973, the US passed almost a dozen laws that required the
government to be more responsive to local citizens and the environment. They
were the National Historic Preservation Act (1966), the Department of
Transportation Act, the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1968, the National
Environmental Policy Act, the Clean Air Act of 1970, the Uniform Relocation
Assistance and Real Property Acquisition Policies Act, the Noise Control Act of
1972, the Clean Water Act, the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1973, and the
Endangered Species Act. In seven years, America compiled an arsenal of
The Bipartisan Environmental Turn
- President Richard Nixon championed environmentalism as a 'common cause' beyond party lines, framing pollution as a debt to nature that required urgent reparations.
- Nixon's administration oversaw the creation of the EPA and the passage of foundational laws like the Clean Air Act and the Endangered Species Act.
- Ronald Reagan, often viewed as a conservative icon, took credit for California's early leadership in environmental legislation during his time as governor.
- The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) was originally passed as a modest bill that received almost no media attention at its inception.
- The landmark 'Friends of Mammoth' court case radically expanded the scope of CEQA by defining private developments requiring public permits as public projects.
- This legal shift transformed environmental regulation from a check on government building into a powerful tool for slowing or stopping private development.
Through our years of past carelessness we incurred a debt to nature, and now that debt is being called.
regulation to slow or outright stop the era of big government building.
These were not partisan fights. To read President Richard Nixonâs State of the
Union address from 1970 is to tumble into a politics very different than our own,
where Republicans talked in ways that even few Democrats dare speak today:
The great question of the seventies is, shall we surrender to our
surroundings, or shall we make our peace with nature and begin to make
reparations for the damage we have done to our air, to our land, and to our
water?
Restoring nature to its natural state is a cause beyond party and beyond
factions. It has become a common cause of all the people of this country. It
is a cause of particular concern to young Americans, because they more
than we will reap the grim consequences of our failure to act on programs
which are needed now if we are to prevent disaster later.
Clean air, clean water, open spacesâthese should once again be the
birthright of every American. If we act now, they can be.
We still think of air as free. But clean air is not free, and neither is clean
water. The price tag on pollution control is high. Through our years of past
carelessness we incurred a debt to nature, and now that debt is being called.
Nixon promised that âthe program I shall propose to Congress will be the most
comprehensive and costly program in this field in Americaâs history.â He was as
good as his word. He went on to sign the National Environmental Policy Act, the
Clean Air Act, and the Endangered Species Act, and he created the
Environmental Protection Agency, making him arguably the most important
environmentalist president of the twentieth century.
41But Nixon was not aberrant as a Republican taking the environmental worries
of the moment seriously. âI might be letting you in on a little secretâas a matter
of fact, one of the best-kept secrets in Washington,â President Ronald Reagan
told the nation in 1984. He went on to describe Californiaâs leadership role in
passing environmental legislation. He talked about how the nation had followed
Californiaâs lead. And then he delivered the punch line. âThe secret I mentioned
is that I happened to have been Governor of California back when much of this
was being done,â Reagan said.69
In âCities of Amber,â Anbinder tells the story in more detail. Reagan signed
the California Environmental Quality ActâCEQA, as itâs calledâinto law in
1970. But he did not know what he was signing, and the legislature did not know
what it was passing. The bill was thought to be modest. Despite the
environmental consciousness rising in the state and in the media at the moment,
the Los Angeles Times didnât devote a single full article to the legislation.
Then, in 1972, came a case called Friends of Mammoth v. Board of Supervisors
of Mono County. A developer had proposed to build six buildingsâ worth of
condominiums and shops and restaurants near Mammoth Lakes, one of
Californiaâs beloved ski resort areas. Friends of Mammoth, a homeownersâ
association, sued to stop the build, arguing that it would strain water and sewage
resources. The novelty of their argument was that they sued under CEQA. The
legislation, as passed, held that government entities in California needed to
produce environmental impact reports before embarking on major new projects.
But the developer of the proposed Mammoth Lakes condos was not an arm of
the California state, and this was not a public project. The argument of the
Mammoth homeowners held that yes, actually, it was, because any development
that required public permits to be built was inherently a public project.
Friends of Mammoth lost the case in the lower courts but appealed up to the
state Supreme Court, which ruled in their favor in a 6-to-1 decision. CEQA, the
court held, applies ânot only [to] situations in which the government itself
engages in construction, acquisition or other development, but also [in] those
The Rise of Anti-Growth
- A 1972 court ruling expanded the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) to cover almost all private construction, effectively requiring environmental reviews for any commercial building activity.
- The sudden legal shift caused such chaos that San Francisco froze all building permits and the legislature had to issue a moratorium to prevent a total statewide standstill.
- CEQA quickly became a primary tool for blocking housing, with a fifth of all Bay Area housing production facing environmental litigation between 1972 and 1975.
- The 'highway revolts' against planners like Robert Moses provided a blueprint for community coalitions to organize and block large-scale development projects.
- The term 'Californication' emerged as a pejorative for the perceived moral and physical bankruptcy of rapid, soulless suburban sprawl.
- Environmentalism began to merge with anti-growth politics, often framing newcomers as a 'consumptive horde' threatening the stewardship of existing residents.
As a lobbyist for the Sierra Club put it, CEQA now covered âanybody engaged commercially in putting two sticks of wood together.â
instances in which the state regulates private activity.â70 That meant it applied to,
well, almost anything that anyone might try to build in the state of California. As
a lobbyist for the Sierra Club put it, CEQA now covered âanybody engaged
commercially in putting two sticks of wood together.â71
The Sacramento Bee called the decision âprobably⌠the most important such
ruling by any court in the field of environmental concern since the daisy-pickers
42came out of the woods and plunged into the tangle of government influence.â72
San Francisco froze all new plumbing, building, and electrical permits until it
could fully understand the scope of the ruling. As Anbinder dryly notes, âHaving
been informed of what the law they had passed two years earlier actually said⌠the
legislature moved quickly to impose a four-month moratorium on CEQAâs
implementation so that worksites across the state would not come to a complete
standstill.â73
A couple of years later, government agencies in California were reviewing
more than four thousand environmental impact statements annuallyâfour times
more than the entire federal government was generating under the facially similar
National Environmental Policy Act. CEQA became a potent weapon against the
construction of new homes. âBetween 1972 and 1975, twenty-nine thousand
proposed homes in the Bay Areaâroughly a fifth of the regionâs total housing
production at the timeâwere subject to environmental litigation,â Anbinder
writes.74
The Plague of Growth
We think now of the Interstate Highway System as one of the grand achievements
of the postwar era. The reaction at the time, particularly among liberals, was more
mixed. âThe most charitable thing to assume about [the highway bill] is that they
hadnât the faintest notion of what they were doing,â the critic and historian Lewis
Mumford wrote in 1958. âWithin the next fifteen years they will doubtless find
out; but by that time it will be too late to correct all the damage to our cities and
our countryside.â75
Robert Caro published The Power Broker, his study of how Robert Moses
carved up New York, in 1974. Much of what Moses was building was highways.
And he was not alone. Moses might have been distinctive in his power, but
planners were slicing highways through communities all across the nation. Cities
fought back, culminating in the so-called highway revolts, in which residents
organized to block the roads being cut into their neighborhoodsâand, in doing,
built connections and coalitions and tactics for opposing all manner of
development.
California was ground zero for both the possibilities and the predations of
growth. In the 1950s, the five fastest-growing municipalities were all in
43California.76 New suburbs sprung like poppies across the state. Before
Californication was a Red Hot Chili Peppers song or a TV series starring David
Duchovny, it was shorthand, Anbinder writes, for âthe moral bankruptcy that
many believed was inextricable from the physical form of sprawl itself.â77 In 1972,
Time reported on the conversations happening in other western states, where
âlegislators, scientists and citizens are now openly concerned about the threat of
âCalifornication.âââ78 This was growth unleavened by concern for beauty or
community or conservation. The term âticky-tackyâ comes from a song recorded
by Malvina Reynolds and covered by Pete Seeger, describing the soulless, same-
same tract housing covering the hills of Daly City, just south of San Francisco.
Antigrowth politics could, and often did, tip into a kind of misanthropy
aimed at newcomers. Those who already lived in a place were its stewards, its
guardians, its voice. Those who wanted to move to that place were recast as a
consumptive horde. Harold Gilliam, who wrote the âThis Landâ column for the
San Francisco Chronicle, put it grimly. âUltimately, every conservation problem is
The Dilemma of Degrowth
- Climate change flips traditional political roles, with the left seeking to conserve the existing environment while the right often favors radical adaptation.
- The 'degrowth' movement argues that climate change is a symptom of a deeper philosophical error rooted in capitalism and the desire for dominion over nature.
- Proponents of degrowth suggest that humanity must abandon the dream of endless growth and dismantle industries like fast fashion and meat production.
- A significant critique of degrowth is that its required philosophical revolution would take centuries, whereas the climate crisis requires immediate action.
- While degrowth targets specific wasteful industries, there is no global consensus on which sectors of production are truly unnecessary.
- Humanity's physical footprint is dominated not by urban infrastructure, but by the massive amount of land required for food production.
Every effort to save some vestige of Californiaâs pristine splendor would be defeated by the unending advance of new hordes of population like a swarm of locusts devouring everything in sight.
a population problem. Every effort to save some vestige of Californiaâs pristine
splendor, every campaign to preserve the bay or the hills or a natural coastline or a
grove of redwoods, every attempt to curb galloping slurbanism or to save
breathing space for the future, would be defeated by the unending advance of
new hordes of population like a swarm of locusts devouring everything in
sight.â79
But what could you do about it?
442
Build
NO LESS THAN HOUSING, CLIMATE change makes a hash of our traditional political
categories. Here it is typically the right that is willing to leap into the unknown,
confident that humanity can adapt to unimaginable change. Here it is largely the
left that wants to conserve the climate that the entirety of human civilization has
known.
But to conserve our climate requires more than mere inaction. To do nothing
âto let greenhouse gas emissions accelerate as they would if we kept burning coal
and oil and gas heedlesslyâis to welcome warming of four or five or six degrees
Celsius. These are numbers that diverge from the climate of the eighteenth
century as sharply as the climate of the eighteenth century diverges from the Ice
Age.1 These are numbers inside which the planetary systems that sustain us break.
To maintain the climate we have had, or anything close to it, requires us to
remake the world we have built. One vision that is popular in some corners of the
left is called âdegrowth.â It holds that climate change reflects humanityâs thrall to
an impossible dream of endless growth. Rich countries must accept stasis,
shuttering or scaling down major industries, and poorer countries must grow
more gently and prudently.
Degrowth is simultaneously much more and much less than an answer to the
climate crisis. It is much more than an answer because it is not really about
climate at all. It is an anti-materialist philosophy that holds that humanity made
its fundamental errors hundreds of years ago, trading the animism of our
ancestors for Christianityâs promise of dominion over nature. The problem is not
simply greenhouse gas emissions or microplastics. It is Cartesian dualism and
American-style capitalism and everything these systems of thought and practice
have taught us to value and prize and want.
45âThose who sought to pave the way for capitalism in the sixteenth century first
had to destroy other, more holistic ways of seeing the world, and either convince
or force people to become dualists,â writes Jason Hickel in Less Is More: How
Degrowth Will Save the World. âDualist philosophy was leveraged to cheapen life
for the sake of growth; and it is responsible at a deep level for our ecological
crisis.â2
Hickel compares the scale of the philosophical and economic revolution
degrowth imagines to Darwin persuading the world of evolution or Copernicus
spreading the knowledge that the earth revolves around the sun.3 He envisions a
wholesale shift in humanityâs relationship to other living thingsâand to itself.
But shifts of that size take decades or centuries to play out. In the case of
evolution, the victory is yet only partial. We do not have decades or centuries to
convince the world to act on climate change.
To the extent that degrowth has a specific climate plan, it is to shut off or scale
down areas of production it deems destructive, like military investment, meat and
dairy production, advertising, and fast fashion. There is some appeal to this. All
of us can identify some aspect of the global production system that seems
wasteful, unnecessary, or harmful. The problem is that few of us identify the same
aspects of the global production system.
Take meat and dairy production. When we think of humanityâs land
footprint, we mostly think of buildings and roadways. But only 2 or 3 percent of
habitable land is taken up by cities. We do not primarily use land to live on. We
primarily use land to feed ourselves. About half of all habitable land is used for
The Politics of Meat and Scarcity
- Industrial animal agriculture is a primary driver of climate change, deforestation, and mass extinction, consuming vast land and water resources.
- Despite the moral and environmental arguments for eliminating meat consumption, doing so remains a political impossibility due to public demand for cheap meat.
- The degrowth movement argues that even clean energy abundance would not stop ecological destruction, as humans would simply use that energy to further exploit nature.
- Degrowth faces a fundamental paradox: if it is difficult to change consumer desires during times of abundance, it is even harder to impose collective scarcity.
- Historical precedents, such as the 'yellow vest' protests and unrest in Sri Lanka, demonstrate that rising energy and food costs frequently lead to political collapse.
Industrial animal agriculture is more than a climate problem. It is a moral stain upon modernity.
agriculture. Of that, three-quarters is given over to raising livestock or growing
feed for livestock. It is difficult to find an environmental challenge that is not tied
up in raising animals for our consumption. It is a driver of climate change. It is a
driver of deforestation. It is a driver of mass extinction, as the land we turn over to
cows and sheep and goats is the land that other species need to survive. It is a
driver of drought and water scarcity, as it takes about 1,800 gallons of water to
produce a single pound of boneless beef.
To the vegetarians and vegans among us, this is an obvious target for
elimination. Humans thrive on a vegetarian diet, and the factory farms that
produce most of our meat are abattoirs of unimaginable cruelty and suffering.
Industrial animal agriculture is more than a climate problem. It is a moral stain
upon modernity. There is probably no single change that would do more for our
interlinked environmental problems than for the world to cease using cows and
goats and sheep for food.
46But to suggest such a thing is to court political ruin. People want to eat meat,
and they want that meat to be cheap and plentiful. The right accuses the left of
scheming to ban hamburgers for a reason. The left denies those accusations and
leaves direct confrontation with the meat industry out of its legislation for the
same reason. There is no near-term politics that will ban meat consumption or
redistribute it from richer countries to poorer countries.
For all the radicalism of his book, even Hickel flinches from the task he sets for
himself. He does not suggest anything akin to ridding the world of the factory
farms that produce most of our beef. Instead, he proposes âto end the subsidies
high-income countries give to beef farmersâ and notes that âresearchers are also
testing proposals for a tax on red meat.â4 Fine proposals. But not the
revolutionary upheaval that will cut our emissions rapidly enough to limit global
temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius.5 And that is even assuming you could pass
a global or multinational tax on meat. Which you could not.
Degrowth criticizes other approaches as unrealistic, noting the ease with
which countries slip from their climate commitments or the ways that clean
energy may allow other human cruelties to persist. In a telling passage, Hickel
imagines what would happen if we perfected and deployed nuclear fusion
tomorrow, bringing to life the clean energy economy of green dreams. âWhat
would we do with it?â he asks.6 âExactly what we are doing with fossil fuels: raze
more forests, trawl more fish, mine more mountains, build more roads, expand
industrial farming, and send more waste to landfill.â
In this sense, degrowth recognizes the difficulty that politics poses to climate
policy. It knows people want more of what they have, and although it blames
capitalism and plutocracy for these wants, it sees the challenges these wants pose
to traditional climate politics. But those challenges apply to the degrowth vision
with even greater force. If you cannot imagine convincing people to change their
desires in the presence of energy abundance, how do you imagine convincing
them to accept the rapid, collective scarcity that degrowth demands?
We know what it looks like when governments face the political fury of rising
energy prices or fuel rationing. In 2022, ninety countries and territories
experienced often violent protests over the rising price of fuel between January
and September, according to a BBC analysis.7 In Sri Lankaâa country that
Hickel holds out as a model for degrowth developmentâthose protests led to the
collapse of the ruling government.
47It is not much easier in rich countries, where degrowthers insist on the most
radical restrictions in energy use. In France, the 2018 âyellow vestâ protests
followed a modest hike in the fuel tax. In America, rising energy costs resulting
The Political Cost of Scarcity
- Western governments are retreating from climate policies as high energy costs trigger voter backlash and political instability.
- Political scientist Erik Voeten notes that citizens bearing the costs of green transitions are increasingly gravitating toward far-right movements.
- The only effective way to blunt climate policy backlash is direct compensation, which is impossible under a degrowth economic model.
- Failing to provide abundant energy risks empowering populist authoritarians who promise prosperity through fossil fuel expansion.
- Historical accounts of Versailles and Monticello illustrate that even the wealthiest elites lived in frigid discomfort before the fossil fuel era.
- Energy inequality remains one of the most fundamental divides in modern global society.
It is to deliver a future of populist authoritarians who drill and burn their way back to a false prosperity.
from sanctions against Russia forced the Biden administration to open up
domestic fossil fuel production and beg Saudi Arabia for more oil.8 Germanyâs
government tried to ban fossil fuel heating systems in favor of greener heat
pumps; the outcry nearly split the ruling coalition and the compromised, cut-up
bill that ultimately passed was a shadow of the initial proposal. In 2023, a wave of
electoral defeats for the UKâs Conservative Party were blamed on high energy
costs, leading Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to delay a suite of climate policies. In
the 2024 election, Vice President Kamala Harris emphasized the record levels of
oil and gas production achieved under the Biden administration far more than
the historic climate investments she helped pass into law.
When Erik Voeten, a political scientist, picked through the political
consequences of recent climate policies, he found that âpeople who bear the cost
of climate policies increasingly flock to the far right.â9 The only policy that
seemed to blunt the backlash was directly compensating the people who suffer
under green policies. But you canât both compensate residents of rich countries
for lost growth and cut growth in those same countries. Turning global politics
into a zero-sum contest for allotted energy rations will not deliver a greener
future.
The cost of trying and failing to implement the degrowth vision would not
merely be missing our climate targets by a few tenths of a percentage point. It is to
deliver a future of populist authoritarians who drill and burn their way back to a
false prosperity. It is to discredit parties that care about climate change and
empower strongmen who will give people what they have always wanted: the gift
of abundant energy.
âW e Just Burned Itâ
âTake any variable of human well-beingâlongevity, nutrition, income, mortality,
overall populationâand draw a graph of its value over time,â Charles Mann
writes in The Wizard and the Prophet. âIn almost every case it skitters along at a
low level for thousands of years, then rises abruptly in the eighteenth and
nineteenth centuries, as humans learn to wield the trapped solar power in coal, oil
and natural gas.â10
48Without energy, even material splendor has sharp limits. Mann notes that
visitors to the Palace of Versailles in February 1695 marveled at the furs worn to
dinners with the king and the ice that collected on the glassware. It was frigid in
Versailles, and no treasury could warm it. A hundred years later, Thomas
Jefferson had a vast wine collection and library in Monticello and the forced labor
of more than a hundred slaves,11 but his ink still froze to the tip of his pen during
winter.12
Today, heating is a solved problem for many. But not for all. There are few
inequalities more fundamental than energy inequality. The late demographer
The Energy Revolution
- Hans Rosling's framework categorizes humanity by energy access, illustrating that energy is the fundamental nucleus of wealth and social mobility.
- Air pollution from burning fuels kills 7 to 9 million people annually, making it far more lethal than traffic accidents, war, or natural disasters.
- Historical data shows that as societies become technologically and economically rich, they transition from dirty fuels to cleaner air and water.
- The perceived conflict between economic growth and environmental protection is a false dichotomy; growth enables the adoption of cleaner technologies.
- A technological miracle has occurred as solar and wind costs plummeted by 90% and 70% respectively between 2010 and 2020.
- The world is entering an era of 'negative energy prices' where renewable capacity is expanding so rapidly that electricity may soon be effectively free.
The cost of solar is falling so fast that for much of the day it will be effectively free, in much of the world, by 2030.
Hans Rosling had a vivid way of framing this. In 2010, he argued that you could
group humanity by the energy people had access to. At the time, roughly 2 billion
people had little or no access to electricity and still cooked food and heated water
by fire. About 3 billion had access to enough electricity to power electric lights.
An additional billion or so had the energy and wealth for laborsaving appliances
like washing machines. Itâs only the richest billion people who could afford to fly,
and we used around half of global energy.13 Energy is the nucleus of wealth.
Can we all be energetically wealthy? Not if weâre burning coal and oil. The
stocks of fossil fuels are finite and their continued combustion is lethal. This
would be true even if climate change was a hoax. Air pollution kills between 7
million and 9 million people each year; that is six or seven times the death toll
from traffic accidents and hundreds of times the death toll from war or terrorism
or all natural disasters combined. It is deadliest where people cook by burning
wood or charcoal and farm by burning the end of the last seasonâs crops. That is
to say, it is deadliest where people are energy poor, because where people are
energy poor, they burn fuel and breathe in the byproducts.
For most of human history there was no other choice. That is why nearly every
society that has become rich since the industrial revolution has seen air pollution
build to crisis levels. Human beings choked on smog in London in the nineteenth
century and in New York and Los Angeles in the twentieth century. A few years
ago, Beijingâs air quality was an international scandal, and now the same is true
for Delhi. But notice: the problem passes. Los Angeles got richer and its residents
now breathe clean air. The same is true in London, where air pollution in the
eighteenth century was worse than Delhi is today.14
âEnvironmental action is often framed as at odds with the economy,â writes
Hannah Ritchie in Not the End of the World. âItâs either climate action or
economic growth. Pollution versus the market. This is just wrong.â15 As societies
49become economically and technologically rich, they clean their air and water. Air
pollution is not a problem of using too much energy or pursuing too much
growth. It is a problem of using dirty energy because you do not have the money
or the technology to grow another way.
The same is true for climate change. We did not always know how to power
economies without using fossil fuels. We do now. This is the technological miracle
of our age. The cost of solar energy fell by about 90 percent from 2010 to 2020.
The cost of wind power fell by nearly 70 percent.16 Solar power does not choke
the lungs. Wind power does not sting the eyes. Neither of them warms the planet.
Two decades ago, it was not possible to imagine that modernity was compatible
with renewable energy. Now we need not imagine it.
The world installed more solar power in 2023 than it did between 1954 and
2017. We have seen repeated periods in California and Texas of ânegative energy
pricesââmoments where consumers are, mind-bendingly, paid to consume
electricity because there is more of it than the system needs. The cost of solar is
falling so fast that for much of the day it will be effectively free, in much of the
world, by 2030. âI simply cannot believe where we are with solar,â Jenny Chase,
the BloombergNEF analyst, told the New York Times. âAnd if youâd told me
nearly 20 years ago what would be the case now, 20 years later, I would have just
said you were crazy. I would have laughed in your face. There is genuinely a
revolution happening.â17
In a thrilling paper with the very un-thrilling title âEmpirically Grounded
Technology Forecasts and the Energy Transition,â a team of researchers found
that the price of oil, gas, and coal, after adjusting for inflation, is about what it was
140 years ago.18 But renewable energy keeps crushing expectations. The authors
The Clean Energy Transition
- Forecasting models consistently underestimated the rapid decline of solar costs, which fell by 15 percent annually compared to predicted rates of 2.6 percent.
- Renewable energy sources like solar and wind are now significantly cheaper than coal and competitive with or cheaper than natural gas.
- Vast disparities in per-capita carbon emissions between wealthy nations prove that high standards of living do not require high carbon intensity.
- Developed nations have successfully decoupled economic growth from carbon emissions, showing absolute declines in CO2 even when accounting for offshored manufacturing.
- The United Kingdom's transition from 90% coal dependency in 1950 to a total phase-out by 2024 serves as a primary example of rapid energy transformation.
The sun burns, so we donât need to.
looked at 2,905 projections for solar costs made by the most popular forecasting
models and found that solar costs were expected to fall by 2.6 percent a year and
never by more than 6 percent. In reality, they fell by 15 percent per year, year after
year. In 2022, the US Energy Information Administration released a report
estimating life-cycle costs for new energy installations in the coming decades.
Solar was already cheaper than natural gas. Wind was a dollar more. Both were
about half the price of coal.19
As the climate writer and activist Bill McKibben put it, âIn the place of those
fires we keep lit day and night, itâs possible for us to rely on the fact that there is a
fire in the skyâa great ball of burning gas about ninety-three million miles away,
whose energy can be collected in photovoltaic panels, and which differentially
50heats the Earth, driving winds whose energy can now be harnessed with great
efficiency by turbines. The electricity they produce can warm and cool our
homes, cook our food, and power our cars and bikes and buses. The sun burns, so
we donât need to.â20
To this miracle one might add humanityâs harnessing of nuclear power, or our
growing ability to tap the geothermal energy pulsing beneath the earth or the
hydropower generated by the waves. So much clean energy is possible, and
available, if we can muster the ingenuity and the will to harness it.
And so there is nothing inevitable about the pace of greenhouse gas emissions.
To see this clearly does not require imagining any new energy technology; it
simply requires looking at the way different countries power themselves now.
America emits about 15 tons of carbon per person, per year. Canada and
Australia belch out nearly the same. In Germany and Japan, itâs 8 tons. In France
and the United Kingdom, itâs less than 5 tons.21 These are vast differences across
similar lifestyles. A wanderer in London or Paris or Tokyo or Berlin would not
notice material deprivation compared to Toronto or Sydney or Houston.
What is true across space is also true across time. In 1979, Americans pumped
out 22.7 tons of CO2 per person; Canadians, 18.2; Germans, 14.3; Australians,
13.2; the UK, 11.5, France, 10.22 All these countries are richer today than they
were then, and yet they emit less carbon, per person, than they did then. Nor is it
the case that their emissions have simply been offshored to the developing
countries that manufacture many of the goods that richer countries buy.
Researchers use trading data to track the movement of manufacturing emissions.
Adjusting for offshore manufacturing blunts the cuts to emissions somewhatâin
the United States, a 21 percent drop becomes a 14 percent drop, while in
Germany, thereâs almost no differenceâbut it doesnât come close to erasing it.23
What is changing, in all these countries, is the source of power. âIn 1900,
nearly all of the UKâs energy came from coal, and by 1950 it was still supplying
over 90%,â writes Ritchie. âNow coal supplies less than 2% of our electricity, and
the government has pledged to phase it out completely by 2025.â24 Indeed, the
last coal-fired power station operating in the UK shuttered in September 2024.25
It is possible to power a modern economy with clean energy. It is possible to
develop an economy with clean energy. And it will be possible to go beyond
where any economy is today with clean energy. While we were writing this book,
researchers at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory generated more
The Path to Energy Superabundance
- Recent breakthroughs in nuclear fusion and renewable energy suggest humanity is still in the early stages of its relationship with power.
- Future generations may view our current practice of burning fossil fuels as a primitive and 'barbaric' method of energy production.
- Energy superabundance could enable transformative technologies like vertical greenhouses, large-scale desalination, and direct carbon capture.
- Decarbonization requires the replacement of approximately one billion household machines with electric alternatives like heat pumps and induction stoves.
- Transitioning to a clean economy presents a massive manufacturing and persuasion challenge to move away from a grid still 60 percent reliant on fossil fuels.
âFolks will look back and be blown away by how we used energy today. Theyâll say, âWait, you just burned it?âââ
energy than they used in a test of laser-ignited nuclear fusion.26 We know nuclear
51fusion can work: it is how stars generate power. We have never known if we can
make it work here on earthâat least not affordably and at scale. But we are
getting closer.
It is tempting to assume we in the United States sit at the terminus of what
energy can achieve and all that is left is for the rest of the world to catch up. We do
not. We are early in the story of humanityâs relationship with energy. Todayâs
technologies will come to seem comical, even barbaric. âIn 100 or 200 years,
everything will look radically different,â says Melissa Lott, the former director of
research at Columbia Universityâs Center on Global Energy Policy. âFolks will
look back and be blown away by how we used energy today. Theyâll say, âWait,
you just burned it?âââ27
Too many see clearly the costs that dirty energy can impose on the
environment but do not dare imagine the possibilities clean and abundant energy
unlocks for it. In a paper imagining âenergy superabundanceââwhich they
define modestly, as simply every human being having access to the energy that
residents of Iceland enjoyâAustin Vernon and Eli Dourado sketch out some of
the near-term possibilities. Vertical greenhouses could feed far more people while
using far less land. Desalination is a major contributor to water supplies in Israel
now and could supply more than half of the demand in Singapore by the middle
of the century. The technology could become affordable for poorer, populous
nations that need new water sources most. Directly removing carbon dioxide
from the air would become more plausible, giving us a path to reversing climate
change over time.
But the first step to building the clean economy of tomorrow is building the
clean economy of today. That is a daunting task.
Electrify Everything
Start with the major ways that most US households warm the planet. We drive.
We heat homes. We cook food. We dry clothes. These activities require millions
and millions of machines, most of which now run on fossil fuels. To decarbonize,
they all will need to run on electricity.
The energy analysts Sam Calisch and Saul Griffith estimate that in the next
few years consumers will need to replace about one billion machines with clean
alternatives.28 That means when old cars give out, they will be replaced by electric
vehicles. It means when old furnaces cough their last breath, they are replaced by
52heat pumps. It means trading gas stoves for induction stoves and clothes dryers
that run on natural gas for dryers that work off heat pumps.29
Producing all these new machines is itself a steep manufacturing challenge. It
is also a persuasion challenge. People need to want these alternatives. That means
the alternatives need to be excellent, which in many cases they now are. Electric
cars accelerate faster and run quieter than cars powered by combustion engines.
Induction stoves boil water in a fraction of the time it takes those little licks of
fire. Because these advantages are not universally knownâand because new
technologies are more expensive than mature onesâsubsidies need to be
generous, and advertising needs to be everywhere. Making these replacement
decisions needs to be a no-brainer, every time. But assume that challenge can be
met, fully or partially. Now we have a billion more machines using more
electricity than ever before. Where is all that electricity coming from?
About 60 percent of the electricity generated in the United States in 2022
came from fossil fuels.30 The precise mix varies by state. South Dakota gets 84
percent of its power from renewables, mainly wind,31 and Washington gets 74
percent from renewables,32 thanks to hydropower. But Nevada gets 56 percent of
its electricity from natural gas.33 Wyoming gets 71 percent from coal.34 Florida
The Massive Scale of Decarbonization
- The United States must transition from 60 percent fossil fuel electricity to near zero while simultaneously doubling or tripling total grid capacity.
- To meet decarbonization goals, the U.S. needs to build the equivalent of its entire current electricity grid every fifteen years until 2050.
- The physical footprint of required wind and solar installations would span a landmass equal to eight U.S. states, including Illinois and Ohio.
- Current infrastructure pace is insufficient, requiring the addition of two massive 400 MW solar facilities every single week for the next 30 years.
- Building an integrated national grid faces severe political and bureaucratic hurdles, with most major transmission projects stalling or failing to begin construction.
- Modern liberalism must shift from a focus on tax codes and regulations to a 'liberalism that builds' physical infrastructure at an unprecedented scale.
To meet even a middle-road renewable energy scenario would require bringing online two new 400 MW solar power facilitiesâeach taking up at least 2,000 acresâevery week for the next 30 years.
gets only around 6 percent of its electricity from solar.35 So much for the
Sunshine State.
The first task is to convert that 60 percent of energy coming from fossil fuels
to something closer to 0 percentâor at least 0 percent coming from energy that
releases carbon emissions into the atmosphere, which could leave a role for
natural gas with carbon capture.
That would be task enough. But with one billion new machines plugging into
the countryâs grid, we donât just need the electricity we generate now to be clean.
We need much more of it. âOne way to put that is for every fifteen years from
2020 to 2050, we need to build the entirety of our electricity grid worth of supply
again,â says Jesse Jenkins, an energy expert at Princeton University.36 And we
need to build it out of solar panels and wind turbines and storage batteries.
Jenkinsâs team has modeled that build-out in detail. A plausible path to
decarbonization sees wind and solar installations spanning up to 590,000 square
kilometers. That is roughly equal to the landmass of Connecticut, Illinois,
Indiana, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Ohio, Rhode Island, and Tennessee.37 And we
need to do it fast. In their 2023 paper âThe Greensâ Dilemma,â J. B. Ruhl and
James Salzman, professors of environmental law at Vanderbilt and UCLA,
53respectively, put this vividly. âConsider that the largest solar facility currently
online in the United States is capable of generating 580 MW [megawatts],â they
write. âTo meet even a middle-road renewable energy scenario would require
bringing online two new 400 MW solar power facilitiesâeach taking up at least
2,000 acresâevery week for the next 30 years.â38
Installing that much wind and solar capacity isnât just a manufacturing
challenge; itâs a political one. Wind and solar require far more land than coal or
natural gas to produce the same amount of energy. Some of the viable land is
open and easy to purchase. Much of it isnât. Neighbors have fears about a wind
farm rising near their homes, and communities have concerns about becoming
the site of a major solar array. If the land is publicly owned, the project has to
negotiate with an overlapping set of federal and state authorities. It can take years
to merely get the plans and permits approved.
Once weâve generated this electricity, weâll have to move it. This will
sometimes require sending power across vast distances. The wind blows harder in
Oklahoma than in Oregon, and the sun shines brighter in Arizona than in Maine,
but a fully electric economy will require these far-flung states to be connected by
an integrated energy grid. The name for the infrastructure that moves electricity
from one place to another is transmission lines, and weâve never completed more
than 4,100 miles of transmission lines in one year, ever.39 Weâd have to build more
than that, year after year, to hit these goals. Transmission projects often come in
late and over budget, and many planned projects stall. A 2016 report by Lawrence
Berkeley National Laboratory looked at five major transmission projects with
projected completion dates of 2021. Only one of them has been completed.
Construction hasnât even begun on the other four.40
For decades, American liberalism has measured its successes in how near it
could come to the social welfare system of Denmark. Liberals fought for
expansions of health insurance and paid vacation leave and paid sick days and a
heftier earned-income tax credit and an expanded child tax credit and decent
retirement benefits. Worthy causes, all. But those victories could be won, when
they were won, largely inside the tax code and the regulatory state. Building a
social insurance program does occasionally require new buildings. But it rarely
requires that many of them. This was, and is, a liberalism that changed the world
through the writing of new rules and the moving about of money.
The climate crisis demands something different. It demands a liberalism that
The Cost of Building
- Federal climate and infrastructure acts represent a potential investment of $450 billion, but their success depends on the ability to actually execute projects.
- The true value of these bills is variable; they could scale to trillions if construction is fast or fail to reach estimates if permitting is too difficult.
- California's high-speed rail project serves as a cautionary tale, having been in the planning and study phases since 1982 without completion.
- Despite high-speed rail being a proven technology used globally since the 1960s, California has struggled with decades of delays and rising costs.
- The Obama administration viewed infrastructure stimulus not just as economic recovery, but as a means to build a lasting national legacy.
Planners imagined a silver shell whistling along beams of steel, carrying millions of parents, children, Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, Hollywood actors, and solo travelers through Americaâs largest state at speeds reaching 220 miles per hour.
builds. The Infrastructure and Investment Jobs Act, the Inflation Reduction Act,
54and the CHIPS and Science Act add up to about $450 billion in clean energy
investments, subsidies, and loan guarantees. This is how the scale of such bills is
normally described in Washington: by a price tag. The more money, the bigger
the bill. That is an incomplete measure, at best.
If we could build faster, the numbers could rise. If we could build cheaper, the
money would go further. That $450 billion is only an estimate. Many of the
subsidies in these bills are open-ended. They will go to as many projects as can use
them. These bills could spend trillions of dollars if we can build that
infrastructure fast enough. They could spend far less than $450 billion if projects
become too hard to permit. They could waste tens or hundreds of billions on
projects that are never completed. What matters is not what gets spent. What
matters is what gets built.
Californiaâs No-Speed Rail
In 1982, Governor Jerry Brown signed a bill to study what it would take to build
a high-speed rail system across California. Californians liked what they saw. In
1996, California formed a high-speed rail authority to plan for the construction
of what would be Americaâs fastest rail system. Planners imagined a silver shell
whistling along beams of steel, carrying millions of parents, children, Silicon
Valley entrepreneurs, Hollywood actors, and solo travelers through Americaâs
largest state at speeds reaching 220 miles per hour. Goodbye, traffic and
pollution-choked freeways. Hello, classy dining cars and reclinable seats.
High-speed rail is not some futuristic technology like cold fusion or flying cars.
France and Japan broke ground on these projects back in the 1960s. Both of us
have boarded bullet trains in foreign countries, taking the TGV from Paris to
Bordeaux and the Shinkansen from Tokyo to Kyoto.
Ah, but California. The years ticked by. The governors came and went. In
2008, voters approved a plan to build the first segments by 2020 for $33 billion.
Then, in 2011, high-speed railâs foremost champion returned when Brown
improbably won back the governorâs mansion, almost thirty years after last
leaving it. In his 2012 State of the State address, he marked high-speed rail as his
signature project. âIf you believe that California will continue to grow, as I do,
and that millions more people will be living in our state, this is a wise
investment,â he said. And California was ready to make it. âWe are within weeks
55of a revised business plan that will enable us to begin initial construction before
the year is out,â he promised.
This time, Brown had allies. In 2009, President Barack Obama signed the
American Recovery and Reinvestment Act into law. The âRecoveryâ bit was
obvious: A housing bubble had caused a financial crisis. A financial crisis had
caused mass joblessness. The economy needed help, and it needed it now. But the
administration wanted to do more than mere stimulus. They wanted a legacy.
They wanted the kinds of ambitious projects upon which another century of
The High-Speed Rail Dream
- The Obama administration viewed the 2008 financial crisis as a strategic opportunity to reinvest in American infrastructure, with high-speed rail as its centerpiece.
- President Obama envisioned a future where rail travel would eliminate the frustrations of air travel, such as airport security and tarmac delays.
- California was positioned as the ideal testing ground for this vision, enjoying unprecedented political support and billions in combined state and federal funding.
- Despite the favorable political climate, the project suffered from extreme delays and ballooning costs, leading to a significant scaling back of its original goals.
- The ambitious plan to connect San Francisco and Los Angeles was eventually reduced to a smaller line between Merced and Bakersfield.
- Current estimates suggest the project will cost tens of billions more than anticipated and will not carry passengers until at least 2030.
âYou never want a serious crisis to go to waste,â Rahm Emanuel, Obamaâs chief of staff, said. âAnd what I mean by that is an opportunity to do things that you think you could not do before.â
American might and prosperity could be built. âYou never want a serious crisis to
go to waste,â Rahm Emanuel, Obamaâs chief of staff, said. âAnd what I mean by
that is an opportunity to do things that you think you could not do before.â41
This was the âReinvestmentâ side of the bill: hundreds of billions of dollars to
build the infrastructure of the future. And high-speed rail was the glitzy, headline
project at the center of it. âImagine boarding a train in the center of a city,â
Obama said in April 2009. âNo racing to an airport and across a terminal, no
delays, no sitting on the tarmac, no lost luggage, no taking off your shoes. Imagine
whisking through towns at speeds over one hundred miles an hour, walking only
a few steps to public transportation, and ending up just blocks from your
destination. Imagine what a great project that would be to rebuild America. Now,
all of you know this is not some fanciful, pie-in-the-sky vision of the future. It is
now. It is happening right now. Itâs been happening for decades. The problem is
itâs been happening elsewhere, not here.â42 Obama wanted it to happen here.
The most obvious place was California, where, Obama continued, âvoters
have already chosen to move forward with their own high-speed rail system, a
system of new stations and 220-mile-per-hour trains that links big cities to inland
towns; that alleviates crippling congestion on highways and at airports; and that
makes travel from San Francisco to Los Angeles possible in two and a half hours.â
In 2009, then, this was the status of high-speed rail in California: It was a
signature project of the president of the United States. A signature project of the
most powerful governor California had in decades. Voters in California had set
aside billions to make it real. And the federal government was adding billions
more. It is hard to imagine a more favorable climate for the project. A spokesman
for the California High-Speed Rail Authority joined a call-in radio show and told
listeners that theyâd be âable to ride that train from San Francisco to LA in the
year 2020.â
But progress crawled and costs ballooned. In his final State of the State
address, in 2018, Brown tried to rally Californians to the task. âDifficulties
56challenge us but they canât discourage or stop us,â he said.43 The next year, Gavin
Newsom, who had served as lieutenant governor, succeeded Brown. âLetâs be
real,â Newsom said in his first State of the State. âThe project, as currently
planned, would cost too much and take too long. Thereâs been too little oversight
and not enough transparency. Right now, there simply isnât a path to get from
Sacramento to San Diego, let alone from San Francisco to LA. I wish there
were.â44
Ambitions were cut. No longer was California trying to build high-speed rail
to connect the megacities of San Francisco and Los Angeles. Now it was trying to
salvage something, anything: A line between the agricultural centers of Merced
and Bakersfield. A line no one would have authorized if it had been the plan
presented in the first place. The scaled-down plan was estimated at $22 billion.45
But even the price tag on that line has ballooned. The latest estimate is it will cost
$35 billion to complete, and it wonât begin carrying passengers until sometime
between 2030 and 2033.46 If all goes well.
The US has contributed as much to rail technology as any other country in the
worldâor more than any other country. Americans invented the air brake47 and
The High-Speed Rail Limbo
- The California High-Speed Rail project stands in stark contrast to the 19th-century Transcontinental Railroad, which spanned 1,800 miles in just six years.
- While California struggles to complete a 500-mile system, China has successfully constructed over 23,000 miles of high-speed rail in the same timeframe.
- The project's primary obstacles are not engineering-based but are rooted in political, legal, and bureaucratic negotiations.
- Eminent domain and environmental reviews have become grueling, decade-long processes that invite constant litigation and construction moratoriums.
- Delays create a vicious cycle where rising inflation and loss of public trust make the project increasingly expensive and politically difficult to finish.
- The project currently exists in a state of 'building anyway' in the hope that future funding and political will materialize to complete the route.
The project is caught in a strange limbo between political fantasy and physical fact.
led the world in rail construction at the end of the 1800s. California businessmen
helming the Central Pacific Railroad Company built all but a few hundred miles
of the western portion of the Transcontinental Railroad in the 1860s. The project
spanned nearly 1,800 miles. It took just six years to finish. These days, six years is
roughly the amount of time it takes California to realize that its bullet train needs
to be pushed back by another decade. In the time California has spent failing to
complete its 500-mile high-speed rail system, China has built more than 23,000
miles of high-speed rail.48
In October 2023, one of usâokay, it was Ezraâwent to Fresno, California,
and toured the miles of rail infrastructure that the California High-Speed Rail
Authority has built.49 The project is caught in a strange limbo between political
fantasy and physical fact. The agency doesnât have anywhere near the money or
political capital it would need to complete the Los AngelesâtoâSan Francisco
system Californians actually want. It doesnât even have the money to complete
the Bakersfield-to-Merced system that Newsom proposed. It has no line of sight
on how it will get that money or that political capital. But since it has some
money and some political capital, it is building anyway, in the hopes that
Californians will want to finish what they started.
57As Ezra walked the path of the track with the engineers who built it, he heard
less about engineering problems than political problems. He stood on a patch of
the 99 freeway that had been moved in order to clear the hoped-for trainâs path.
Not far from there had been a Derrelâs Mini Storage. In folk imagination,
eminent domain is a simple process by which the state simply tells you it wants
your land and then gives you some money and takes it from you. In reality, it took
the High-Speed Rail Authority four separate requests for possession, and two and
a half years of legal wrangling, to get the land.
That story repeated and repeated again and again. There are parts of the build
that intersect with the freight rail lines. But the freight rail lines are so busy in the
holiday season that some impose a construction moratorium from October to
December. So in those areas no construction can happen for a large chunk of the
year. Trains are cleaner than cars, but high-speed rail has had to clear every inch of
its route through environmental reviews, with lawsuits lurking around every
corner. The environmental review process began in 2012, and by 2024 it still
wasnât finished. âIâm always amazed the staff has been working on these segments
for a decade or longer to get through the environmental process,â Brian Kelly,
who served as CEO of the High-Speed Rail Authority from 2018 to 2024, says.50
What has taken so long on high-speed rail is not hammering nails or pouring
concrete. Itâs negotiating. Negotiating with courts, with funders, with business
owners, with homeowners, with farm owners. Those negotiations cost time,
which costs money. Those negotiations lead to changes in the route or the build
or the design, which costs money. Those negotiations lead to public
disappointment and frustration, which leads to loss of money that might
otherwise have been approved if the project were speeding toward completion.
There is one school of thought that says it is worth taking the time to do these
projects right. If the reviews and the negotiations and the consultations take a few
more years, those are years well spent. But they carry a price tag. âTime is a killer
on the estimate of a projectâs cost,â Kelly said. âWhen you donât have funding
and canât make decisions and canât drive to get operational and you canât move
the ballâthe cost is huge. Two to three percent a year, and in higher inflation
periods, like we just had, five percent.â As delays mount, costs keep rising. The
project becomes more expensive to finish. The public loses faith. The politicians
The Crisis of Building
- Prominent Democratic leaders are increasingly vocal about the 'public sclerosis' and pervasive delays preventing large-scale infrastructure projects.
- The United States spends significantly more per kilometer of rail ($609 million) than peer nations like Japan, Canada, and Germany.
- Data suggests that government involvement and union density are not the primary causes of high costs, as other nations with both factors build more efficiently.
- Construction productivity in the U.S. has paradoxically declined since 1970, even as technology has advanced and other sectors have seen massive gains.
- The inability to build efficiently creates a cycle of diminished ambition, where the loss of confidence prevents the proposal of future projects.
We got so good at stopping projects that we forgot how to build things in America.
begin second-guessing.
Governor Newsom knows how bad this looks. He knows how bad this is. âI
watched as a mayor and then a lieutenant governor and now governor as years
became decades on high-speed rail,â he says. âPeople are losing trust and
58confidence in our ability to build big things. People look at me all the time and
ask, âWhat the hell happened to the California of the â50s and â60s?âââ51
But itâs not just California. Democrats today are as searing in their criticisms
of public sclerosis as any Republican. John Podesta, the graybeard who oversaw
the rollout of the Inflation Reduction Act for Joe Biden, bemoaned that âdelays
are pervasive at every level of governmentâfederal, state, and local. We got so
good at stopping projects that we forgot how to build things in America.â52 Brian
Deese, then the director of Bidenâs National Economic Council, noted in April
2022 that the Empire State Building was completed in a little over a year and said
that government needs to âdemonstrate that America can buildâfast, as weâve
done before, and fairly, as weâve sometimes failed to do.â53
One responseâthe typical Republican responseâis that government is
intrinsically inefficient. But the data doesnât bear that out. The Transit Costs
Project tracks the price tags on rail projects in different countries. Itâs hard to get
an apples-to-apples comparison here, because different projects are, well, different,
and it matters whether they include, say, a tunnel, which is expensive for all the
obvious reasons.
Even so, the United States is notable for how much we spend and how little we
get. It costs about $609 million to build a kilometer (about 0.6 miles) of rail here.
Germany builds a kilometer of rail for $384 million. Canada gets it done for $295
million. Japan clocks in at $267 million. Portugal is the cheapest country in the
database, at $96 million. All those countries build more tunnels than we do,54
perhaps because they retain the confidence to regularly try. The better you are at
building infrastructure, the more ambitious you can be when imagining
infrastructure to build.
We looked into it, and it turns out that all those countries also have
governments. So the problem cannot simply be government. Nor is the problem
unionsâanother favored bugaboo of the right. Union density is higher in all
those countries than it is in the United States.
The Construction Puzzle
Think of the technology we have today that we didnât have in the 1970s. The new
generations of power tools and computer modeling and teleconferencing and
advanced machinery and prefab materials and global shipping. Youâd think we
59could build so much more, so much faster, for so much less money, than in the
past. But we canât. Or, at least, we donât.
Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, productivity in the construction sectorâ
how much more could be done given the same number of workers and machines
and the same amount of landâgrew faster than productivity in the rest of the
economy. Then, around 1970, it began to fall, even as economy-wide productivity
kept rising. Today, a chasm yawns. A construction worker in 2020 produced less
than a construction worker in 1970, at least according to the official statistics.
Contrast that with the economy overall, where labor productivity rose by 290
percent between 1950 and 2020, or to the manufacturing sector, which saw a
stunning ninefold increase in productivity.
In the piquantly titled âThe Strange and Awful Path of Productivity in the
U.S. Construction Sector,â Austan Goolsbee, the president of the Chicago
Federal Reserve and a former chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers
under President Barack Obama, and Chad Syverson, an economist at the
University of Chicagoâs Booth School of Business, set out to uncover whether
The Construction Productivity Paradox
- Economists Goolsbee and Syverson used a process of elimination to determine that the decline in construction productivity is not a statistical illusion or a result of underinvestment.
- The productivity slowdown is a global phenomenon, with 55 percent of OECD countries seeing a decline between 1996 and 2019.
- Data suggests that regulatory burdens and geographic location do not provide a simple explanation for why some areas perform better than others.
- Industry veterans point to a massive increase in administrative overhead, noting that projects now require multiple estimates and significantly more office staff than in the 1970s.
- Modern safety protocols and mandatory site rituals, while beneficial for worker health, contribute to the statistical decline in hourly productivity.
âEveryone has their pet theory. But everyone has a different pet.â
this is all just a trick of statistics, and if not, what has gone wrong.
Their paper works by process of elimination. First, they look at whether there
has been less capital investment in construction than elsewhere in the economy.
Nope. Then they examine whether weâre mismeasuring constructionâwhich
would mean that sometime starting in the 1970s we began overestimating the
labor or materials the construction industry used or underestimating how much
it built with them, or both. They test this a few different ways, but the most
interesting is to look at how many houses were built per worker, adjusted for
square footage. There, the trend looks more flat than negative, and maybe slightly
positive for single-family homes, but itâs far from bringing construction
productivity anywhere near level with the rest of the economy.55
This isnât a quirk of American recordkeeping. The slowdown is international.
The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development tracked
construction productivity in twenty-nine countries between 1996 and 2019. In
55 percent of them, productivity fell during that time. The only countries in
which productivity rose at more than 2 percentage points per year were the
Slovak Republic, Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuaniaâpoorer countries rebuilding
after the crackup of the Soviet Union and the Soviet bloc.56
So if itâs not underinvestment and itâs not a statistical illusion, what is it? Here,
Goolsbee and Syverson seem stumped. The Wharton School, for example, tracks
building regulations across cities, and Goolsbee and Syverson tested regulatory
60burden against construction productivity. There was a slight relationship, but
nothing impressive. They looked at which states saw the highest and lowest rates
of productivity increases. The worst performers, Syverson said, were Alaska,
Idaho, Wyoming, Delaware, and Michigan. The relative stars were Georgia,
North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, and Colorado. That doesnât lend itself
to a clean story of red states and blue states or urban states and rural states.
Syverson, for one, is skeptical that thereâs any single answer. âI donât know
how you get 50 years of decline without having multiple problems,â he said.
âEveryone has their pet theory. But everyone has a different pet.â57
But Goolsbee and Syverson are economists. Maybe the cause is obvious to
industry insiders. Ed Zarenski worked in construction, largely as an estimator, for
more than forty years and now runs the market analysis firm Construction
Analytics. Zarenski, who tracks construction costs and business volume closely,
agrees that there has been a slowdown. And he agrees that there is no single cause
for it. But when he thinks back on what the construction industry looked like
when he began his career, and what it looks like now, the anecdotes tumble out.
âWhen I first started back in the â70s, you did one estimate on a project,â he
said. âYou put it in, you got your bid, and if you won, you began construction. By
the time I left in 2014, you did three estimates for every job before you even put
the bid in. That becomes part of the cost of the job.â
Or take the job site, he said. âThe safety features on jobs when I started in the
industry were not even noticeable. Safety on a job today is incredibly different.
You donât walk across a beam; you walk around on a pathway marked for you to
stay safe so you donât fall off the side of the building. By the time I retired, one
thing that took place every day, on every job site, was a mandatory 15 minutes of
calisthenics before you start your workday. Thatâs totally nonproductive, but it
led to fewer work site injuries during the day.â
And behind all that is paperwork, and paperwork, and more paperwork. âThe
work we do today takes hundreds more people in the office to track and bring to
completion,â he said. âThe level of reporting that you have to send to the
The Costs of Affluence
- Economist Mancur Olson theorized that stable, affluent societies naturally accumulate more organized interest groups over time.
- While these groups allow for collective action and representation, they also lead to increased lobbying, complex regulations, and endless bargaining.
- The proliferation of these organizations creates a 'vetocracy' where complex infrastructure projects become nearly impossible to complete compared to authoritarian systems.
- Olsonâs theory explains why war-torn nations like post-WWII Japan and Germany initially grew faster than stable victors like Britain.
- Modern critiques suggest Olson missed the 'post-materialist' shift where groups organize for values like environmentalism rather than just wealth redistribution.
- The ultimate trade-off of a mature democracy is the inclusion of more voices at the expense of speed and efficiency in execution.
China does not spend years debating with judges over whether it needs to move a storage facility. That power leads to abuse and imperiousness. It also leads to high-speed rail.
government, to the insurance companies, to the owner, to show youâre meeting
all the requirements on the job site, all of that has increased. And so the number
of people you need to produce that has increased.â58
61The Organizations of Affluence
The economist Mancur Olsonâs famous 1982 book The Rise and Decline of
Nations begins with its own productivity mystery: After World War II,
Germanyâs and Japanâs cities were bombed out, their people dispirited, their
economies wrecked. The question of the age, Olson writes, was âwhether these
abjectly defeated societies would be able to provide themselves with even the
rudiments of survival.â59 Instead, West Germany and Japan thrived, growing far
faster in that era than Britain, which had emerged victorious from the war.
Olson was known for seminal work on how groups cooperateâand why, so
often, they donât. In The Rise and Decline of Nations, he developed a deeper
theory of why nations often stagnate amid affluence yet thrive in the aftermath of
chaos. His key insight is that groups capable of collective actionâimagine the
Sierra Club or the Chamber of Commerceâare slow to build but powerful and
persistent when they coalesce. America has long had seniors, but the emergence of
the AARP gave them a new level of political power. Workers become far stronger
once they organize into unions. Forming these groups is difficult, but power
creates persistence: once a group is successfully organized, it can fight for its own
survival and invest in its future strength. And so, Olson suggests, âif organizations
and collusions for collective action usually emerge only in favorable circumstances
and develop strength over time, a stable society will see more organization for
collective action as time passes.â60
The more organized groups you have, Olson says, the more fights over
distribution youâll have, the more lobbying youâll have, the more complex
regulations youâll have, the more bargaining youâll get between groups, and the
harder it will be to get complex projects done. Affluent, stable societies have more
negotiations. And that means they have more negotiators. Thereâs great good in
that. It means peopleâs concerns can be voiced, their needs can be met, their ideas
can be integrated, their insights can be shared. It also means that it becomes
difficult to get much of anything done. This is why China can build tens of
thousands of miles of high-speed rail in the time it takes California to fail to build
hundreds of miles of high-speed rail. China does not spend years debating with
judges over whether it needs to move a storage facility. That power leads to abuse
and imperiousness. It also leads to high-speed rail.
The Rise and Decline of Nations is a classic economics text. But time has
exposed gaps in the theory. Japan has gone from economic poster child to growth
62laggard. Olsonâs argument would seem to imply that the United States, with its
geographic protection against invasion and its long history of continuity, would
be far more sclerotic than Germany, but it isnât. And Olson has no real answer for
why so few countries that fall into crisis subsequently grow into affluence.
Olsonâs biggest error is his assumption that groups organize around
redistribution. Olson almost completely missed the post-materialist turn in the
politics of affluent countries. Some groups seek to fill their coffers, but others
organize to protect the environment, to increase safety standards, to preserve the
feel of their communities, or to express their values. These kinds of groups have
been engines of social progress. Their existence is a gift of affluence, not a disease
of affluence.
But Olson, who died in 1998, was right when he said that affluence is a gift
that comes with costs. And those costs concentrate in the areas of the economy in
which the number of groups that have to be consulted mounts. From this
The Construction Productivity Crisis
- Construction faces unique challenges compared to software or manufacturing because it must navigate complex physical, social, and political environments.
- The industry is highly susceptible to 'veto points' where neighbors, politicians, and community groups can stall or block projects.
- Wealthier communities are particularly effective at organizing to stop development, shifting construction to areas with less political resistance.
- Productivity in construction once kept pace with manufacturing until 1970, proving that the current stagnation is a modern phenomenon rather than an inevitability.
- The industry remains dominated by small, less efficient firms because success depends more on local political navigation than on scalable industrial expertise.
There are a million veto points. There are a lot of mouths at the trough that need to be fed to get anything started or done.
perspective, the productivity woes in the construction industry donât seem so
puzzling. Itâs relatively easy to build inside the confines of computer code. Itâs
harder, but manageable, to manipulate matter within the four walls of a factory.
When you construct a new building or subway tunnel or highway, you have to
navigate neighbors and communities and existing roads and emergency access
vehicles and politicians and beloved views of the park and the possibility of
earthquakes and on and on. Construction may well be the industry with the most
exposure to Olsonâs thesis. And construction of public projects, like high-speed
rail, is almost uniquely vulnerable. It is the governmentâs job, after all, to balance
societyâs many competing perspectives. They need to do more than turn a profit
or satisfy shareholders.
Zarenskiâs experience often felt like a narrativization of Olsonâs thesis. âThere
are so many people who want to have some say over a project,â he said. âYou have
to meet so many parking spaces, per unit. It needs to be this far back from the
sight lines. You have to use this much reclaimed water. You didnât have 30 people
sitting in a hearing room for the approval of a permit 40 years ago.â61
Syverson told a similar story. âThere are a million veto points,â he said. âThere
are a lot of mouths at the trough that need to be fed to get anything started or
done. So many people can gum up the works.â62 Thatâs particularly true in richer
areas. Thereâs a reason so much of the housing construction in Washington, DC,
since 2000 has happened in the cityâs Southwest, rather than in Georgetown.
When richer residents want something stopped, they know how to organizeâ
63and they often already have the organizations, to say nothing of the lobbyists and
access, needed to stop it.
These dynamics help explain the curious finding that ends Syverson and
Goolsbeeâs paper. After looking at the states with the highest construction
productivity, they note that the more productive states donât seem to gain market
share in the construction industry. That doesnât make much sense if you assume
that the difficulties of construction are primarily the organization of manpower
and materials. It makes more sense if you assume that the frictions are in
navigating local regulations, community considerations, neighborsâ qualms, and
politiciansâ interests. Developers are often fixtures in the local political scene.
They have to be.
âMy feeling is the guys that know the system have a much easier time getting
through the system,â Zarenski said. âThey know ahead of time what they have to
come into the party with and how to speak to those people and how to satisfy
them, and so it goes a lot smoother for them.â63 But a thorough knowledge of
one city or state, and establishing relationships with its decision-makers, wonât
necessarily translate to success in another.
In a separate paper, Ed Glaeser and four coauthors add to this story.64 They
begin with an astonishing fact: from 1935 to 1970, the number of homes
produced per construction worker increased at the same pace as, and sometimes
even faster than, the number of cars produced per automobile industry worker or
the total manufactured output per industrial worker.65 The world we live inâ
where manufacturing productivity rises and rises even as construction
productivity fallsâis a new phenomenon, not a historical inevitability.
Glaeser and his colleagues go on to look at the size of the firms involved. It
turns out that big home construction companies are much more efficient than
small home construction companies. No surprise there. But the market in home
construction is dominated by small firms: more than 60 percent of employment
in single-family home construction is in firms with fewer than 10 employees; in
manufacturing, most employees work in firms of more than 500 people.66
Why is home construction in America dominated by such small firms? The
The Rise of Complexity Navigators
- Increasing land use regulations and political negotiations prevent builders from scaling efficiently compared to manufacturing firms.
- Mature societies shift rewards from builders like engineers to 'navigators of complexity' like lawyers and consultants.
- The internet has become a 'frontier-of-last-resort' for ambitious talent seeking to avoid the bureaucratic stagnation found in physical infrastructure.
- Postwar liberalism shifted toward skepticism of government power, fueled by rising vehicle fatalities and environmental negligence.
- Ralph Nader and his 'Raiders' pioneered a new model of civilian oversight, using expertise to challenge both corporate and state failures.
A young country that is still in its building phase creates opportunities for engineers and architects. A mature country that has entered its negotiations phase creates opportunities for lawyers and management consultants.
researchers pick through the data and find that firms are allowed to build on less
and less land, and are subject to more and more land use regulations, in ways that
choke off their ability to grow and scale their work across cities and states. A
manufacturing plant can locate in one place and sell everywhere. Builders have to
64negotiate through the regulations and interest groups and political relationships
of each parcel of land they work on individually.
One of Olsonâs insights is that a complex society begins to reward those who
can best navigate complexity. That creates an incentive for its best and brightest to
become navigators of complexity and perhaps creators of further complexity.
âEvery society, whatever its institutions and governing ideology, gives greater
rewards to the fittestâthe fittest for that society,â Olson writes.67 A young
country that is still in its building phase creates opportunities for engineers and
architects. A mature country that has entered its negotiations phase creates
opportunities for lawyers and management consultants.
Then thereâs the incentive to avoid bureaucracy and its attendant frustrations.
Patrick Collison, the CEO of the online payments behemoth Stripe, was once
asked whether too much talent was flowing into Silicon Valley. âI donât think that
the ambitious upstarts who go into high-speed rail (in America, anyway) are going
to have a great time or have much success in convincing their friends to follow
them. And I suspect that, for various reasons, too many domains look somewhat
like high-speed rail.⌠Thereâs a view that the internet is a frontier-of-last-resort
and I donât think itâs totally wrong.â68
Naderâs Raiders
Americaâs postwar politics are often shorthanded as the rise of New Deal
liberalism and then the backlash of small-government conservatism. But it wasnât
just conservatives who came to think the government reckless and dangerous and
in need of new rules and strictures. Liberals did, too.
After World War II, as highway construction grew, vehicle sales soared. So did
road deaths. Motor vehicle fatalities rose from about 30,000 in 1946 to more than
50,000 in the late 1960s. In 1965, a lawyer named Ralph Nader published the
book Unsafe at Any Speed, a blistering exposĂŠ of car manufacturers resisting safety
improvements while blaming individual drivers for rising fatalities. The book was
a sensation. In 1966, Lyndon Johnson signed the National Traffic and Motor
Vehicle Safety Act and the Highway Safety Act, which mandated a new set of
auto safety standards.69 Nader soon became one of the most famous lawyers in
America.
To replicate his success, he recruited teams of young activists to join the cause
of bird-dogging government and big business on behalf of consumers. His
65disciples, known as Naderâs Raiders, transformed politics, with their blend of
expertise and advocacy.70 âSo far as anyone can remember, nothing quite like this
has happened in Washington before,â a Christian Science Monitor reporter wrote
in 1969. âA group of unofficial but informed outsiders⌠as a sort of civilian posse,
has descended on a rather stuffy government commission, poked under sofas, and
asked some rough questions.â71
As the historian Paul Sabin writes in his book Public Citizens, reformers like
Ralph Nader were right to concentrate their fury on government and its safety
record in the 1960s. âThe government was allowing strip mines to ravage the
Appalachian Mountains and leaving coal miners to suffer from black lung disease
with little compensation,â he writes. âGovernment policies were permitting oil
refineries to freely dump toxic emissions into low-income communities of color,
and letting oil spills pollute the nationâs waterways and coasts.â72
Nader didnât just criticize the government. He launched a movement to tame
The Rise of Democracy by Lawsuit
- Ralph Nader and his 'Raiders' pioneered a legal strategy that focused on relentlessly suing the government to enforce environmental standards.
- Early environmental groups like the Sierra Club and EDF targeted federal agencies almost exclusively, rather than private corporations.
- This legal revolution achieved massive successes, including an 80 percent drop in common pollutants and millions of lives saved by the Clean Air Act.
- The movement shifted liberalism's view of government from a partner in progress to a source of problems that must be restrained by the courts.
- The same legal tools designed to protect the environment are now frequently used to obstruct clean energy projects and affordable housing.
- Critics argue that by prioritizing procedure and litigation, liberals inadvertently created a 'broken bicycle' of governance that is easily stalled.
It was as if liberals took a bicycle apart to fix it but never quite figured out how to get it running properly again.
it. His Raiders contributed to some of the most important environmental laws in
history, including the Clean Water Act. With each win, they made it easier for
more citizens and groups to sue the government for wrongdoing. But what they
were building was an arm of liberalismâwith associated institutions, laws, and
leadersâdesigned to relentlessly sue the government itself, and that would go on
to fight for more bills and rules that would widen the opportunities to sue the
government. Sabin writes:
Litigation by leading public interest environmental law firms in the early
1970s almost exclusively targeted the government for legal action. The
Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund boasted of seventy-seven legal
accomplishments between 1971 and 1973. Approximately seventy sought
to block government actions, or to intervene in public proceedings to
influence government regulatory and permitting practices. The
Environmental Defense Fund similarly began its 1972 case summary with a
list of acronyms for the ten federal agencies named in its legal interventions.
In more than sixty of its sixty-five listed legal actions, the Environmental
Defense Fund either intervened in public proceedings, such as government
permitting processes for private projects, or directly assailed a government-
led initiative. Fewer than five of EDFâs legal actions directly targeted
companies or private parties. Similarly, only three out of twenty-nine of
NRDC [Natural Resources Defense Council]âs legal action initiatives from
its first seven months directly named a corporate defendant.73
66The environmentalist movement succeeded brilliantly. Between 1970 and 2020,
the combined emissions of the six most common pollutantsâwhich include lead,
carbon monoxide, and sulfur dioxideâdropped by roughly 80 percent. New cars,
SUVs, and trucks that run on gas today are more than 99 percent cleaner than in
1970.74 The benefits of the Clean Air Act, which was amended in 1977 and 1990,
have prevented between 400,000 and several million premature deaths in the last
fifty years.75 The reduction in lead furthermore saved tens of thousands from
senseless poisoning and saved millions of IQ points. The number of âvery
unhealthy or hazardous air daysâ in Los Angeles fell from 160 in 1981 to an
average of 2 in the 2010s.76
But behind these victories, Naderâs revolution created a new layer of
government: democracy by lawsuit. The number of lawyers and cases soared in
the 1970s and 1980s. The result, Sabin argues, was a new kind of liberalism,
which regarded government not as a partner in the solution of societal problems
but rather as the source of those very problems.77
When the PBS news anchor Jim Lehrer asked Nader why he was qualified to
be president in 2000, Nader told him, âI donât know anybody who has sued more
[agencies and departments].â78 Nader and his Raiders believed in government.
They defended it from conservative assault. When they criticized itâwhen they
fought it, sued it, restrained itâthey did so to try to make it better. But those
same laws and processes were available for anyone else to use, too. You can bog
clean energy projects down in environmental reviews. You can use a process
meant to stop the government from building a highway through your town to
keep a nonprofit developer from building affordable housing down the block. âIt
was as if liberals took a bicycle apart to fix it but never quite figured out how to
get it running properly again,â Sabin writes.79
Liberalismâs Lawyers Problem
Nicholas Bagley, a law professor at the University of Michigan, has seen the
broken bicycle up close. When he served as Governor Gretchen Whitmerâs chief
legal counsel, he noticed that Republicans were consistent in the way they tried to
weaken the government. They would bury it in paperwork and procedure and
The Procedure Fetish
- Republicans have increasingly adopted activist legal tactics to overwhelm government agencies with disclosure demands and compliance burdens.
- The 2017 Regulatory Accountability Act exemplifies how 'paperwork and process' can be weaponized to paralyze federal regulation.
- Legal scholar Nicholas Bagley argues that liberal government has become 'process-obsessed' rather than outcomes-oriented, prioritizing rules over results.
- The American state is defined by 'adversarial legalism,' where judges and lawsuits replace the centralized bureaucracies found in other Western nations.
- The current procedural architecture is a relic of post-WWII anxiety and 1970s-era liberal efforts to ensure government accountability through the courts.
- This obsession with procedural legitimacy now frustrates the very government actions required to address urgent modern problems.
It had convinced itself that the stateâs legitimacy would be earned through compliance with an endless catalog of rules and restraints rather than through getting things done for the people it claimed to serve.
hearings and disclosure demands and lawsuits. It was as if the right had studied
the tactics of Naderâs Raiders and adopted them for their own purposes.
67The 2017 Regulatory Accountability Act, which Republicans proposed but
couldnât pass,80 was a good example. For every major regulation, it would have
forced the government to open a period of comment and solicit alternative
approaches from the public, given those affected the opportunity to cross-
examine the agency proposing the rule at an oral hearing, forced the publication
of ongoing frameworks for evaluation, and much more. Some of these ideas
sound fine in theory but multiplied across the entire swath of major regulations
the government proposes or carries out, the burden of compliance would become
overwhelming.
Democrats would defend the government against these salvos, but they didnât
seem to notice what the defenses implied. If Republicans were proposing more
paperwork and process to make the government less effective, wasnât it likely that
less paperwork and process would make government more effective? Or as Bagley
asked, âIf new administrative procedures can be used to advance a libertarian
agenda, might not relaxing existing administrative constraints advance progressive
ones?â81
In 2019, Bagley published an incendiary article in the Michigan Law Review,
which he later turned into a policy paper for the Niskanen Center. âThe
Procedure Fetishâ argued that something had gone wrong inside government,
inside liberalism, inside Bagleyâs own profession. Liberal legalismâand through
it, liberal governmentâhad become process-obsessed rather than outcomes-
oriented. It had convinced itself that the stateâs legitimacy would be earned
through compliance with an endless catalog of rules and restraints rather than
through getting things done for the people it claimed to serve.
âInflexible procedural rules are a hallmark of the American state,â Bagley
wrote. âThe ubiquity of court challenges, the artificial rigors of notice-and-
comment rulemaking, zealous environmental review, pre-enforcement review of
agency rules, picayune legal rules governing hiring and procurement, nationwide
court injunctionsâthe list goes on and on. Collectively, these procedures
frustrate the very government action that progressives demand to address the
urgent problems that now confront us.â82
Behind these procedures, Bagley suggested, were two very real concerns:
legitimacy and accountability. How can a government as powerful and vast as that
of the United States maintain legitimacy? How could it maintain accountability
to citizens?
68These fears reflect, in part, the age in which the rules were written. The 1946
Administrative Procedure Act, which governs much of the federal governmentâs
bureaucratic workings, was adopted âto soothe the jangled nerves of legal and
business communities alarmed by the New Deal and the muscular wartime
exercise of state power.â83 Then came the buildup of procedural architecture in
the â70s, when liberal lawyers, inspired by the courtroom heroics of the civil rights
movement, turned to the legal system to make sure that the government actually
worked on behalf of the people.
The system we developed is unique. Decisions that are often made by
bureaucracies in other countries are made by judges in our country. Robert
Kagan, a law professor at the University of California, Berkeley, calls it adversarial
legalism. âIt is only a slight oversimplification to say that in the United States,
lawyers, legal rights, judges, and lawsuits become functional equivalents for the
large central bureaucracies that dominate governance in the activist states of
Western Europe,â he writes.84
Thereâs a reason, Kagan thinks, that America has ended up with the system we
have. Americans have always mistrusted the government. Theyâve particularly
mistrusted centralized power. But they also need a government able to wield
The Rise of Adversarial Legalism
- Post-1960s legislation created a massive expansion of federal regulatory power while simultaneously refusing to grant the government centralized authority.
- Adversarial legalism emerged as a compromise to reconcile the public's demand for government action with its deep-seated suspicion of state power.
- The United States has become exceptionally legalistic, with a per capita lawyer population far exceeding that of other Western democracies like France and Germany.
- Legal training has become the default for American political leadership, prioritizing statutory language and process over actual results and outcomes.
- A system dominated by legal complexity often becomes so focused on balancing manifold interests that it loses the ability to act in the public interest.
- Government legitimacy is suffering because procedural compliance is being prioritized over the ability to deliver tangible results, such as infrastructure.
When you make legal training the default training for a political career, you make legal thinking the default thinking in politics.
power. They want the good a government can do. The tension became
unbearable after the New Deal and the Great Society. âBetween 1965 and 1977,
responding to the new political movements, Congress passed 25 major
environmental and civil rights acts, plus far-reaching statutes regulating
workplace safety, consumer lending, product safety, private pension funds, and
local public education,â Kagan writes. âIt created federal regulatory agencies or
bureaus to issue implementing regulations, binding on millions of business firms.
But to enforce those laws and regulations, Congress was compelled to bow to the
inherited demands for decentralization of government.â85
Americans were asking the government to do more than it ever had but they
were not willing to give the government the trust and authority it needed to do it.
But reformers could not simply devolve power to state and local governments.
Liberals had just seen, in the fight against Jim Crow, that you could not trust the
states, much less the localities, to do what the federal government asked. And so
they turned to the courts, which had, under Chief Justice Earl Warren, become
newly beloved by liberals. Adversarial legalism was a way of reconciling the
government we wanted with the suspicions we harbored.
69America is unusually legalistic. It always has been. In 1835, Alexis de
Tocqueville wrote, âScarcely any political question arises in the United States that
is not resolved, sooner or later, into a judicial question.â86 What was true then is
truer now. America has twice as many lawyers per capita as Germany and four
times as many as France. Much of this energy is now devoted to suing the
government. In 1967, there were 3 cases per 100,000 Americans directed at
enforcing federal laws. By 1976, there were 13. By 2014, there were 40.87
The prevalence of lawyers in American life is unusual. But their dominance at
the top of American politics is startling. âThough they make up less than 1
percent of the population, lawyers currently constitute more than one-third of
the House of Representatives and more than half the Senate. Fully half of the last
ten presidents were lawyers, as are more than a third of the officials now serving in
the states as governor, lieutenant governor, and secretary of state,â Bagley
writes.88 In the Democratic Party, every presidential and vice presidential
nominee from Walter Mondale to Kamala Harris attended law school (Tim Walz,
in this respect, was an almost radical break with tradition). When you make legal
training the default training for a political career, you make legal thinking the
default thinking in politics. And legal thinking centers around statutory language
and commitment to process, not results and outcomes.
Olson predicted that a thriving, successful society would become more
complex to navigate over time. There would be more groups and voices and laws
and processes. Those who succeeded would be those best suited to operating at
the nexus of that complexity. In the economy, that might be management
consultants and financiers. In politics, it will be lawyers. There is nothing wrong
with lawyers. There might be something wrong with a country or a political
system that needs so many of them and that makes them so central to its
operations. That might be a system so consumed trying to balance its manifold
interests that it can no longer perceive what is in the publicâs interest.
âLegitimacy is not solelyânot even primarilyâa product of the procedures
that agencies follow,â Bagley writes. âLegitimacy arises more generally from the
perception that government is capable, informed, prompt, responsive, and fair.â89
And that is where government is failing. Californiaâs High-Speed Rail Authority
has been scrupulous in following the law but has been unable to deliver a train.
The result is less, not more, faith in government.
The Pew Research Center has aggregated decades of polls tracking the publicâs
The Green Dilemma
- Public trust in the U.S. government has collapsed from a high of 77 percent in 1964 to just 16 percent in 2023.
- The bureaucratic processes designed to build trust and legitimacy have instead created a state paralyzed by its own rules.
- Modern environmental goals, such as decarbonization, are being forced through legal frameworks originally designed to block construction.
- The 'Grand Bargain' of the 1970s traded slower, more expensive development for cleaner air and water, a trade-off that is now failing the climate crisis.
- Renewable energy projects face the same 'not in my backyard' (NIMBY) opposition and permitting nightmares as fossil fuel infrastructure.
- The environmental movement, having perfected the art of stopping projects, now struggles to facilitate the rapid growth required for a green transition.
The environmentalist movement evolved to stop bad people from destroying the world, and so we have perfected the art of saying no.
trust in government. The high mark on the chart is in 1964, when 77 percent of
70the public believed that the government would do the right thing all or most of
the time. Confidence plummets from there. In the â70s, after Watergate, it sits in
the 30s. It rebounds into the 40s in the â80s and briefly brushes the 60s after 9/11,
but the downward trend is undeniable. By 2023 it sat at 16 percent.90 This is not,
in our view, attributable solely or even mainly to cumbersome government
processes. But the collapse in trust across the same decades that so many processes
were being built to affirm that government could be trusted should make us
question whether we have yoked the state to a failed theory of legitimacy.
Now the government has taken on the task of decarbonization and the
responsibility of coordinating a once-in-a-century transformation of Americaâs
built landscape. But it is doing so with laws and agencies and habits that are better
designed to block green construction than to allow it.91
The Green Dilemma
In 2020, J. B. Ruhl and James Salzman published a paper titled âWhat Happens
When the New Green Deal Meets the Old Green Laws?â They began by
imagining a presidential debate in which two opposing candidates describe their
vision for remaking Americaâs energy infrastructure. One candidate proposes
doubling down on oil and gas production, building more freeways, and
crisscrossing the country in natural gas pipelines. The other candidate imagines
an all-out race to an economy built atop renewables, with electric vehicle chargers
everywhere and a national high-speed rail system anchoring American transit.
âThese two infrastructure agendas could not be more different in vision, but they
are very much alike in one key respect,â Ruhl and Salzman noted. âEach is an
environmental impact assessment and project permitting nightmare.â92
The problem, Ruhl and Salzman argued, is that âthe Green New Deal must
undertake multiple national-scale infrastructure initiatives of magnitudes never
before processed through existing siting and environmental law standards and
procedures.â There was little reason to believe that was possible. Examples were
piling up of renewable projects being stalled or killed by coalitions akin to those
that formed against dirty energy projects, and deploying the same environmental
laws and rules. âMost people do not like the idea of an oil pipeline or electric
transmission line running through their backyard,â write Ruhl and Salzman.
âGuess whatâthey do not like the idea of wind turbines or solar panels in their
backyard, either.â93
71In their follow-up, âThe Greensâ Dilemma,â Ruhl and Salzman tried to
diagnose the problem more precisely. The raft of environmental laws in the
1970s, they said, represented a âGrand Bargainâ of sorts.94 âThe quid pro quo for
a cleaner environment was that development would become slower and more
expensive due both to permitting and to the litigation that often ensued. In many
respects, this has turned out to be a good deal. Apart from greenhouse gases,
which effectively have been unregulated, every major air pollutant has decreased
significantly over the past five decades, from carbon monoxide and sulfur dioxide
to airborne lead and others. Surface water quality has similarly improved
substantially since the 1970s.â95
But that bargain has broken down. The problem we faced in the 1970s was
that we were building too much and too heedlessly. The problem we face in the
2020s is that we are building too little and we are too often paralyzed by process.
And this is not just the view of a few law professors.
âThe environmentalist movement evolved to stop bad people from destroying
the world, and so we have perfected the art of saying no,â says Larry Selzer, the
president and CEO of the Conservation Fund. âBut we canât ânoâ our way to the
kind of growth we need. The Interstate Highway System is forty-nine thousand
The Permitting Morass
- The transition to a clean-energy system requires an enormous physical footprint, touching over five hundred thousand miles of land.
- Current environmental laws are indiscriminate, making it as difficult to permit a wind farm as it is to permit an oil refinery.
- A profusion of over sixty overlapping federal permitting programs, plus state and local assessments, creates a legal morass for infrastructure.
- The Chokecherry and Sierra Madre Wind Energy Project illustrates the crisis, facing an eighteen-year timeline from proposal to completion.
- The United States leads the world in public construction costs, with highway building costs tripling in the late twentieth century.
- Legal experts suggest fast-tracking green energy projects using models similar to those used for border security or military base closures.
Either we build faster or we accept catastrophe. There is no third option.
miles of road. The interstate clean-energy systemâthe solar farms, the wind
turbines, the geothermal land, the transmission lines, the pipesâwill touch more
than five hundred thousand miles of land. This will be an enormous project. We
have to build, and build, and build.â96
Ruhl and Salzman, for their part, believe we need new laws. The problem with
the laws we have is that they are indiscriminate. It is as easy to obstruct an oil
refinery as a wind farm. The National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) gets
much of the attention here, but the problem is really the profusion of different,
overlapping policies and authorities. Beyond NEPA, Ruhl and Salman note the
Endangered Species Act, the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, the Marine Mammal
Protection Act, the Coastal Zone Management Act, the Clean Water Act, the
Federal Land Policy and Management Act, and the National Forest Management
Act. âAll told,â they write, âover sixty federal permitting programs operate in the
infrastructure approval regime. And that is just the federal systemâstate and
local approvals and impact assessments could also apply to any project.â97
The Chokecherry and Sierra Madre Wind Energy Project, which is intended
for federal land in Wyoming, would be the largest wind farm in US history.
Building it has meant navigating a morass of federal, state, and local permitting
72and siting authorities, as well as environmental challenges. If all goes well from
here, it will be completed in 2026âeighteen years after it was proposed, Ruhl and
Salzman note. Timetables like that will not meet the climate emergency we now
face. Either we build faster or we accept catastrophe. There is no third option.
In his paper âGetting Infrastructure Built: The Law and Economics of
Permitting,â Zachary Liscow notes that the United States performs below the
average of OECD states in environmental quality but also performs below average
in confidence in government. âSo, despite its participatory ethos, the United
States does not succeed in producing more trust.â98
What we are leaders in is the cost of public construction. In separate work
with Leah Brooks, Liscow has found the cost of building a mile of interstate
highway tripled in the back half of the twentieth century. âThough the data are
fairly sparse, available data show that the U.S. Interstates built in the 1980s and
1990s were more expensive (in real terms) than any projects built elsewhere at any
timeâand that the highways built since 2010 are far more expensive than
highway projects elsewhere in the world,â he writes.99
To many environmentalists, thatâs a victory. It should be harder to build
highways. But that same architecture of law affects the infrastructure they care
about, too. âIt is important to keep in mind what is actually expected to be
permitted in the coming decades,â Liscow continues. âAmong projects seeking to
connect to the grid (which is one indicatorâthough an imperfect oneâof what
will ultimately be built), 95% of the capacity is solar, battery storage, or wind.â
Thatâs a dramatic change from 1969, âwhen 81% of the electricity supply was
petrochemical and only 19% was zero-emission.â100
New problems and new solutions require new laws. Ruhl and Salzman favor
past models by which certain kinds of projects have been fast-tracked past
environmental and legal challenges. A 1996 law offered this favoritism to border
security, and the Trump administration used it to great effect in constructing
parts of their border wall. In another example, Congress recognized that we had
too many military bases after the Cold War and that closing them through the
normal congressional process would be politically impossible. So they created an
independent base-closing commission that received recommendations from the
Department of Defense, proposed plans for closure based on those
recommendations, and ensured those plans got simple and fast up-and-down
The Speed of Building
- Recent legislation, like the CHIPS Act exemptions, shows a growing trend of fast-tracking critical infrastructure by bypassing traditional environmental reviews.
- Modern liberalism must shift from a culture of slowing down government to prevent abuse to a culture of speeding it up to meet climate and housing goals.
- The Tahanan housing project in San Francisco succeeded by using private funding to avoid the burdensome regulations triggered by government money.
- Tahanan achieved a three-year construction timeline and significantly lower costs per unit compared to the six-year average for similar affordable housing.
- The project's success relied on state-level legislation that allowed it to bypass local discretionary reviews and board approvals.
- The government functions as a 'plural posing as a singular,' where internal factions and conflicting regulations often frustrate the very people running the system.
The answer, for liberals, is depressing: It used private money to avoid the pile of rules and regulations that taking government money triggers.
votes. In October 2024, President Biden signed legislation exempting
73semiconductor-manufacturing facilities receiving subsidies under the CHIPS and
Science Act from environmental review.101
Something similar could be created for green infrastructure, Ruhl and
Salzman suggest, with projects deemed important to our climate goals fast-
tracked past a slew of normal hurdles. Something akin to this system would, in
their thinking, update our environmental laws for a new age, tuning them to meet
the challenge of today rather than the challenge of yesteryear.
But no individual law will address this many different blockages at this many
points in the system. What is needed here is a change in political culture, not just
a change in legislation. Liberalism acted across many different levels and branches
of government in the 1970s to slow the system down so the instances of abuse
could be seen and stopped. Now it will need to act across many different levels
and branches of government to speed up the system. It needs to see the problem
in what it has been taught to see as the solution. Nothing about this is easy, and it
is not always clear how to strike the right balance. But a balance that does not
allow us to meet our climate goals has to be the wrong one.
743
Govern
TAHANAN, AT 833 BRYANT STREET in the Soma neighborhood of San Francisco, is
145 studio units of permanent supportive housing for the chronically homeless.
Completed in 2021, itâs a cheerful, efficient building that bears the hopes and
scars of the population it serves. The curated murals and architectural flourishes
are pockmarked by extensive water damage inflicted when a resident on an upper
floor reportedly slept with the faucets running. Social workers stride purposefully
through the halls, and well-loved dogs are being walked everywhere you turn.
But what makes Tahanan notable isnât its aesthetic. Itâs the way it was built.
Tahanan went up in three years, for less than $400,000 per unit.1 Affordable
housing projects in the Bay Area routinely take twice as long and can cost almost
twice as much. âDevelopment timelines for affordable projects in San Francisco
have typically stretched to 6 years or longer and development costs have reached
$600,000 to $700,000 per unit,â reported the Terner Center for Housing
Innovation at the University of California, Berkeley.2 San Francisco cannot dent
its housing crisis at the speed and cost at which it is building affordable units now.
But if the pace and price of Tahanan were the norm, the outlook would brighten.
So how did Tahanan do it? The answer, for liberals, is depressing: It used
private money to avoid the pile of rules and regulations that taking government
money triggers. But it could only do that because it had the support of city and
state officials who streamlined zoning and cut deals to make it possible. Tahanan
reveals a confusion in the way we talk of the government. The government is a
plural posing as a singular. Different factions and officials and regulations and
processes push in different directions. It is often the case that no one is more
frustrated by how the government works than the people who work in it or who
are charged with running it.
75Tahanan was built on the former site of a parking lot and temporary bail bond
office. Sounds easy enough to build on. But it wasnât zoned for affordable
housing. The project could get off the ground only because of legislation passed
by State Senator Scott Wiener in 2017 that fast-tracked certain kinds of affordable
housing projects in California past the local approval process.3 âThis project
didnât have to go before the planning department for discretionary review or the
Board of Supervisors,â Rebecca Foster, the chief executive of the Housing
Accelerator Fund, which led the development of Tahanan, said. âWe got our
entitlements in four months, which is unheard-of.â
But that merely means you can begin the process of building. When youâre
The Cost of Public Funding
- Publicly funded affordable housing in San Francisco is subject to complex contracting ordinances that prioritize small, local businesses over larger, more efficient firms.
- The 14B ordinance creates a bottleneck by limiting the pool of eligible contractors to small firms that often lack the capacity to handle multiple large-scale projects simultaneously.
- Redundant regulatory reviews, such as those from the Arts Commission and the Mayorâs Office on Disability, add months of delays and millions in compliance costs.
- The Tahanan project successfully bypassed these bureaucratic hurdles by utilizing a $65 million private grant from the Schwab family instead of public money.
- While modular construction offers a path to faster and cheaper housing, it faces political resistance from local unions despite being a unionized process.
- The project's success highlights a paradox where government involvement often makes the construction of essential public goods slower and more expensive.
It is damning that you can build affordable housing so much more cheaply and swiftly by forgoing public funds.
building affordable housing, youâre typically using public money. When youâre
using public money, you have to abide by public requirements. Take the Local
Business Enterprise and Non-Discrimination in Contracting Ordinance, also
known as 14B.4 These requirements began in 1984 as a preference for minority-
and female-owned contractors. But in 1996, California passed Proposition 209,
which held that âthe state shall not discriminate against, or grant preferential
treatment to, any individual or group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or
national origin in the operation of public employment, public education, or
public contracting.â5
Instead of scrapping the contracting requirements, San Francisco rewrote
them to favor small businesses. âThe public has an interest in fostering a strong
and vibrant network of small and very small micro businesses in San Francisco,â
the ordinance says. To qualify as one of the favored âMicro-Local Business
Enterprisesâ under 14B, a contractor must have less than $12 million in average
annual gross revenue.6 This cap creates a few problems. One is that it means
public housing efforts in San Francisco are, by definition, discouraged from
working with large contractors that have grown in size and revenue precisely
because they are good at delivering projects on time and under budget. Another is
that San Francisco has a tight labor market and an even tighter construction
market. There arenât a lot of capable small contractors sitting around with
nothing to do.
In practice, Foster said, a few small contractors end up attached to a large
number of affordable housing jobs, causing delays and cost overruns. Then, of
course, thereâs the cost of complianceâof proving to the city youâre following the
14B rules. Fosterâs team estimates that requirements like 14B could add six to
76nine months and millions of dollars to building an affordable housing project the
size of Tahanan.
Itâs not just 14B. There are local hiring requirements. The Arts Commission
does a separate review of your design. You need an additional review from the
Mayorâs Office on Disability. Who could oppose that? But these projects already
have to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act, and the additional
review takes time and comes at a cost. âThey come in when youâre done,â Foster
said. âAnd theyâll say, âThat threshold is two centimeters off, and it is in all of your
doors.â And so that delays people moving in for another couple of months. And it
might mean that you miss a financing deadline and have an adjuster on your tax
credit fees that are another $2 million. So it just has a big ripple impact.â7
Tahanan is the first affordable housing project in San Francisco built using
modular housing. All the units above the ground floor were fabricated at a factory
in Vallejo, California. âThat definitely helped with meeting the time-and cost-
saving goals,â Foster said. But some local unions were furious, even though the
factory in Vallejo is unionized. Here, then, is another place where progressive
goals conflict. Local union jobs are a good thing. Modular housing can make
construction cheaper and faster in a state facing a severe housing shortage. Which
do you choose?
What made Tahanan possible was a $65 million grant from Charles and Helen
Schwab.8 The grantâs conditions were that the housing had to be built in under
three years and for under $400,000 a unit. By using private financing, the project
avoided the standards and rules that public money carries. That isnât to say the
political system in San Francisco was against the project. The Board of
Supervisors approved a crucial lease to keep the development operating into the
future. But private money was the secret sauce.
It is damning that you can build affordable housing so much more cheaply
and swiftly by forgoing public funds. Shouldnât things happen faster when they
are backed by the might and money of the government?
The State Capacity Crisis
- The traditional divide between big-government liberals and small-government conservatives is often a rhetorical illusion that ignores actual state effectiveness.
- Both political sides frequently undermine their own goals: liberals hamstring the government's ability to act, while conservatives expand state power through surveillance.
- A lack of state capacity in healthcare leads to an American system that is more expensive than European socialized medicine due to a lack of negotiating power.
- Ideological discomfort with market-based solutions, such as deregulation, prevents liberals from addressing the housing crisis effectively.
- Data from Houston suggests that removing zoning restrictions significantly increases housing supply and lowers the cost of addressing homelessness compared to restrictive cities like San Francisco.
Keeping the American health-care state weak has made the American government larger and left Americans poorer.
A False Divide
We are used to understanding the battle lines of American politics as cleaving
liberals who believe in a strong, active government from conservatives who doubt
it. The truth is far more complicated. Liberals speak as if they believe in
government and then pass policy after policy hamstringing what it can actually
77do. Conservatives talk as if they want a small state but support a national security
and surveillance apparatus of terrifying scope and power. Both sides are attached
to a rhetoric of government that is routinely betrayed by their actions. The big
governmentâsmall government divide is often more a matter of sentiment than
substance.
Neither side focuses on what scholars call âstate capacityâ: the ability of the
state to achieve its goals. Sometimes that requires more government. Sometimes it
requires less government. But it always requires a focus on what the state is trying
to achieve and what is in its way. In the absence of that focus, absurdity reigns.
Across Europe, government-administered health-care systems negotiate down
the prices of drugs and treatments. In America, our fear of socialized medicine has
led to a hodgepodge of private and public insurers who do not coordinate and do
not effectively negotiate. The weight-loss drug Ozempic, for instance, costs about
ten times as much in America as it does in Britain or France.9 Those countries
have national health-care systems that restrict what pharmaceutical companies
can charge, and we do not. As a result, taxpayers in Europe spend less on health
care, as a percentage of GDP, than taxpayers in America. And then Americans
have enormous private bills atop our public spending. Keeping the American
health-care state weak has made the American government larger and left
Americans poorer.
But liberals lose sight of their goals, too. In response to the Tahanan story, Bob
Kuttner, the cofounder of the stalwart liberal publication The Am erican Prospect,
tried to jam the problem into a container that the left is more comfortable with.
âWe have a very modest social-housing sector in the US and limited funds for
housing subsidies. We are largely at the mercy of developers. We could eliminate
zoning restrictions and make it easier to build multifamily housing, and that
would solve only a small portion of the affordable-housing shortage.â There is a
comfort here with solutions that put more faith in government (public, or social,
housing) and a discomfort with solutions that seem to align with markets (being
at the âmercyâ of developers, eliminating zoning restrictions).
The reality of housing development doesnât track along such neat ideological
lines. Kuttner says that eliminating zoning restrictions and making it easier to
build multifamily housing would make only a modest difference in our problems.
He does not provide any evidence for this claim, but there is evidence against it.
Houston has no zoning rules at all, though it does have some land use
regulations.10 As a result, it is dramatically easier to build in Houston than to
build in Los Angeles or San Francisco or Seattle or Boston.
78In 2023, the San Francisco metro area issued about 7,500 new housing
permits. The Boston metro area issued 10,500. New York City, Newark, and
Jersey Cityâtogetherâissued slightly fewer than 40,000. The Houston metro
area issued almost 70,000.11 This divergence is decades old, and its consequences
are clear. Houston has the lowest homelessness rate of any major US city. Officials
estimate that it costs $17,000 to $19,000 to house a homeless resident of
Houston, with about $12,000 of that going to housing and the rest to
wraparound services.12 In San Francisco, the cost is between $40,000 and $47,000
annually, with about $35,000 going to housing costs alone. This tracks the
The Cost of Good Intentions
- Houston's market-driven approach results in median home prices nearly six times lower than those in San Francisco.
- Regulatory hurdles in San Francisco create a multi-year 'gauntlet' that effectively forces developers to prioritize luxury condos over affordable units.
- Los Angeles's Proposition HHH demonstrates how public funding for homeless housing can result in costs exceeding $600,000 per unit.
- The 'leveraging' of multiple funding sources for affordable housing creates a complex 'hopscotch' of conflicting requirements and delays.
- Well-meaning liberal housing policies often inadvertently drive up costs through layered regulations and bureaucratic restructuring.
But the grim absurdity of liberal housing policy comes clearest when you focus on the kind of housing liberals claim to support: affordable housing built by nonprofit developers with the backing of both voters and local government.
broader difference between the two cities: in Houston, the median home costs a
bit over $300,000 rather than a bit over $1.7 million in San Francisco.13 Houston
is not free of affordability problems. But it is not facing the crises of homelessness
and housing affordability seen in the superstar cities of many blue states.
Liberals lament that private developers want to build profitable developments
when what is needed most is affordable housing. But even aside from how much
housing is built, one way to make housing more affordable is to make it cheaper
to build. The problem is many liberal jurisdictions have layered on rules and
regulations that make housing pricier even when it is constructedâand that, of
course, makes it less affordable. In San Francisco, a 2023 state report found that it
took 523 days, on average, to get clearance to construct new housing, and another
605 days to get building permitsâand thatâs for the projects that arenât killed by
community opposition during the planning process.14 A project needs to be
quite profitable to make it through that gauntletâand it needs to be acceptable
to its wealthy neighborsâand that pushes developers toward luxury condos.
But the grim absurdity of liberal housing policy comes clearest when you focus
on the kind of housing liberals claim to support: affordable housing built by
nonprofit developers with the backing of both voters and local government. In
2016, the people of Los Angeles overwhelmingly passed Proposition HHH, a
ballot measure that raised $1.2 billion through a higher property tax to create
10,000 new apartments for the homeless. âThe voters of Los Angeles have
radically reshaped our future,â Mayor Eric Garcetti said, âgiving us a mandate to
end street homelessness over the next decade.â15
By March 2024, the city had built 4,344 units under HHH.16 A 2022 audit
found the units cost, on average, around $600,00017âalmost twice the cost of
the median sale price for a home in Houston. There have been many problems
with Prop HHH, but the real problem predates it: the way that taking advantage
79of public money layers on requirements, delays, and additional goals, slowing
down construction and raising costs.
HHH is designed to provide some, but not all, of the money for
developments. Defenders of HHH are quick to point out that the average cost
per unit includes around only $134,000 of HHH funds.18 The program is
designed to seed projects that can find other financing, too. That sounds good: by
leveraging outside money, the taxpayerâs dollar can go further. In reality, it means
affordable housing projects need to line up four or five or six different funders,
cobbling together tax credits and philanthropic donations and state and local
incentives.
âEveryone wants to be able to say we spent only $50,000 on this apartmentâ
that means I have to go through the process four or five times,â Yasmin Tong, the
founder of CTY Housing, a consultancy on affordable housing projects, says.
âIâve seen projects with as many as ten funding sources. It takes time to do
that.â19
The different financing sources come with different demands, all of which
make the project more complex. âThe developer has to hopscotch from one
funding source to another to another,â Tong said. âSo you start by saying weâll
serve low-income families at this development. But the funding falls through. So
you put in veteransâ units. Or try to house domestic violence survivors in here.
Thereâs this constant restructuring of the project as the funding sources come and
go.â
The Cost of Good Intentions
- Former LA Controller Ron Galperin argues that the complex regulations and funding restrictions attached to HHH housing funds often cost more to navigate than the subsidies themselves.
- Publicly funded projects face significant cost premiums due to prevailing wage requirements, sustainability standards, and specialized consultants.
- The pursuit of high-quality standards creates a moral paradox where the demand for perfect housing prevents the construction of 'good enough' housing for those living in tents.
- Local opposition groups use environmental and aesthetic concerns as legal weapons to delay projects, forcing developers to hire expensive specialists to survive the approval process.
- The resulting high per-unit costs are used by critics as evidence against future affordable housing initiatives, creating a self-reinforcing cycle of failure.
Given that failure, does it make sense to be asking for special air filtration systems for developments near freeways when the alternative, for many of the would-be residents, is a tent beneath the freeway?
Ron Galperin was the Los Angeles city controller from 2013 to 2022. His
office was responsible for auditing HHH. His office tracked how much each unit
cost and where the money came from and whether the program was achieving its
aims. You might expect him to praise HHHâs effort to match each dollar with five
dollars from other funders. In fact, heâs furious at the way the money was
structured.
âIf you look at the inflated cost that comes along with all of the regulations
and rules and restrictions and limitations,â Galperin said, âthen basically all of
this money is going to feed the beast of covering the cost of the regulations. Yes,
they get $134,000 on average from the city, but the hoops that have to be jumped
through to get it very well may exceed the $134,000. Weâve created an absolutely
insane system.â20
Then there are the higher standards that public money requires developers to
meet. âWeâre required to pay prevailing wage, so thereâs at least a 20 or 30 percent
80premium on the labor costs,â Tong says. âWe have sustainability requirements we
need to maintain. Iâve had projects where the planning department required a
higher-quality air ventilation system because we were a certain distance from the
freeway. All the affordable housing development is subject to green building
requirements. The standards in California are higher than anywhere else in the
country. And youâre not just required to build to the standard, you also need to
hire a consultant to confirm youâve built to the standard. That adds costs.â21
Every one of these is a worthy goal. But so too is building a lot of affordable
housing quickly and cheaply. Los Angeles is failing, and failing badly, at doing
that. Given that failure, does it make sense to be asking for special air filtration
systems for developments near freeways when the alternative, for many of the
would-be residents, is a tent beneath the freeway? To pose the question sounds
callous. But to refuse to pose the question, given the need for more housing, is
cruel.
These additions do not come only from planning boards trying to upgrade the
quality of the housing. They also come from neighbors who would prefer it never
got built at all. In Venice, home of the legendary boardwalk, the Venice Dell
Community project is trying to turn a parking lot owned by the city into a 140-
unit building for homeless residents, low-income artists, and families, all of it
designed by a star architect.22 The development is being fought and even sued by
a collection of local homeowners who complain that âVenice desperately needs
this parcel to address our chronic parking shortage,â that the new housing would
be âan eyesore completely divorced from sound architectural principles,â and that
it is being developed âwith no environmental review in a designated tsunami zone
and FEMA Special Flood Hazard Zone.â23 (When do Angelenos want affordable
housing? Now! Where do they want it? Not here!)
Surviving local opposition often means agreeing to a range of demands that
send costs ballooning. To try to neutralize local attacks, developers hire pricey
architects, redo plans repeatedly, make all kinds of aesthetic and architectural
concessions or additions, hire extra lawyers and auditors, and on and on. Even if a
project does survive all this, it does so at a higher per-unit cost, which then, of
course, becomes one more data point that gets wielded in opposition to the next
project.
Perhaps, as Kuttner suggests, the problem is simply that we donât have enough
public (or, as itâs been rebranded, âsocialâ) housing. In Singapore, almost 80
percent of the population lives in public housing. These projects have a bad
81reputation in the United States, but beautiful developments have opened in
places like Montgomery County, Maryland, and larger cities like Atlanta are
experimenting with using public projects to expand their housing stock. But
The Trap of Procedural Liberalism
- Social housing projects face the same fundamental requirements for speed and affordability as private developments but are hindered by government-imposed strictures.
- Former LAHSA head Heidi Marston highlights how thirty-eight unique funding sources create a paralyzing web of audits and conflicting restrictions.
- Individual funding conditions are often rational responses to political pressure or accountability needs, but their cumulative effect is a bureaucratic nightmare.
- The obsession with rule-following and procedure over actual outcomes robs public servants of the discretion and agility needed to solve complex social crises.
- Liberal governance has increasingly sought legitimacy through strict adherence to process rather than the effective enactment of the public's will.
We ask people to work on societyâs hardest problemsâoften making much less than they could make in the private sectorâand then rob them of the discretion and agility they need to solve them.
social housing will rise or fail for the same reasons that all building projects rise or
fail. It doesnât matter whether the worker hammering in nails is a public employee
or a private contractor. The government still needs to build those homes
affordably and quickly. And thatâs not possible under the rules and strictures that
liberals have designed within the governments they run.
Heidi Marston led the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority from late
2019 until April 2022, when she resigned in frustration. âWe had thirty-eight
unique funding sources coming in when I was there,â Marston says, âand each of
those had annual or biannual audits of not just us, but the nonprofits we were
funding.â Those audits were meant to show that the money was being spent
exactly as intended. But that was part of the problem.
âFederal funding is probably more restrictive than any other,â Marston
continued. âEvery year we get money from the Department of Housing and
Urban Development. The city often gives their share to us, but on top of the
auditing and tracking that the federal money comes with, they add on their own
conditions, like we canât use it for staffing. Just all this stuff that gets added on in
the process.â24
It is easy enough to imagine how these conditions emerge. The city wants to
show that it is using its money to build houses rather than expand its head count.
HUD has no end of priorities and is trying to satisfy the desires and demands of
the members of Congress who control its funding. Tax credits are added to the
code to address real and wrenching problems, like the rise in homelessness among
veterans. Grant makers want to show donors that their money is being used well,
and the only way to prove that is through audits. Everyone, everywhere, is afraid
of being implicated in fraud or waste or having their funding cut or seeing the
public turn on them.
Each individual decision is rational. The collective consequences are
maddening. We hire skilled, dedicated people to do the publicâs work and then
make it impossible for them to do that work well. We ask people to work on
societyâs hardest problemsâoften making much less than they could make in the
private sectorâand then rob them of the discretion and agility they need to solve
them. And then we wonder why so many of them leave.
âThereâs tons of money that goes into homelessness, particularly in Los
Angeles,â Marston says. âMy budget was almost a billion dollars. But the money
82comes with such confined requirements that itâs almost impossible to spend. If
you give me a billion dollars and the ability to spend it, it would be a different
story.â25
It is hard to hear Marstonâs story without being reminded of Nicholas Bagleyâs
argument that liberalism has become obsessed with procedure rather than with
outcomes, that it seeks legitimacy through rule following rather than through the
enactment of the publicâs will. Homelessness in Los Angeles is a catastrophe. The
public is furious at the sluggish, ineffective response. And the lead agency on
homelessness is spending its time filling out audit forms and making sure each
dollar is spent in strict accordance with the specific demands of funders.
The Problem with Everything-Bagel Liberalism
In his 2022 article âA Time for Triage,â Michael Gerrard, the founder of
Columbia Law Schoolâs Sabin Center for Climate Change Law, considered why it
has proven so hard for liberals to build the kind of climate infrastructure they
believe is needed. âRather than climate denial, the environmental community has
The Everything-Bagel Liberalism Trap
- Society is currently suffering from 'tradeoff denial,' refusing to acknowledge that we can no longer preserve every precious goal simultaneously.
- Liberal governance often suffers from 'everything-bagel liberalism,' where projects collapse under the weight of too many competing social and regulatory objectives.
- While conservatives may use procedural bloat to intentionally sabotage government, liberals often do so accidentally by trying to solve every problem at once.
- The CHIPS and Science Act serves as a case study, where a national security priority is burdened with extensive requirements for childcare, equity strategies, and environmental reviews.
- The high cost of domestic manufacturing is exacerbated by these additional mandates, potentially undermining the primary goal of competing with global semiconductor leaders.
In the Oscar-winning movie Everything Everywhere All at Once, there is an attempt to create a true everything bagel, and it becomes a black hole from which nothing can escape.
tradeoff denial. We donât recognize that itâs too late to preserve everything we
consider precious, and to linger in making decisions. Society has run out of time
to save everything we want to save, and to mull things over for years.â26
One problem liberals are facing at every level where they govern is that they
often add too many goals to a single project. A government that tries to
accomplish too much all at once often ends up accomplishing nothing at all.
(Conservatives are not immune from piling on procedure and stricture, but they
often do so in a purposeful attempt to make government work poorly, and so
failure and inefficiency become a perverse form of success.)
Call this âeverything-bagel liberalism.â The everything bagel is, of course, the
best bagel. But that is because it adds just enough to the bagel and no more. It
does not, actually, pile everything atop the bagel. In the Oscar-winning movie
Everything Everywhere All at Once, there is an attempt to create a true everything
bagel, and it becomes a black hole from which nothing can escape. The same is
true for public projects. When the government adds the right number of goals,
standards, and rules, much can be accomplished. When it adds too many, the
project can collapse under its own weight, as has happened to high-speed rail in
California.
83In 2022, President Biden signed the CHIPS and Science Act into law. The
Biden administration believed semiconductors would be to the twenty-first
century what oil was to the twentieth century and that America must be a leader
again in manufacturing them. âThis is first and foremost and primarily a national
security initiative,â Gina Raimondo, the secretary of commerce, said. âWe have
national security goals we must achieve. Period. Full stop. No compromise.â27
The semiconductor industry was invented in Americaâthe âsiliconâ in
Silicon Valley refers to the material that semiconductors are made fromâbut we
long ago lost our dominant position in making what we invented. A report by the
Semiconductor Industry Association says that the US share of global
semiconductor-manufacturing capacity dropped from 37 percent in 1990 to 12
percent in 2020.28 Part of the reason is cost. The association estimates that
building and operating a semiconductor-manufacturing facility in the United
States costs about 30 percent more over ten years than it does in Taiwan, South
Korea, or Singapore.29
In 2023, the Biden administration released its Notice of Funding Opportunity
for the $39 billion it intended to hand out to semiconductor manufacturers to
locate new fabs in the United States. Reading the NOFO was a strange
experience. Here was the US government trying to recapture an industry it had
lost in part because it had become cost-prohibitive to manufacture
semiconductors domestically. But the NOFO did not seem laser-focused on the
cost problem. To be honest, it did not seem laser-focused on any problem.
Page 12 encouraged a pre-application that includes an environmental
questionnaire âto assess the likely level of review under the National
Environmental Policy Act.â Page 20 mandated that applicants prepare âan equity
strategy, in concert with their partners, to create equitable work force pathways
for economically disadvantaged individuals in their region,â which should include
âbuilding new pipelines for workers, including specific efforts to attract
economically disadvantaged individuals and promote diversity, equity, inclusion,
and accessibility.â Pages 21 and 22 asked for a plan âto include women and other
economically disadvantaged individuals in the construction industryâ and
encouraged the use of project labor agreements and sets out requirements for
âaccess to child care for facility and construction workers.â
Pages 24, 25, and 26 asked applicants to detail how they would include
minority-, veteran-and female-owned businesses, as well as small businesses, in
The Burden of Competing Goals
- The CHIPS Act includes numerous social and environmental requirements, such as childcare and supply chain diversification, alongside its industrial objectives.
- Secretary Raimondo argues that these social mandates, like childcare, are necessary to attract the labor force required for semiconductor manufacturing.
- Critics argue that adding these secondary goals creates trade-offs and complexities that may ultimately hinder the primary mission of building factories.
- The text highlights a lack of regulatory relief, noting that process is often added but rarely removed to streamline construction.
- A comparison is drawn to California's high-speed rail, where federal air quality mandates led to construction in the Central Valley rather than high-traffic corridors.
- The accumulation of diverse policy goals can lead to projects that fail to achieve their primary purpose or their secondary social benefits.
But there is some margin at which trying to do more means ultimately achieving less.
their supply chain, and offered seven bullet points detailing how this might be
84done, including dividing supply chain requirements âinto smaller tasks or
quantities to expand accessâ and âestablishing delivery schedules for
subcontractors that encourage participation by small, minority-owned, veteran-
owned, and women-owned businesses.â Then there are requirements for âa
climate and environmental responsibility plan,â as well as community
investments in areas like transit, affordable housing, and schools.30
Many of these are good goals. But are they good goals to include in this
project? There is no discussion in the NOFO of tradeoffs. Nor was there any
admission by the administration that anything they were asking for even
represented a tradeoff.
âEvery one of the requirementsâor theyâre not really requirementsânudges
âare for criteria or factors we think relate directly to the effectiveness of the
project,â Raimondo said. âYou want to build a new fab that will require between
7,000 and 9,000 workers. The unemployment rate in the building trades is
basically zero. If you donât find a way to attract women to become builders and
pipe fitters and welders, you will not be successful. So you have to be thinking
about child care.â31
But do Taiwanese semiconductor firms really know how to expand the role of
women in the construction industry? How good will they be, really, at
diversifying supply chains? These are all worthwhile goals. But there is some
margin at which trying to do more means ultimately achieving less.
It is impossible to read these bills and guidelines and not notice that the
additions are rarely matched by deletions. Process is enthusiastically added but
seldom lifted. You can imagine a version of the CHIPS bill that lifted
immigration rules to make it easier for skilled semiconductor workers to come to
the United States. That would have been the most direct way to address the
shortage of skilled workers hindering the construction and operation of the fabs.
You could have imagined rules exempting the semiconductor fabs from NEPA or
giving them some kind of fast-track process. (In late 2024, the Biden
administration signed a bill from Senators Mark Kelly and Ted Cruz to do exactly
that, after warning that environmental review could add âyearsâ to the
construction timeline.)
To be clear, there is nothing unusual in the way the Biden administration
approached the CHIPS and Science Act. The federal government often tries to
make the subsidies it offers serve an array of goals and constituencies. Californiaâs
high-speed rail was shaped by this dynamic, too. Many Californians were
confused that construction had begun in the Central Valley, which was far less
85populated than the corridors near Los Angeles or San Francisco.32 Why start
there?
When California applied for federal money under the terms of the American
Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the Obama administration gave preference to
bids that would improve air quality in poor communities. And so the $3 billion
the federal government offered was not really to build high-speed rail. It was to
begin building high-speed rail in ways that addressed air pollution in specific
places. The Central Valley is poorer and more polluted than coastal California, so
federal funding went there, and so did the initial construction. California is
building high-speed rail in a place that makes it less likely that it will generate the
ridership, political support, and financial backing to ever finish. The irony is that
itâs not just bad for the high-speed rail project. Itâs also bad for air pollution across
the state.
It Should Not Be This Hard to Serve the Public
Since 1960, federal government spending has risen more than fivefoldâand yes,
The Cost of Outsourcing Capacity
- The U.S. federal civilian workforce has remained stagnant at roughly 2 million people since 1960 despite massive population and economic growth.
- A prevailing political ideology in the U.S. demonizes 'bureaucrats' and prioritizes privatization, viewing the private sector as inherently more efficient.
- California's high-speed rail project suffered from a lack of in-house expertise, relying on a massive network of consultants who underestimated costs and timelines.
- The California High-Speed Rail Authority initially operated with only ten employees, outsourcing critical planning and management to high-cost external firms.
- In contrast, BART saved $400 million on rail cars by utilizing in-house engineering staff rather than relying solely on external manufacturers.
- Research indicates that increasing state department of transportation staffing can reduce highway construction costs by as much as 26 percent per mile.
California was financing and overseeing a program it did not have the capacity to plan, manage, or even truly understand.
thatâs accounting for inflation.33 But the size of the federal civilian workforce has
barely budged. It was slightly fewer than 2 million people in 1960 and itâs slightly
over 2 million people today. In countries like China and Singapore, civil service is
held in high esteem, and the brightest graduates compete in nationwide tests to
win government jobs. In the United States, the word âbureaucratâ is tossed
around as an epithet. Republicans have spent decades demonizing government,
and they have largely won the argument. The dominant belief is that anything
that can be outsourced or privatized should be. Government is bloated. The
private sector is efficient.
Democrats may not believe what Republicans believe about government, but
they often act as if they do. In 2008, when California began building its high-
speed rail system in earnest, the stateâs High-Speed Rail Authority had just ten
workers. One of them was responsible for designing graphics for social media.
The job was turned over to a vast assemblage of consultancies. It was one of these
consultantsâWSPâthat estimated the system would cost only $33 billion and
take only twelve years to build. But WSP was joined by Project Finance Advisory,
Cambridge Systematics, Arup, TYLin, HNTB, PGH Wong Engineering, Harris
& Associates, Arcadis, STV, Sener, and Parsons Corporation. The outsourcing
âproved to be a foundational error in the projectâs executionâa miscalculation
86that has resulted in the California High-Speed Rail Authority being overly reliant
on a network of high-cost consultants who have consistently underestimated the
difficulty of the task,â reported Ralph Vartabedian in the Los Angeles Tim es.34
California is one of the richest polities in the world. It was building one of the
most ambitious rail projects in the world. But it did not hire the best rail designers
and engineers to provide in-house expertise and manage the project. California
was financing and overseeing a program it did not have the capacity to plan,
manage, or even truly understand. âThere was an ideology at the Authority some
time ago that was like, âLetâs keep this small and in-house and weâll rely on
consultants to build this,âââ Brian Kelly, the High-Speed Rail Authorityâs CEO,
said. âMy philosophy when I got here was the state is the owner of this project
and so we need to build state capacity. When I started, the authority was seventy
percent consultants, thirty percent state. Now itâs fifty-five percent state and
forty-five percent consultant.â35
In the Bay Area, a different story played out. In 2012, Bay Area Rapid Transit
(BART) signed a contract with Alstom, a French rail car manufacturer, to deliver
775 cars for $2.58 billion.36 By 2023, though, something unusual had happened:
the cars were coming in faster, and cheaper, than expected. The cost estimate was
slashed by almost $400 million.37 One major source of savings, reported
trains.com, was âBARTâs decision to have its own staff do more of the
engineering work in house. The project team has included engineers who have
successfully completed new rail car projects at other agencies.â38 Nor is this an
isolated anecdote. Zachary Liscowâs research found that increasing employment
in state departments of transportation by 1 employee per 1,000 residents reduced
the cost-per-mile of highway construction by 26 percent.39 Government cannot
The Sediment of Governance
- Jen Pahlka's work highlights the immense difficulty of modernizing government services through technology.
- The COVID-19 pandemic exposed the fragility of state unemployment systems, particularly California's EDD, under extreme demand.
- Government technology is described as 'layers of sediment' where new systems are tacked onto ancient foundations rather than replacing them.
- Critical infrastructure often relies on obsolete 1980s mainframes and COBOL, a programming language dating back to 1959.
- Complex procurement rules and fragmented subsystems create 'traps' where hundreds of thousands of applications can become lost.
- The challenge is not just technical incompetence but the structural burden of harmonizing decades of conflicting regulations and legacy code.
The system is not so much updated as it is tacked on to.
do everything itself. But it needs enough know-how to oversee the projects it is
doing.
Jen Pahlka is the founder of Code for America, a civic tech group that tried to
build a bridge between the technology industry and the government in a bid to
upgrade government services. The work was hard, fruitful, important, frustrating.
She went on to advise on digitizing government in the Obama White House. She
is something of a godmother to a generation of idealistic technologists who tried,
or are trying, to make government work the way it should work. Her memoir of
this work, Recoding Am erica, is a compendium of their stories. It is painful to
read.
87In January 2020, Pahlka had stepped away from her role at Code for America.
She needed some time away from the problems of digitizing government. But
then came the pandemic, and the lockdowns, and the millions of people suddenly
out of work. Those people were all, unexpectedly, now reliant on unemployment
insurance, which is managed by the states. And those systems were not prepared
for anything like this level of demand. Californiaâs system, administered by the
stateâs Employment Development Department, fell into particular chaos, with
millions of people seeing their benefits wrongly delayed or denied.40 Pahlka was
asked to co-lead a task force that would rescue it.
Technologically, there was nothing particularly novel in the challenge.
Unemployment insurance is fairly simple. People apply. They are accepted or
rejected. Then checks are sent out. By the standards of the technology sector, this
is a solved problem. âPrivately, some California officials told me they thought the
EDD staff was just incompetent at technology and our team would find the
problems easy to fix,â Pahlka writes. But that wasnât how the task force saw it.
âPrivately, we wondered if we could help at all.â41
Pahlka has come to think of government technologyâand the regulations that
control itâas layers of sediment. As new problems emerge, new layers are added.
But the older ones are rarely removed. âEach successive layer is constrained by the
limitations of the earlier technologies,â she writes. âThe system is not so much
updated as it is tacked on to.â42 The challenge of updating government
technology is the challenge of updating, harmonizing, or terminating the
functions of these old systems. And all of it must be done while following
procurement and contracting rules that no private technology company would
ever impose on itself.
At the EDD, the core technological layer was called the single client database,
which runs on an IBM mainframe from the â80s.43 Parts of it are written in a
programming language called COBOL, which dates back to 1959. COBOL is
almost never used today, and it is hard to find engineers who know how to
program in it. Making matters worse, parts of the single client database were
designed to run on those old monochrome displays that showed green text on a
black background. Because nobody makes those displays any longer, the staff used
virtual emulators to access the systemâthey would run software on new
computers that could mimic the constraints of old computers.
Then came more layers. In 2002, the EDD contracted with Deloitte to bring
their work online. Deloitte built one system to access the IBM mainframe
88through a web browser. It built another system to corral and manage applications
flagged for manual identity verification. It built a third system that acts as the
public-facing website for people to apply for benefits. All these systems had their
own subsystems. And within those subsystems, applications could pool and get
trapped in places no one was really looking. Pahlka and her team were told the
number of backlogged applications was around 230,000. It took them seven
The Labyrinth of Government Tech
- The California EDD spent a decade merely preparing a contract for modernization, rather than actually updating their technology stack.
- Systemic failures in government IT are widespread, with projects at the IRS and State Department often spanning decades and costing hundreds of millions.
- Public servants are often dedicated and creative, but they are trapped by systems and rules that have become complex beyond human imagination.
- Hiring surges during crises can backfire, as training thousands of new workers consumes the time of the experienced staff needed to clear backlogs.
- Manual identity verification systems often trigger on trivial errors like nicknames or typos, resulting in massive delays for claims that are almost always valid.
They had not been working on modernizing their technology stack for ten years. They had been working for ten years on the massive contract they would award to outside firms to modernize and manage their technology stack.
weeks to organize the databases such that they could be precisely counted. The
true number was 1.2 million.
The EDD doesnât build or manage its own technology. Nor is that technology
built or managed by a centralized team of software engineers in the state
government. It is done by external firms chosen and managed through a
labyrinthine procurement process. At the time of the meltdown, the EDD had
been working on a modernization contract for ten years that it was theoretically
just weeks away from awarding. Read that again: They had not been working on
modernizing their technology stack for ten years. They had been working for ten
years on the massive contract they would award to outside firms to modernize and
manage their technology stack. That contract was expected to take eleven years to
execute.
The sedimentary chaos at the EDD was not at all unusual. California spent ten
years and $500 million trying to bring its courts onto a common document
management system before abandoning the effort.44 The State Departmentâs
Bureau of Consular Affairs has been trying to modernize and consolidate its visa
and passport systems since 2009.45 The IRS began trying to replace one of its core
systemsâthe Individual Master Fileâin 2000. The work is now projected to be
completed in 2030.46
âThe public servants responsible for the interminably drawn-out
modernization efforts are neither lazy, stupid, nor malicious,â Pahlka writes. âIâve
met hundreds of them, and they are overwhelmingly dedicated, conscientious,
and often quite creative. IRS employees managed to send monthly child tax-credit
payments to nearly forty million families and to mail out over $800 billion in
stimulus checks during the pandemic, all while relying on systems that were never
designed to change so quickly or handle such enormous volume.â The problem is
that the systems they are updating have become âcomplex beyond our ability to
imagine,â as has âthe complexity of all the rules these public servants need to
follow to do that updating.â47
89The worst of the EDD backlog was in the system that managed manual
identity verification. But working in that system required years of experience,
accreditation, and testing. When the EDD crisis had begun, elected officials
demanded the EDD hire more people. So the EDD signed another contract with
Deloitte to bring on another five thousand workers. The governor touted the new
hires. But it would have taken years to train those workers to face down the
backlog the EDD was facing. And their questions and confusion were taking up
the time of the workers who could work on the backlog. Pahlkaâs team calculated
that it was now taking two to five times as long to clear those files as it had before
the pandemic.
Letting go of thousands of new hires is cheaper and easier than training them.
But that wasnât how the agencyâs leadership saw it. âHiring as fast as they possibly
could had been the one consistent directive coming from everyone above them:
the governorâs office, the legislature, the federal Department of Labor, and every
oversight body with jurisdiction over the EDDâs operations,â Pahlka was told.48
Telling all those overseers they were wrong was not in anyoneâs interest. And no
one believed they would listen anyway. Firing workers during a crisis of EDD
performance would look terrible.
There was another option. The system was choking over manual verification.
Manual verification was typically triggered when the information an applicant
filled out on their form didnât precisely match some other piece of information
the EDD had about them. Perhaps you write âJonathanâ on legal forms but your
employer pays you under âJohn.â Perhaps you mistyped a digit in your Social
Security number. It makes sense why this would lead to a manual check. But
there was no real relationship between these tiny errors and fraud. Out of the
183,167 claims flagged in the previous quarter, only 804 were ultimately judged
invalid.49
The Burden of Complexity
- Stolen identities from dark web breaches allowed fraudulent applications to bypass EDD verification systems by perfectly matching official records.
- Fear of political backlash prevented officials from loosening failing anti-fraud rules, leading to a total shutdown of the application portal to clear backlogs.
- Legislators continued to add new requirements and language mandates to a system that was already failing to meet its existing legal obligations.
- The accumulation of policy layers over decades created a 'cluttered delivery environment' that made the underlying code nearly impossible to maintain.
- True government efficiency often requires 'subtraction' and the removal of bureaucratic layers rather than the addition of new mandates.
- Emergency declarations, such as the one used for the I-95 bridge collapse, demonstrate how bypassing standard procurement rules can compress years of work into months.
For government to do moreâor even for it to just do what it is already doingâsometimes it first needs permission to do much less.
If anything, there was more fraud in the perfect applications. âOur world is
awash in databases of stolen identities from breaches at credit monitoring services,
retailers, and employers, and these stolen identities are freely traded on the dark
web. Fraudulent applications using these sources will not get flagged: the data
entered on the application will exactly match the sources the EDD checks against,
because it is usually a copy of precisely that data,â Pahlka writes.50
The EDD was implementing a new system of identity verification that would
be quicker and more effective, but it needed to do something about the backlog
that was building daily. The obvious answer was to loosen the rules that would
90lead to manual verification. But even though the process wasnât working, it was
still the process. To follow it was safe. To evade it was risky. Fraud was really
happening, and when its full extent was known, there was going to be a furor,
and it would fall particularly heavily on anyone who loosened the anti-fraud rules,
even if the rules they loosened were failing to catch fraud and causing the huge
backlogs that were crashing the system.
What the EDD eventually did was simply stop taking applications altogether.
For weeks, they shut down the portal for new applications. The EDD reassigned
the bulk of its staff to clearing the backlog and setting up the new identity
verification program.
Amid all this, Pahlka recalls, a member of the California Assembly introduced
legislation requiring the EDD to make its applications and communications
available in over a dozen languages. Most of those languages were already required
by a 1973 state law. They were also required by multiple federal laws and rules.
The EDD wasnât in compliance with all these older rules. It wasnât even serving
English speakers effectively. It was not able to do what it was already required to
do. Now it was being instructed to do more.
What was needed was subtraction. What Pahlka and her team found, again
and again, was that the rules and regulations that governed Californiaâs
unemployment insurance system and that had been written into its code had just
kept growing. That made the code more complex and harder to update. It made
new hires harder to find and harder to train. It made backlogs harder to clear.
âLawmakers often have good intentions, but they continually add policy layers
with too little understanding of (and, sometimes, regard for) how what they add
will interact with the layers that are already cluttering the delivery environment,â
she concluded.51 For government to do moreâor even for it to just do what it is
already doingâsometimes it first needs permission to do much less.
A Government That Chooses Is a Government That
W orks
On June 11, 2023, a tanker truck carrying 8,500 gallons of gasoline flipped over.
The truck ignited underneath the I-95 bridge in Philadelphia, killing the driver
and melting the steel beams undergirding it. The I-95 bridge, which carries
160,000 cars daily, collapsed. This wasnât just a crisis for a roadway. It was a crisis
for a region. I-95 is one of the main transportation arteries on the East Coast. Itâs
91a crucial connector between New York and Washington. Officials, including
Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro, warned that rebuilding it would take
months.
And it would have taken months, or longer, under Pennsylvaniaâs normal
rules. âWe would hire a consultant to design it,â Mike Carroll, the Pennsylvania
secretary of transportation, says. âWeâd need final design approved by the Federal
Highway Administration. Then thereâd be bidding from interested contractors.
Then weâd process the bids. Then weâd issue a contract. Thatâd take about twelve
to twenty-four months.â52
But Shapiro signed a declaration of emergency that exempted the rebuilding
process from the rules and requirements that slow so many public projects
The Speed of Emergency
- Following a bridge collapse on I-95, Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro bypassed standard procurement and environmental rules to prioritize speed.
- The project utilized 24/7 union labor and social media transparency to demonstrate that government can still build major infrastructure rapidly.
- Officials took calculated risks, such as paving in the rain and skipping bidding processes, that would normally be prohibited by bureaucratic regulations.
- The bridge reopened in just twelve days, significantly boosting Shapiro's political profile and proving the public's appetite for government efficiency.
- The success of the rebuild highlights a systemic preference for following 'the book' over exercising professional discretion, even when the book causes routine delays.
- Shapiro's primary takeaway was the necessity of empowering leaders to be decisive rather than deferring to a circular and often stagnant bureaucracy.
I said turn the machine on and knock the goddam thing over.
down.53 Speed was the priority here. There would be no environmental impact
statement. There would be no lengthy bidding process. The procurement rules
were shunted aside. When Carroll arrived at the disaster, C. Abbonizio
Contractors, a firm the state had worked with before, was already at the bridge on
another job. They were chosen to oversee the demolition. Rob Buckley, of the
highway contractor Buckley & Company, was also nearby, working on another
project. His firm was pulled in, too. âThe emergency declaration gave us the
ability to engage contractors without bidding,â Carroll said. âWork commenced
the moment the fire department released the sceneâthat same day.â
All the labor Pennsylvania used was union labor. And they pushed hard: work
went on twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.54 A twenty-four-hour live
cam trained on the site allowed the public to follow along. Shapiro took to giving
updates on Twitter and TikTok. He turned the I-95 rebuild into a crucible for his
governorship and an object lesson in something few still believed: That
government could build big things fast. That it could do so using union labor.
That it could move at the speed of an emergency rather than according to its own
rules.
âThe common denominator with all these decisions was letâs get this thing
done as fast as possible,â Carroll said. He recalled a moment he came across a
bunch of Abbonizio workers using a screwdriver to disassemble a highway sign.
He asked what they were doing, and they told him they were saving the sign for
the Department of Transportation in case they wanted to reuse it. âI said turn the
machine on and knock the goddam thing over,â he said with a chuckle. On
another night Carroll saw rain forecast over the next few days. He told the team to
pave anyway, in contravention of the Department of Transportationâs rules,
92because the rain was light that night and could grow heavier soon.55 If they
waited, they might be waiting for days. âThe emergency declaration was a game
changer,â Carroll says. âI took calculated risks that Iâd have not taken in a normal
project. It couldâve gone badly, but it didnât.â
Itâs worth taking seriously what Carroll says there. These were risks. There are
reasons these rules are in place. No-bid contracts can enable corruption as well as
speed. There are reasons not to put down asphalt when itâs raining. But in
turning these questions from choices into rules, we have taken discretion and
judgment away from people like Carroll. We prefer that projects go badly by the
book. We minimize some risks but make delay and high costs routine.
The emergency declaration allowed Shapiro to make choices. He chose to use
union labor but to gore a lot of other interests and processes. I-95 reopened in
just twelve daysânot the âmonthsâ initially forecasted. Shapiro did âone heck of
a job,â President Biden said.56 His popularity swelled, and he began to be
mentioned as a possible future presidential candidate. Turns out people like it
when their government gets things done.
The W ashington Post asked Shapiro to write an op-ed reflecting on lessons heâd
learned. The first lesson, he said, was âempower strong leadership.â The key to the
rebuild was that the people in charge of the rebuild could act. âManagers of every
component of the project were empowered to be decisive, take ownership and
make a call when necessaryânot defer and delay to the often-circular
bureaucracy,â Shapiro wrote.57 The process Shapiro used would typically be
illegal. Yet national Democrats and Pennsylvania voters alike loved it. What does
that say about the typical process?
In his paper âState Capacity: What Is It, How We Lost It, and How to Get It
Back,â Brink Lindsey puts it well:
What is needed most is a change in ideas: namely, a reversal of those
intellectual trends of the past 50 years or so that have brought us to the
current pass. On the right, this means abandoning the knee-jerk anti-
Effective Governance and mRNA Pioneers
- The text argues for a shift from a legalistic, process-oriented government to one focused on effective exercise of power and tangible outcomes.
- Progressives are urged to reduce the veto power of activist groups and courts to allow the state to function more efficiently.
- Katalin KarikĂł's early life in rural Hungary, characterized by poverty and manual labor, instilled the persistence required for her scientific career.
- KarikĂł faced extreme financial and legal hurdles to move to America, including smuggling cash inside a teddy bear to bypass currency controls.
- Despite the scientific community's obsession with DNA, KarikĂł focused on mRNA, believing its temporary nature was a therapeutic strength rather than a weakness.
- The National Institutes of Health and other major bodies repeatedly rejected KarikĂł's grant applications, labeling her mRNA research as too risky.
When the center lost its state funding, she sold her car for nine hundred British pounds and sewed the cash into her daughterâs teddy bear to elude Hungarian currency-control laws.
statism of recent decades, embracing the legitimacy of a large, complex
welfare and regulatory state, and recognizing the vital role played by the
nationâs public servants (not just the police and military). On the left, it
means reconsidering the decentralized, legalistic model of governance that
has guided progressive-led state expansion since the 1960s, reducing the
veto power that activist groups exercise in the courts, and shifting the focus
93of policy design from ensuring that power is subject to progressive checks
to ensuring that power can actually be exercised effectively.58
Liberals have chosen to trust elected politicians and government workers less and
trust regulatory and judicial processes more to ensure that government delivers.
That may have made sense in a past era, but given the problems we face now, it is a
mistake. Whether government is bigger or smaller is the wrong question. What it
needs to be is better. It needs to justify itself not through the rules it follows but
through the outcomes it delivers.
944
Invent
KATALIN KARIKĂ WAS BORN IN a small village in the Northern Great Plain of
Hungary. Her home, built of clay and straw, had no running water. It drew heat
from a sheet metal stove that burned leftover sawdust from a local toy store.1 Her
first science lesson as a child did not come from a classroom but rather from the
small garden next to the house. One year, an infestation of Leptinotarsa
decemlineata, or what Americans call Colorado potato beetle, blighted her
familyâs crop of potatoes. On her hands and knees, she plucked the black-and-
white bugs, one by one, from the tubers and scraped off the smear of their pink
eggs to preserve the crop. The work was âtedious and sometimes gross,â she wrote
years later;2 no fun for a kid, perhaps, but fitting practice for a career in medicine.
As a young woman, KarikĂł became a scientist at the Biological Research
Centre in Szeged, near Hungaryâs southern border.3 When the center lost its state
funding, she sold her car for nine hundred British pounds and sewed the cash into
her daughterâs teddy bear to elude Hungarian currency-control laws. She moved
to Pennsylvania with her family. For the first few years in America, KarikĂł was an
academic tumbleweed. She bounced around several university labs before she was
hired by the University of Pennsylvania.
When KarikĂł arrived at Penn, a great gusher of money was flowing to DNA, as
scientists hoped to directly edit the instruction manual of the human body.4
KarikĂł developed a different interest: messenger ribonucleic acid, or mRNA. If
DNA was the king of the biotech landscape, mRNA was a frail courier: a single-
stranded molecule that ferried information from the nucleus to the part of the cell
that made new proteins. Upon accomplishing this, mRNA disintegrated.
DNA had many technical advantages over mRNA, including its centrality to
the genome. But in KarikĂłâs mind, mRNAâs apparent weakness, its structural
frailty, was a strength. With human-edited mRNA, she thought, scientists could
95
theoretically turn human cells into factories for producing any protein under the
sunâto repair organs, or to fight diseaseâand then, poof, the therapy would
disappear from the body without a trace. âPeople didnât understand why I was so
interested in RNA,â KarikĂł said. âThey didnât see any potential. Nobody saw it
as suitable for making medicine.â5
At the University of Pennsylvania, KarikĂł submitted dozens of grants,
including to the National Institutes of Health, the largest and most important
scientific body in the USâand, by extension, in the world. For two years, she
submitted a new grant application almost every month. The rejections were
relentless. âEvery night I was working: grant, grant, grant,â she said. âAnd it came
back always no, no, no.â6 Sometimes the NIH told her that her work was too
risky. Sometimes they said she didnât have enough data to prove that her
The mRNA Miracle
- Katalin KarikĂł faced years of professional failure, including grant rejections and a demotion at the University of Pennsylvania, while pursuing mRNA research.
- Despite the lack of institutional support, KarikĂł remained motivated by a scientific curiosity and the belief that experiments themselves never err.
- The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the limitations of behavioral interventions like lockdowns and masking, which varied wildly in implementation and efficacy.
- The global crisis necessitated a medical solution that could provide immunity at scale, leading to the rapid development of mRNA vaccines.
- The eventual success of Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines validated KarikĂł's once-rejected theories and saved an estimated 10 to 20 million lives.
Rejected, ignored, and unfunded, her work seemed destined to wither away in that great invisible graveyard of ideas that die a silent death.
experiments would work. Other times, her grants scored so poorly that she
received no feedback at all.
Throughout these years of failure and disappointment, KarikĂł stayed
motivated. She loved science: the painstaking discovery of the new, the long and
winding road out of ignorance. On her wall hung a Leonardo da Vinci quote that
offered inspiration during the dark years when the rejections piled one on top of
another: Experiments never err, only your expectations do.7 âI was a scientist
through and through,â she writes in her memoir. âI wanted more than anything
else to understand how the world works.â8
But after five years of relentless rejection, KarikĂł hadnât brought in any federal
grants, which are the lifeblood of American science. The NIH and other funding
agencies rejected her work so many times she lost count. Penn demoted her to
âsenior research investigator.â The position was so powerless that it seemed
practically made-up, as she didnât know anybody at the university with the same
title. By the mid-1990s, Katalin KarikĂłâs future as a scientistâand the future of
mRNA science itselfâhad hit a dead end. Rejected, ignored, and unfunded, her
work seemed destined to wither away in that great invisible graveyard of ideas that
die a silent death, thrilling their creator and then petering out into oblivion.
In 2020, decades after KarikĂłâs demotion, a novel coronavirus pandemic was
rampaging around the world. With frantic desperation, countries experimented
with a variety of policies to contain it. Some ideas worked in some places. Few
ideas worked everywhere. Italy implemented a strict national lockdown, while
96Sweden allowed many businesses to stay open. In the US, the response was
scattershot. Pennsylvaniaâs state rules permitted indoor dining in the summer,
while in Philadelphia, a November city ordinance made it illegal for neighbors to
sip beer on a porch.9
A year into the pandemic, researchers were still debating the most elemental
questions, such as: Do masking rules even work? In 2021, a group of scientists
from Yale, Stanford, and other august institutions published the final results of a
randomized study of masking, which included data from roughly 350,000 people
in 600 villages in Bangladesh.10 The researchers concluded that villages
randomized to receive surgical masks saw less symptomatic infection. But two
years later, the coauthor of a large analysis of global masking research concluded
that âthere is just no evidence that [masks] make any difference, full stop.â11 To
bring the pandemic to heel, the world needed something more universally
applicable than a rule, or a law, or a border control policy. We needed a global fix:
a medicine that would achieve immunity protection at scale.
What happened next is a kind of miracle. Before 2020, no vaccine in American
history had ever gone from the lab to the public in less than three years.12 The
COVID vaccines achieved this feat in about ten months. In December, the US
Food and Drug Administration issued an emergency authorization for two
COVID therapies based on mRNA technologyâthe very same idea that the
science establishment rejected when Katalin KarikĂł had suggested it, decades
earlier.13 The first vaccine came from Pfizer, working with the German firm
BioNTech. The second came from Moderna, a biotech start-up based in the US.
Unlike most behavioral interventions, the vaccines were immediately and
obviously effective at reducing mortality for adults in every age cohort and in
every country. Every study testified to their effectiveness at reducing severe illness,
especially for the elderly. In the US, one year after the vaccines were first granted
authorization, unvaccinated seniors were dying at more than ten times the rate of
vaccinated seniors.14 In Britain, an analysis by Imperial College London
estimated that between 10 million and 20 million lives were saved worldwide by
The Politics of Invention
- The COVID-19 pandemic demonstrated that some global challenges cannot be solved through regulation or subsidies alone, but require the invention of entirely new technologies.
- Human progress is fundamentally driven by technology rather than biology, as evidenced by the radical transformation of daily life and medicine over just three modern lifetimes.
- Modern liberal politics and social safety nets like Medicare rely on technologies that were invented within the last sixty years, making invention the bedrock of progressive goals.
- A shift in focus toward the mere distribution of existing resources, rather than the creation of new ones, risks turning politics into a zero-sum 'smash-and-grab' war over scarcity.
- Future progress in climate change and healthcare depends on breakthroughs that do not yet exist at scale, such as carbon removal machines and treatments for complex diseases like Alzheimer's.
Without that possibility, progressive politics is dead. Politics itself becomes a mere smash-and-grab war over scarce goods, where one manâs win implies another manâs loss.
the shots in the first year of the vaccination program.15
In our first chapters, we recounted the many ways that America has gotten in
the way of building what we need to flourish in the twenty-first century, from
homes to clean energy. But the pandemic was a different kind of challenge. Here
was a problem we couldnât regulate, or subsidize, or merely build our way out of.
No number of masks for shoppers or plastic dividers in restaurants could do what
97the vaccines did. The end of the health emergency required the summoning into
existence of something fully new. To defeat COVID, it wasnât possible to build
our way out of the problem.
We had to invent our way out.
The Politics of Invention
Inventionâthe act of solving problems by bringing new products, systems, and
ideas into existenceâis the basis of human progress. Consider a thought
experiment. The average lifespan of an American today is about eighty years. The
world of 2025 is therefore just three modern lifetimes away from the world of
1785âthree eighty-year-olds holding hands across time. To travel back three
lifetimes to the 1780s is to enter a world without a car, toilet paper, or large-scale
production of soap. In the realm of food, it is a world before can openers,
pasteurization, or modern refrigeration. In medicine, it is a world without
antibiotics, anesthesia, or a single vaccine. What principally distinguishes the past
from the present is not biology, nor psychology, but rather technology. If the
world has changed, itâs because we have changed the world.
Modern liberal politics is made possible by invention. Almost every product or
service that liberals seek to make universal today depends on technology that did
not exist three lifetimes agoâor, in some cases, half a lifetime ago. Medicare and
Medicaid guarantee the elderly and poor access to modern hospitals, where many
essential technologiesâsuch as plastic IV bags, MRI and CT scan machines, and
pulse oximetersâare inventions of the last sixty years. It is tempting to say that,
with these essentials already in existence, it is time for society to focus at last only
on the fair distribution of existing resources rather than the creation of new ideas.
But this would be worse than a failure of imagination; it would be a kind of
generational theft. When we claim the world cannot improve, we are stealing
from the future something invaluable, which is the possibility of progress.
Without that possibility, progressive politics is dead. Politics itself becomes a mere
smash-and-grab war over scarce goods, where one manâs win implies another
manâs loss.
The world is filled with problems we cannot solve without more invention. In
the fight against climate change, the clean energy revolution will require building
out the renewable energy that we have already developed. But decarbonization
will also require technology that doesnât exist yet at scale: clean jet fuel, less
98carbon-intensive ways to manufacture cement, and machines to remove millions
of tons of carbon from the atmosphere.
In health care, the last few centuries of invention have turned a death planetâ
where disease ran rampant and, before 1850, one in two babies perished before
their sixteenth birthdayâinto a world where people can look forward to
generation-over-generation increases in life expectancy. But there are still so many
mysteries that require fresh breakthroughs. Weâve made disappointingly little
progress with many cancers. Complex diseases like Alzheimerâs and schizophrenia
elude treatment or even basic comprehension. The cellular process of aging is a
deep mystery. We still donât have effective vaccines for adult tuberculosis or
hepatitis C, or vaccine platforms that we can immediately scale up in the event of
a new pandemic. Decades from now, our children may gawk in horror that people
with chronic pain or lingering illness in the early twenty-first century couldnât
The Politics of Invention
- Future technologies like self-driving cars and robotic labor may seem outlandish today but are as plausible as the rapid success of mRNA vaccines.
- American political discourse focuses heavily on the distribution of existing healthcare rather than the invention of new treatments that could eliminate disease.
- Progressives often overlook how technological breakthroughs expand the actual value and efficacy of universalist social policies.
- Conservatives and libertarians frequently underestimate the critical role of government funding and public will in fostering private-sector innovation.
- Historical data shows that government-funded R&D has been responsible for a quarter of all U.S. productivity growth since World War II.
- There is a significant communication gap between the scientific community and lawmakers regarding the necessity of prioritizing science policy.
If disease is a universe of mysteries, we have scarcely explored one minor solar system of its cosmos.
take a simple all-purpose saliva or blood test to answer the basic question Why do
I feel sick? If disease is a universe of mysteries, we have scarcely explored one minor
solar system of its cosmos.
Inventions that may seem outlandish today may soon feel essential to our lives.
Streets filled with electric self-driving cars that give us mobility without emissions
and free us from the vast number of deaths caused by faulty human reflexes or
judgment. Gigantic desalination facilities that transform our oceans into
drinkable tap water. An economy with robots that build our houses and
machines that take on our most dangerous and soul-draining work. Wearable
devices to scan our bodies for diseases. Vaccines that we can rub on our skin rather
than inject at the end of a needle. As unrealistic, or even ludicrous, as some of
these ideas might seem, they are not much more ludicrous than a rejected,
ignored, and unfunded mRNA theory that came out of nowhere to save millions
of lives in a pandemic. To make these things possible and useful in our lifetime
requires a political movement that takes invention more seriously.16
So, where is that movement? Invention rarely plays a central role in American
politics. In health care, for example, Democrats have spent decades fighting for
universal insurance, while Republicans have consistently fought its expansion.
But while the dominant fight in Washington is typically about how we buy health
care, we rarely talk about the health care that exists to be bought. After all, in the
future, progressives donât just want everyone to have an insurance card; they want
that card to provide access to a world of treatments that liberates patients from
unnecessary disease and debilitating pain. Technology expands the value of
universalist policies.
99If progressives underrate the centrality of invention in their politics,
conservatives often underrate the necessity of government policy in invention.
âThe government has outlawed technology,â the investor and entrepreneur Peter
Thiel said in a debate with Google CEO Eric Schmidt in 2014, echoing a popular
view among techno-optimists and libertarians that government laws mostly block
innovation. But many of Silicon Valleyâs most important achievements have relied
on government largesse. Elon Musk is now a vociferous critic of progressive
policy. But he has also been a beneficiary of it. In 2010, when Tesla needed cash to
launch its first family-friendly sedan, the Model S, the company received a $465
million loan from the Obama administration Department of Energy.17 His
rocket-launching company, SpaceX, has received billions of dollars from NASA
under Democratic and Republican administrations. Musk has become a lightning
rod in debates over whether technological progress comes from public policy or
private ingenuity. But he is a walking advertisement for what public will and
private genius can unlock when they work together.
Beyond merely regulating technology, the state is often a key actor in its
creation. An American who microwaves food for breakfast before using a
smartphone to order a car to take them to the airport is engaging with a sequence
of technologies and systemsâthe microwave, the smartphone, the highway, the
modern jetlinerâin which government policies played a starring role in their
invention or development. Federal science spending is so fundamental to the
overall economy that a 2023 study found that government-funded research and
development have been responsible for 25 percent of productivity growth in the
US since the end of World War II.18 âThere is widespread agreement that
scientific research and invention are the key driver of economic growth and
improvements in human well-being,â the Dartmouth economist Heidi Williams
said. âBut I think researchers do a poor job of communicating its importance to
lawmakers, and lawmakers do a poor job of making science policy a major
focus.â19
The Xerox Machine Encounter
- A chance meeting at a photocopier between Katalin KarikĂł and Drew Weissman combined expertise in RNA and immunology to pioneer synthetic mRNA therapy.
- Despite the potential to teach the body to fight viruses, the duo faced years of rejection from the NIH and the scientific establishment.
- Their major breakthrough in the early 2000s solved the problem of mRNA-induced inflammation, yet it was initially ignored by major journals like Nature.
- The lack of academic interest and funding eventually led to KarikĂł being forced out of her position at the University of Pennsylvania in 2013.
- While academia remained skeptical, the private sector recognized the value of their work, leading to the formation of companies like Moderna and BioNTech.
But they might have never existed if it werenât for KarikĂłâs force of willâand the cosmic luck of an extremely well-placed Xerox machine.
The pandemic proved the necessity of invention yet again. The mRNA
COVID vaccines saved millions of lives and spared the US more than $1 trillion
in medical costs.20 But they might have never existed if it werenât for KarikĂłâs
force of willâand the cosmic luck of an extremely well-placed Xerox machine.
100A Shot to Save the W orld
One day in the fall of 1997, after her demotion at the University of Pennsylvania,
Katalin KarikĂł left her small office in the building for neurosurgery to make
photocopies of several articles from science journals. The nearest large Xerox
machine was in a different hall, inside Robert Wood Johnson Pavilion, which
housed the biomedical library.21 Waiting to use the photocopier, she struck up a
conversation with an immunologist named Drew Weissman.22 KarikĂł told him
about her interest in mRNA as a therapy. Weissman told her he was working on
an elusive HIV vaccine. Their brief interaction sparked an idea. What if synthetic
mRNA, with its power to teach the body to make specific proteins, could trigger
an immune response that fought off a virus like HIV?
When they teamed up, their partnership felt like kismet. âEach of us had
exactly the knowledge and skills that the other needed,â KarikĂł wrote.23 âI was an
RNA scientist who didnât know much about immunology. He was an
immunologist without RNA experience.â
But progress was painfully slow, and the NIH rejected practically all of their
grant applications. âPeople were not interested in mRNA,â Weissman said. âThe
people who reviewed the grants said, âmRNA will not be a good therapeutic, so
donât bother.âââ24 They cobbled together funds from other projects. Weissman
had federal grant money coming in for his research on HIV, which he pulled over
into the mRNA project. Meanwhile, KarikĂł made do with bits of funding that
had been awarded to her Penn colleagues. For years, the science wasnât going
much better than the fundraising. In their first experiments, mRNA injections in
mice caused terrible inflammation.
After several years of trial and error, they finally broke through in the early
2000s, by creating an mRNA therapy that could enter the cell without sending
the immune system into a frenzy. âI was absolutely elated,â KarikĂł wrote.25 But
the scientific community largely ignored their discovery. When they submitted
their findings to the leading science journal Nature, the editors rejected the paper
entirely. The specialty journal Immunity agreed to publish it in 2005 only after
extensive edits. The night before the paper came out, Weissman told KarikĂł that
âstarting tomorrow, your phone is going to ring off the hook.â26 He was wrong.
In the years following publication, KarikĂł received only two speaking invitations.
âOur breakthrough had apparently failed to break through,â she wrote. Rather
than make KarikĂł a science rock star, the tepid response to her mRNA discovery
101made her a target for firing. In 2013, when it was clear that she wasnât bringing in
enough outside funds to justify a tenured faculty position, she left academia for
good. âI was kicked out, forced to retire,â she said.27
If mRNA was failing to impress the scientific establishment, its reception in
the private sector was a different story. In the US, KarikĂł and Weissmanâs work
caught the attention of a brash group of postdoctoral researchers, professors, and
venture capitalists. They had started a company whose name smushed the words
modiďŹed and RNA: Moderna. In Germany, Ugur Sahin and Ăzlem TĂźreci, a
married couple with backgrounds in immunotherapy research, also saw huge
potential in KarikĂł and Weissmanâs work. They founded several companies,
including one to research mRNA-based treatments for cancer: BioNTech. In
2013, they made KarikĂł a vice president. âThere was a lot of skepticism in the
industry when we started, because this was a new technology with no approved
products,â TĂźreci said. âDrug development is highly regulated, so people donât
The KarikĂł Problem
- The rapid development of mRNA vaccines for COVID-19 was made possible by years of private and philanthropic investment in technology that government institutions initially ignored.
- The mRNA platform functions by instructing human cells to produce viral spike proteins, allowing the immune system to recognize and neutralize the actual virus with military precision.
- Despite the eventual Nobel Prize-winning success of mRNA, its pioneers like Katalin KarikĂł faced decades of grant rejections and a lack of federal funding.
- American scientific institutions have become increasingly risk-averse, favoring established players who know how to navigate the system over those with bold, unproven ideas.
- While the scale of academia and the availability of data have grown exponentially, the actual rate of breakthrough innovation is hindered by 'creaky' institutional processes.
It turned out that mRNA offered the perfect key to pick the lock of the virus that caused COVID.
like to deviate from paths with which they have experience.â BioNTech and
Moderna pressed on for years without approved products, thanks to the support
of investors and philanthropy groups, such as the Bill & Melinda Gates
Foundation.
By the time the coronavirus outbreak shut down the city of Wuhan in China,
Moderna and BioNTech had spent years fine-tuning their technology, which
explains how they solved the mystery of SARS-CoV-2 with such speed. It turned
out that mRNA offered the perfect key to pick the lock of the virus that caused
COVID. Coronaviruses are named after a crown, or âcorona,â of proteins that
surrounds the virus particle, like spikes around a ball. Synthetic mRNA therapies
send detailed instructions to a personâs cells to make duplicates of the distinctive
âspike protein,â which the immune system trains itself to attack. Later, if the
same person confronts the full-blown virus, the body recognizes the spike protein
again and blitzes it with the precision of a well-trained military, reducing the risk
of severe illness.28
With COVID, the science of mRNA proved its value almost immediately. On
January 11, 2020, Chinese researchers published the genetic sequence of the
virus. Within forty-eight hours, Modernaâs mRNA vaccine recipe was finalized.
By late February, batches of the vaccine had been shipped to Bethesda, Maryland,
for clinical trials. By December, it was approvedâthe fastest vaccine development
in history. Today, several billion mRNA vaccines have been shipped.29 In 2023,
Katalin KarikĂł and Drew Weissman, who struggled for years to get a dollar of
102funding from the NIH, won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for a
technology that saved millions of lives.
The mRNA vaccines were a triumphâfor KarikĂł and Weissman, for Pfizer
and Moderna, for all of us. But they are also clearly a cautionary tale for American
science. KarikĂł said she ânever got a dimeâ from the US government to directly
support her mRNA projects in her years at Penn.30 âEven now, I am working on
therapies that were part of grant applications that were rejected twenty years ago,â
she said.31
KarikĂł is not the only scientist to hear âno, no, noâ from funding institutions
like the NIH on her path to international renown. When he won the Nobel Prize
in Physiology or Medicine in 2013, James Rothman told an interviewer that he
was grateful to have started work in the 1970s, back when the federal government
âwas willing to take much bigger risksâ on young scientists. âI had five years of
failure, really, before I had the first initial sign of success,â Rothman said. âIâd like
to think that that kind of support existed today, but I think thereâs less of it.â32
At the highest levels, American science has become biased against the very
thing that drives its progress: the art of taking bold risks. âWe have a problem of
creaky institutions getting in the way of inventing,â the MIT economist Pierre
Azoulay said. âItâs not so different from housing or clean energy. American
science has accumulated a set of processes and norms that favor those who know
how to play the system, rather than those who have the most interesting ideas.â33
In short, Americaâand American scienceâhas a KarikĂł Problem.
The KarikĂł Problem and the Great Science Slowdown
By some measures, the business of academia in America has never been bigger. In
the 1930s, there were just 80,000 professors across all US universities;34 today
there are more than 1.5 million.35 The search for knowledge has never been easier.
We have more information about our genes, our proteins, and our cells, along
with tools to make it easier to search, copy, paste, and organize the data and to run
statistical analyses. It is easier than ever to collaborate across large distances on the
internet. Surely it seems like, if we value science, our society has done everything
right.
And to be sure, the landscape of inventions sparkles with bright spots. The last
The Burden of Knowledge
- Despite rapid advancements in AI and gene therapy, basic science productivity is declining across multiple fields.
- Economists have identified a trend where increasing research inputs, such as funding and publications, yield diminishing returns in life expectancy and innovation.
- The 'War on Cancer' illustrates this stagnation, with massive investments often resulting in drugs that only extend life by a few months rather than providing cures.
- The 'burden of knowledge' theory suggests that as a field matures, new experts must spend more time learning existing information before they can innovate.
- Scientific discovery is compared to picking fruit; as the low-hanging fruit is exhausted, researchers must climb higher and use more resources to reach the next breakthrough.
The more low-hanging fruit we pick, the higher in the tree we have to climb to pick fruit, and the more resources we need to do it.
few years have witnessed the remarkable emergence of new gene therapies, drugs
103to thwart diabetes and obesity, and a suite of artificial intelligence toolsâsuch as
ChatGPT from OpenAI and DeepMind from Alphabet, the parent company of
Googleâthat can perform a wide range of complex tasks, from writing essays and
code to predicting the shape of proteins.
But, mysteriously, progress in many fields seems to be slowing down. In April
2020, just as the world was convulsing from the pandemic, a group of economists
from Stanford and MIT published a study with the irresistible title âAre Ideas
Getting Harder to Find?â36 Their answer was an unambiguous yes. From
medicine to agriculture, basic science is becoming less productive. âConsider
whatâs happened in medicine in the twenty-first century,â said Nicholas Bloom, a
Stanford economist and coauthor of the paper. âIn heart-disease research, the
number of journal publications has increased, and the number of clinical trials
has soared, but the quantity of lives saved or extended has slowed significantly. As
a result, itâs taking more and more research to eke out the same extra year of
life.â37
One area where we should expect much more from scientific progress is in the
field of cancer research. In 1971, President Richard Nixon signed the National
Cancer Act, kicking off what became known as the âWar on Cancer.â Three
decades later, Andrew von Eschenbach, the director of the National Cancer
Institute, pledged in 2003 to âeliminate suffering and death due to cancer by
2015.â38 Six years later, President Obama pledged to find âa cure for cancer in our
time.â39 Two presidents later, President Biden reinitiated a âCancer Moonshotâ
to âend cancer as we know it.â40 But our progress on cancer research has been
uneven. While some cancers, such as childhood leukemia, have become much less
fatal, the prognoses for others have proven stubbornly resistant to improvement.
The death rates of some cancers, such as uterine and pancreatic, are still rising,
despite significant investment. Although there are many drugs approved to treat
very sick cancer patients, there are shockingly few drugs approved to prevent
cancer in the first place.41 âEspecially when you consider the scale of spending,
cancer research has been a huge disappointment overall,â said Eric Topol, director
of the Scripps Research Translational Institute. âThere are all these drugs for
treatment that mostly just extend peopleâs lives a few months.â42
How can we possibly account for this puzzle: more scientists, more money,
more years of education, more knowledge, more technology, and more papersâ
but, in many fields, slower progress? In 2008, the Northwestern economist
Benjamin Jones proposed an elegant theory to explain the slowdown across
104science. It starts with two simple observations. First, nobody is born an expert.
Second, total expertise in any given domain of knowledgeâsay, physics or
chemistryâgrows over time, as we unravel the mysteries of the natural world.43
As we build expertise in a field like medicine, itâs a bit like plucking the lowest-
hanging fruit from a tree. The more low-hanging fruit we pick, the higher in the
tree we have to climb to pick fruit, and the more resources we need to do it. Jones
called this escalating challenge âthe burden of knowledge.â
The burden of knowledge isnât just plausible. Itâs practically obvious. To take
one simple example: The first element discovered and recorded by a European
scientist was phosphorus. The story goes that in the mid-1600s, a German
alchemist did a little home experiment, the crux of which involved boiling piss,
evaporating the urine, and heating the remains.44 Out came phosphorus. Almost
any high school chemistry student could replicate this experiment today (please
donât), but they shouldnât expect it to break open any new scientific frontier. The
latest elemental discoveries have been a bit more complicated. Element 117,
The Burden of Knowledge
- Modern scientific discovery requires massive international collaboration and specialized technology, contrasting with the solitary experiments of the past.
- The 'burden of knowledge' means that as science progresses, unsolved problems become increasingly complex and resource-intensive.
- The shift from Gregor Mendel's backyard gardening to genome-wide association studies illustrates the transition from individual genius to institutionalized research.
- Economic growth is tied to basic research, yet government-funded R&D as a share of the economy has declined over the last sixty years.
- Immigrants are a disproportionate driver of American innovation, accounting for a significant percentage of patents, Nobel Prizes, and billion-dollar startups.
- The American talent pipeline is currently threatened by immigration backlogs and policy shifts that make it harder for foreign-born students to remain in the country.
It is absurd to imagine that one person, even as brilliant as Gregor Mendel, could do all this alone in his backyard.
tennessine, was discovered only when a Tennessee laboratory created an isotope of
the rare metal berkelium and sent twenty-two milligrams of the radioactive
material to Russia, where a separate group of scientists at a nuclear research
facility hit it with a beam of 6 trillion calcium ions per second for 150 days and
used specialized equipment to detect the faintest whispers of tennessine flickering
into existence for less than a second.45 While itâs hard to say how the next
synthetic element will be detected, it is safe to assume that it will not be
discovered in a pot of hot urine.
If that example seems a little goofy, try this one. The godfather of genetics was
Gregor Mendel. A Czech friar in the mid-1800s, Mendel grew peas of varying
shape, color, and flower position in his monasteryâs garden. He bred the pea
plants by cross-pollination over generations and noticed that peas seemed to pass
down their traits, producing predictable crossbreeds. Although his 1866
analysis46 was published to little fanfare, a group of botanists later rediscovered
Mendelâs work, independently confirmed the principles of inheritance, and
cracked open the field of genetics.
One hundred and sixty years later, genetics is a mature scientific domain
whose breakthroughs are a bit more complicated than careful gardening. For
example, we havenât yet figured out how a complex disease like schizophrenia
arises from the interplay between multiple genes and the environment. When an
organization like the Broad Institute in Cambridge, Massachusetts, wanted to
105
investigate the genetic building blocks of schizophrenia, scientists sequenced the
genomes of thousands of people around the world, looking for commonalities
among those who share the disease. Such researchâcalled genome-wide
association studiesâtakes hundreds of geneticists, neuroscientists, computer
programmers, assistants, and more working together in organized teams over
many years to get us one small step closer to solving the riddle of schizophrenia. It
is absurd to imagine that one person, even as brilliant as Gregor Mendel, could do
all this alone in his backyard.
That is Jonesâs point in a nutshell. Scientific progress is a blessing that comes
with a curse. The unsolved problems are typically harder than the solved ones.
If keeping up the pace of scientific progress demands more resources, it points to
a clear solution: recruit more scientists and spend more money. These arenât bad
ideas; they might be great ones. âAs a share of the economy, government-funded
R&D has declined in the last sixty years,â the economist Heidi Williams said.47 If
scientific spending is fundamental to economic growth, this suggests that the US
has hugely underinvested in basic research.
Meanwhile, recruiting brilliant immigrants to the US has for decades been the
âsecret ingredientâ to Americaâs success in science and technology, according to
Jeremy Neufeld, a fellow at the Institute for Progress. âSome of the greatest
achievements in US history, including the Manhattan Project and the Apollo
program, are impossible to imagine without the contribution of people who were
born abroad,â he said.48 Despite making up only about 14 percent of the US
population, immigrants accounted for 23 percent of US patents from 1990 to
2016, 38 percent of US Nobel Prizes in chemistry, medicine, and physics from
2000 to 2023, and more than half of the billion-dollar US start-ups in the last
twenty years.49
Today, however, this talent pipeline is at risk. As immigration politics has been
subsumed by debates about border control policies, the US has quietly made it
harder for the typical foreign-born student to stay. America has allowed wait
times for green cards to lengthen, while the number of applicants stuck in
immigration backlogs has gotten so large that some talented immigrants have
stopped waiting and moved away. Since 2007, the share of international students
The KarikĂł Problem
- Artificial caps on H-1B visas force high-skilled foreign graduates to leave the US, potentially stifling future breakthroughs like mRNA technology.
- The 'KarikĂł Problem' describes a systemic bias in American science funding against young researchers and high-risk, high-reward ideas.
- The demographic of funded scientists is aging rapidly, with the share of NIH-funded researchers under 35 dropping from 22 percent to less than 2 percent.
- Scientific output is becoming less disruptive over time as researchers feel pressured to pursue 'safe' ideas to maintain peer standing.
- Sociologists argue that diminishing returns in medicine are caused by the organization of science rather than a lack of discoverable 'low-hanging fruit.'
- Simply increasing funding without structural reform may exacerbate existing flaws in the scientific ecosystem.
The problem is that too many scientists are all looking at the same few trees.
on academic visas applying to stay and work in the US has declined by more than
a third.50
106Neufeld singled out one policy for criticism: the H-1B visa, which is Americaâs
primary visa for high-skilled foreign workers. In 1990, the US capped the number
of annual H-1B visas at 65,000.51 The figure was eventually raised to 85,000 in
the early 2000s. But in twenty years of immigration fights, it still hasnât increased
to match the growth of the population or the urgent need for scientists,
engineers, and researchers. This artificial scarcity means many promising foreign
students and researchers are forced to leave the US after completing their studies,
taking their skills and innovative potential elsewhere. If Katalin KarikĂł, who
moved to the US in 1985, had tried to immigrate just a few years later, the
creation of the H-1B visa cap might have prevented her moveâand, perhaps,
catastrophically delayed the emergence of mRNA research. Strengthening and
expanding Americaâs high-skilled immigration program would be a good way to
pull the KarikĂłs of the future into the U.S., where they could cook up the next
life-saving breakthrough. Doubling the H-1B visa cap, especially while raising the
average wage for visa holders, could be transformative for American science and
technology,52 Neufeld said. âWeâd have more, and more meaningful, inventions,
which would increase productivity, and make the US as a whole richer.â53
More money and more scientists might help the US fight the knowledge
burden. But it doesnât solve what weâve called the KarikĂł Problem. In fact, in the
same way that throwing housing vouchers into a market with insufficient supply
raises home prices, throwing more money into a flawed science system might
exacerbate its problems.
Letâs define the KarikĂł Problem like this: American science funding has
become biased against young scientists and risky ideas. What is most obvious is
that American science is getting older. In the early 1900s, some of the most
famous scientistsâEinstein, Heisenberg, SchrĂśdingerâdid their breakthrough
work in their twenties and thirties. Indeed, their youth may have been critical to
their paradigm-busting genius. But these days the twentysomething scientist is an
endangered species. The share of NIH-funded scientists who are thirty-five years
old or younger declined from 22 percent in 1980 to less than 2 percent by the
2010s.54
American science also seems to produce far too many papers that donât create
new knowledge while overlooking researchers with promising new ideas. A 2023
study titled âPapers and Patents Are Becoming Less Disruptive Over Timeâ
found that any given paper today is much less likely to become influential than a
paper from the same field decades ago.55 This could be because too many papers
107are essentially worthless. Or it could mean that scientists feel pressured to herd
around the same few safe ideas that will keep them in good standing with their
peers.
âWhen you look at the diminishing returns in medicine, you can say, well,
maybe all the easy drugs have been discovered,â said James Evans, a sociologist at
the University of Chicago. But the more compelling possibility, he said, is that
âthe very organization of modern science is leading us astray.â In Evansâs
interpretation, the low-hanging fruit hasnât been plucked. The problem is that
too many scientists are all looking at the same few trees. âI think there are all kinds
of weird trees in the forest that we havenât found, because everybodyâs looking in
the same place, and weâre not making enough high-risk, high-reward bets,â Evans
said. âThat has nothing to do with the knowledge burden. Thatâs all about the
organization of American science. Itâs about our policies, our laws, and our
rules.â56
The idea that the NIH has become deeply biased against risky and novel
researchâand too fixated on funding only those projects that are practically
The Evolution of American Innovation
- The modern scientific funding system is criticized for a pervasive 'risk aversion' that favors guaranteed results over bold exploration.
- A satirical essay in Genome Biology highlights how grant reviewers often demand preliminary data that makes discovery redundant.
- Despite its current flaws, the NIH has historically funded monumental breakthroughs including HIV testing and the Human Genome Project.
- Before the 20th century, innovation was driven by solo tinkerers and individual entrepreneurs rather than government institutions.
- Thomas Edison pioneered the corporate research lab model, which shifted invention from solitary work to professionalized team experimentation.
- The federal government's dominant role in science only emerged as a response to the technological pressures of World War II.
âBut it canât fail, now, can it? Besides, youâve sailed to Portugal before, so the Study Section would know you can do it.â
guaranteed to succeedâis so widespread that it has become âthe biggest clichĂŠ in
science,â said Azoulay, the MIT economist.57 In 2012, Gregory Petsko, a
biochemist and member of the National Academy of Sciences, published a
satirical essay in which King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain mock
Christopher Columbus for not collecting preliminary data about the voyage
across the Atlantic. When King Ferdinand suggests that the explorer try a shorter
tripâsay, to PortugalâColumbus exclaims, âEverybody knows that Portugal is
immediately west of Spain.⌠What will you learn from that?â âNot much, if
anything,â Queen Isabella responds. âBut it canât fail, now, can it? Besides, youâve
sailed to Portugal before, so the Study Section would know you can do it.â58 This
satire didnât appear in a personal blog. It ran in Genome Biology, one of the most
prestigious journals in the field of genetics.
For all its flaws, the NIH has been central to some of the most important
scientific discoveries in history. In the 1960s, when scientists developed the first
effective treatment of childhood leukemia, they used NIH funding. In the 1980s,
when researchers identified the first cancer-causing gene and developed the first
HIV blood test, they did it with NIH funding. In the 2000s, when the Human
Genome Project cracked open a new frontier in genetic research, the NIH was its
leading bankroller. From the human brain to the immune system to the genetic
108basis of disease, almost every bountiful field of bioscience has been irrigated by
the National Institutes of Health.
To understand how a system designed to encourage risk-taking in science
ironically became captured by risk aversion, we have to tell the story of the birth
of the American innovation system and the creation of the modern NIH itself.
The Growth of the American Innovation System
Before the twentieth century, science and invention had largely been a job for solo
entrepreneurs. The cotton gin and the telegraph, icons of eighteenth-and
nineteenth-century ingenuity, were made by individual tinkerers who, through
trial and error, cobbled their way toward a product thatâinitially, barelyâ
worked.
In the late 1800s and early 1900s, Thomas Edison proved a new model: the
corporate research lab. Inside the two-story shed he built in Menlo Park, New
Jersey, Edison oversaw a team of âmuckersââhis term for professional
experimentersâwho fleshed out his sketches and helped him invent, among
other things, the incandescent lightbulb and the first instruments for recording
sound and video. Edisonâs team-based success became too obvious to ignore, and
other companies copied him, with magical results. In the 1930s, DuPontâs
Experimental Station developed synthetic rubber, nylon, and Kevlar. Meanwhile,
the university scientists who worked outside these labs mostly relied on funding
from private philanthropies, such as the Rockefeller Foundation.
In all these triumphs, one actor was notably absent: the federal government.
Washington played almost no role in supporting innovation before the 1900s,
outside of a few programs that subsidized research in farming, agriculture, and
defense. But just as World War II reshaped borders and rules around the world, so
too did it reshape the US innovation system.
In June 1940, as the German army invaded and occupied Paris, the eminent
engineer Vannevar Bush delivered grave news to President Franklin D. Roosevelt
in an urgent White House meeting: America was technologically unprepared to
take on the Axis powers.59 Wiry thin with a narrow face and glasses, Bush
dominated several disciplines. A pioneer in early computer research, he published
some of the first predictions of the internet, was the dean of the MIT School of
Engineering, and was the chairman of the National Advisory Committee for
Aeronautics, which was eventually folded into NASA.
109He urged Roosevelt to create a new agency to direct American ingenuity
The Rise of Federal Science
- Vannevar Bush proposed a revolutionary one-page plan to Roosevelt that created the Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD).
- The OSRD's wartime success in developing radar, vaccines, and the Manhattan Project shifted the national consensus toward government-funded innovation.
- Bush's 1945 report, 'Science, the Endless Frontier,' established the concept of 'basic research' as the essential foundation for all practical technology.
- This vision led to the creation of the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the transformation of the NIH from a minor lab into a global biomedical leader.
- The NIH budget has increased 1,000-fold over seventy years, becoming an irreplaceable institution for global health and longevity.
New products and new processes do not appear full-grown. They are founded on new principles and new conceptions, which in turn are painstakingly developed by research in the purest realms of science.
toward the war effort, presenting the president with a brief, one-page proposal for
a new organization, the likes of which had never existed in US history: a
committee to coordinate all the science and technological work that might help
defeat the Nazis, which would be funded by the White House. The memo was
persuasive. Roosevelt approved the creation of an agency that grew to become the
Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD)âa multibillion-dollar
hydra of wartime science and technology operations that supported the work of
thousands of scientists and engineers. OSRDâs early work developing an atomic
weapon eventually became the Manhattan Project, overseen by J. Robert
Oppenheimer. With OSRD funding and guidance, American scientists invented
radar, invested in malaria treatments, developed an early influenza vaccine, and
built the foundations for early computing.
The country emerged from World War II with a new way of thinking about
science and innovation: this is a job for the government. In 1945, Bush drew on the
lessons of the war to draft a blockbuster report on the future of American
innovation titled âScience, the Endless Frontier.â The most important idea that
emerged from the Bush report was the primacy of âbasic researchââa term Bush
meant to refer to science at universities and research centers that seeks to
understand the world âwithout thought of practical ends.â Bush wrote:
Basic research leads to new knowledge. It provides scientific capital. It
creates the fund from which the practical applications of knowledge must
be drawn. New products and new processes do not appear full-grown.
They are founded on new principles and new conceptions, which in turn
are painstakingly developed by research in the purest realms of science.60
It was a dreamyâeven radicalâdepiction of American science. Rather than rely
on private philanthropy, or the closed-door laboratories of corporate behemoths,
Bush saw the future of science as a kind of hub-and-spoke system, with the federal
government directing funds to the most deserving university researchers.
Bushâs vision of a government organization for science funding led to the
creation of the National Science Foundation (NSF) in 1950. As OSRD wound
downâits charter depended on a wartime designationâcontracts for medical
research were transferred to the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
At the time, the NIH was a fairly insignificant agency. It had evolved out of the
Hygienic Laboratory, a meagerly funded facility with no experience coordinating
110
a national research agenda.61 But this quickly changed. Medical schools, eager to
capitalize on a new source of funding, overwhelmed the NIH with new
proposals. Between 1945 and 1960, the NIH budget grew rapidly, as it added
several specialized institutes, such as the National Heart Institute in 1948 and the
National Institute of Mental Health in 1949. By the mid-1950s, the NIH was the
worldâs largest biomedical research organization. In the last seventy years, its
budget has increased 1,000-fold.62
Today NIH, along with the NSF, are irreplaceable. If these institutions had
never been created or expanded, the lives of millions, even billions of people
around the world would be shorter than they are today, and people would be
sicker. If they disappeared tomorrow, the world would instantly be worse.63
The Rise of Scientific Bureaucracy
- The NIH's dominance in bioscience necessitates a critical look at how its administrative structure shapes global scientific practice.
- Early NIH leaders like Cassius Van Slyke and James Shannon warned that excessive reporting and narrow project definitions would eventually stifle actual research.
- Political pressure from figures like Lawrence Fountain and William Proxmire forced the NIH to prioritize rigid financial accounting over scientific flexibility.
- The 'Golden Fleece Awards' and similar political stunts created a culture of risk aversion and administrative bloat within federal funding agencies.
- Modern scientists now spend approximately 40 percent of their time on paperwork and grant applications rather than conducting experiments.
- The current system mirrors the regulatory paralysis seen in housing and energy, where democratic accountability has inadvertently 'gunked up' the process of progress.
The instinct to make science democratically responsible has gunked up the scientific process.
But it is precisely because the NIH stands above every bioscience institution in
significance that we should scrutinize the way it shapes the practice of science in
America and around the world.
There are several popular complaints about the way the NIH has developed over
the last few decades. The first problem that emerged with the rise of the NIH
echoes the criticism from our chapters on housing, energy, and the difficulty of
building things in America: rules have increased, while efficiency has decreased.
Immediately after World War II, NIH leaders foresaw that the rising tide of
bureaucracy could drown the work of science. In 1946, Cassius Van Slyke, who
would soon become deputy director of the NIH,64 warned in the journal Science
that he did not want the work of writing research grants to eclipse the work of
actually doing science. âIt is not desired that the preparation of these reports
present any long, tedious burden,â65 he wrote. Ten years later, James Shannon,66
himself then one year into the job of NIH director, coauthored an article in
Science with another ominous warning for his field:
The research-project approach can be pernicious if it is administered so
that it produces certain specific end products, or if it provides short periods
of support without assuring continuity, or if it applies overt or indirect
pressure on the investigator to shift his interests to narrowly defined work
set by the source of money, or if it imposes financial and scientific
accounting in unreasonable detail.67
111If we are living in the world that Bush built, we are also living in the world that
Shannon feared. As science funding became more entrenched inside the federal
government, politicians did what they do best. They created paperwork. In the
early 1960s, Congressman Lawrence Fountain, a Democrat from North Carolina,
published two reports complaining that the NIH did a lousy job accounting for
the money it sent to scientists. He convinced Congress to take the unusual step of
cutting the agencyâs funding.68 A decade later, Senator William Proxmire, a
Wisconsin Democrat, created the Golden Fleece Award to draw negative
attention to the worst use of government money in science. The first two Golden
Fleece Awards went to studies about human attraction and why mammals clench
their jaws when stressed. Proxmire called on government science funding to âget
out of the love racketâ and declared that these projects âmade a monkey out of
the American taxpayer.â69
The NIH got the message. Requirements for paperwork surged. âAll of a
sudden,â one NIH administrator wrote at the time, âa whole series of âthou
shaltsâ and âthou shalt notsâ were written down.â70 One 1960s Science editorialâ
the headline: âMore Paper Work, Less Researchââcomplained that turning
scientists into clerks would âcost the nation millions of dollars in lost time from
research.â71 It was a move reminiscent of blue states creating so many rules
around permitting and environmental regulations that it became impossible to
build necessary housing and energy. The instinct to make science democratically
responsible has gunked up the scientific process.
To appreciate the explosion of scientific paperwork requirements, imagine if
every scientist working in America contracted a chronic fatigue disorder that
made it impossible for them to work for half of the year. We would consider this
to be a national tragedy and an emergency. But this make-believe disorder is not
so dissimilar to the burden we place on scientists today when it comes to
paperwork. Todayâs scientists spend up to 40 percent of their time working on
filling out research grants and follow-up administrative documents, rather than
on direct research.72 Funding agencies sometimes take seven months or longer to
review an application or request a resubmission.73
âFolks need to understand how broken the system is,â said John Doench, the
The Crisis of Scientific Grantsmanship
- Excessive administrative bureaucracy forces elite researchers to spend their time on meaningless paperwork and modular budgets rather than scientific discovery.
- The current funding model prioritizes 'grantsmanship'âthe ability to market oneself and navigate political hierarchiesâover actual scientific potential.
- Katalin KarikĂłâs career illustrates how the academic system marginalizes brilliant scientists who lack the interpersonal savvy to 'kiss butts' or schmooze.
- The NIH's peer-review system is criticized for being inherently biased against high-risk, high-reward research in favor of safe, incremental projects.
- A lack of transparent data makes it difficult to determine how many transformative scientists are currently being suppressed by the existing funding structure.
We haveâeven if by accidentâdesigned a system that often privileges the game of performing the act of science over the actual practice of science.
director of research and development in functional genomics at the Broad
Institute.74 âSo many really, really intelligent people are wasting their time doing
really, really uninteresting things: writing progress reports, or coming up with
modular budgets five years in advance of the science, as if those numbers have any
112meaning. Universities have whole floors whose main job is to administer these
NIH grants. Why are we doing this? Because theyâre afraid that Iâm going to buy
a Corvette with the grant money?â75 The rules exist for a reason, Doench
acknowledged. Some scientists in the past probably abused their funding. But just
as environmental laws passed in response to twentieth-century problems created a
crisis of building in the twenty-first century, the paperwork cure in science is
sometimes worse than the disease. âWe are very much in danger of falling behind
because we are so bloatedly inefficient,â Doench said. âItâs the same truth about
how it takes forever to build a mile of subway in New York City. The cracks are
emerging, and we are going to lose our edge if our best and brightest people are
spending their lives filling out forms rather than focusing on the next great
thing.â
The second problem coming out of the growth of the NIH is that the onerous
process of applying for grants has put a premium on status-seeking rather than
pure science. This was a theme of Katalin KarikĂłâs years in the wilderness. âI
wasnât very good at kissing butts,â KarikĂł said bluntly. In Breaking Through, she
wrote that she felt success in academia was more about marketing and status than
it was about hard science:
You needed the ability to sell yourself and your work. You needed to attract
funding. You needed the kind of interpersonal savvy that got you invited to
speak at conferences or made people eager to mentor and support you. You
needed to know how to do things in which I have never had any interest
(flattering people, schmoozing, being agreeable when you disagree, even
when you are 100 percent certain that you are correct). You needed to
know how to climb a political ladder, to value a hierarchy that had always
seemed, at best, wholly uninteresting (and, at worst, antithetical to good
science). I wasnât interested in those skills.76
While KarikĂł flashed the intelligence of a future Nobel-winning scientist, she
wasnât world-class at a skill that Azoulay calls âgrantsmanshipââthe ability to
write winning project proposals.77 âThere is a hidden curriculum for navigating
grants, and it is critical for success as a scientist today,â Azoulay said. âBut those
skills are weakly correlated with scientific potential, and they might be negatively
correlated.â78 We haveâeven if by accidentâdesigned a system that often
privileges the game of performing the act of science over the actual practice of
science.
113
The final common criticism of the NIH might be the most important piece of the
KarikĂł Problem. While many discoveries depend on high-risk research that
departs from the herdâlike embracing the potential of mRNA while others rush
toward DNAâmodern science too often plays it safe.
âI have little doubt that the NIH is biased against high-risk science,â said
Azoulay. When I asked him how we know for sure that the current system isnât
doing a perfect job balancing high-risk bets with important incremental projects,
he offered a charmingly humble answer: we donât know. Not for sure, at least.
âThis is one of the most important things that Iâm working on, and itâs hard to
make progress, because the data is crap.â79 He said itâs hard to know for sure if
there are a few Katalin KarikĂłs in the world or thousands, because the NIH
makes it hard for outside researchers to compare the proposals that it funds
against the ones it rejects.
The NIH still largely relies on its decades-old peer review system. A small team
of independent scientists rates a projectâs merit, methodology, and significance
The Decline of Scientific Novelty
- A Harvard study utilizing a dummy peer review system found that expert evaluators systematically give the lowest scores to the most novel research proposals.
- Data shows that NIH funding for 'young' scienceâresearch based on keywords appearing in the last seven yearsâhas declined by over 25 percent since the 2000s.
- The current funding landscape favors 'probable' projects over 'improbable' ones, despite the fact that major breakthroughs often stem from bizarre, niche obsessions.
- The development of GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic originated from a seemingly peculiar study of Gila monster venom and its effect on metabolic rates.
- Scientific progress is inherently nonlinear, often relying on disparate fragments of knowledge like hot-springs bacteria discovered decades before the invention of PCR.
- The institutional bias against risk and edgy thinking threatens the foundation of broad knowledge required for future medical and genetic revolutions.
Too many projects get funding because they are probable. But science moves forward one improbability at a time.
before offering funding. Without full access to NIH decision-making, a scientist
who wanted to study the agencyâs peer review system might have to do something
a bit strange, like build a dummy peer review system in a lab setting. In 2014, a
team of researchers from Harvard University did just this. They recruited 142 star
medical researchers to act as evaluators in a makeshift grant-review process. They
took 150 proposals and gave each one a ânovelty scoreâ and randomly assigned
multiple proposals to each reviewer. In the final analysis of 2,130 evaluations,
highly familiar proposals did all right, and slightly novel proposals did the best.
But highly novel ideas received the worst scores by far. âWe find that evaluators
uniformly and systematically give lower scores to proposals with increasing
novelty,â the team concluded.80
âNew ideas no longer fuel American science the way they once did,â the
economists Mikko Packalen and Jay Bhattacharya write.81 In a 2020 paper, they
showed that NIH funding used to support fresh questions. In the 1990s, for
example, the NIH consistently funded medical papers whose key words first
appeared in the literature in the previous seven years. But since the 2000s, NIH
funding for the youngest vintage of science has declined by more than 25
percent.82 Once again, either the new ideas in science are getting worse, or weâre
getting worse at looking for them and funding them.
114Bias against novelty, risk, and edgy thinking is a tragedy, because the most
important breakthroughs in scientific history are often wild surprises that emerge
from bizarre obsessions. âToo many projects get funding because they are
probable,â said Evans, the University of Chicago sociologist. âBut science moves
forward one improbability at a time.â83 In the 1990s scientists studying the Gila
monster, a stocky lizard, discovered a hormone in its venom that allowed the
reptile to go months between meals. When they synthesized the hormone in a lab,
they produced a medicine called a GLP-1 agonist, which was shown to reduce
blood sugar levels in some people with diabetes.84 Today GLP-1 drugs, like
Ozempic, seem to treat not only diabetes but also obesity and a dizzying range of
maladies, including heart disease, alcoholism, and drug addiction. The most
famous pharmaceutical breakthrough of the last decade is thus built on the
foundation of a most delightfully peculiar obsession: lizard spit.
Science is often nonlinear in this way. The most popular COVID tests relied
on a technology called polymerase chain reaction. Developed in the 1980s, PCR
is a method for amplifying small DNA sequences, which can be used for paternity
tests and disease diagnoses. When scientists were initially trying to figure out how
to scale PCR, they needed bacterial enzymes that didnât fail at high temperatures.
Fortunately, two decades earlier, in the 1960s, biologists in Yellowstone National
Park had isolated a hot-springs bacteria that thrived in boiling conditions.85 The
bacteria they isolated was incorporated into PCR research and helped launch a
revolution in diagnostics and genetics. Without the bacteria, significant
achievements such as the Human Genome Project might have been impossible.
(Not to mention other great moments in scientific history, such as âYou are not
the father!â outbursts on The Maury Show.) Nobody building an effective
medical test during a pandemic would ever stop to think, Well, ďŹrst thing, letâs
book a ďŹight to Wyoming and take samples from geysers. But this is how science
often works; a broad base of knowledge is built, upon which we piece together
disparate fragments of a puzzle to create new breakthroughs.
Another example: CRISPR is a gene-editing function that some scientists
believe could one day unlock the cure for any number of genetic diseases. But it
was not discovered by a group of geneticists. The first mention of CRISPR in the
The Risk of Safe Science
- The development of CRISPR demonstrates that revolutionary technologies often begin as obscure, low-citation research requiring decades of nurturing.
- Current scientific funding suffers from being 'doomed to succeed,' prioritizing the duplication of known results over the risk of reaching into the unknown.
- The NIH has attempted to address bureaucratic stagnation through 'High-Risk, High-Reward' programs like the Pioneer and New Innovator Awards.
- Standard grant applications often require researchers to prove they can already accomplish their goals, stifling truly novel or 'out there' ideas.
- Despite these initiatives, funding for scientists under thirty-five continues to decline, and high-risk programs represent less than 0.5% of the total NIH budget.
In a strange way, the problem isnât that too much science is âdoomed to fail,â he said. Itâs the opposite. Too much science is, in his words, âdoomed to succeedââfated to duplicate what we know rather than risk failure by reaching into the unknown.
scientific literature comes from Japanese and Spanish researchers working with
bacteria that displayed a peculiar immune reaction when attacked by viruses.86
This early work did not initially receive many citations. But after twenty years of
development, CRISPR now looks like one of the most powerful medical
115
technologies in history. Isaac Newton famously said he saw further by standing
âon the shoulders of giants.â But clearly, some brilliant ideas are not born giants.
They are born as all children are bornâsmall and helpless, requiring care and
protection to grow.
âWe want the most life-saving, life-enhancing, productivity-expanding
inventions and innovations possible,â Evans said. âThat means we need a system
that is designed to take more risks, and accept more failures, as a part of the
scientific process.â87 In a strange way, the problem isnât that too much science is
âdoomed to fail,â he said. Itâs the opposite. Too much science is, in his words,
âdoomed to succeedââfated to duplicate what we know rather than risk failure
by reaching into the unknown.
Rather than see the NIH as an enemy of risky science, it makes more sense to
think of it as a typical bureaucracy whose leaders are doing their best to solve
typically bureaucratic problems. In 2017, longtime NIH director Francis Collins
acknowledged, in an email to the libertarian venture capitalist Peter Thiel, that
NIH needed âto liberate young scientists from training periods that are much too
longâ and that âsome of the ways in which we supportâ biomedical research are
âoutdated.â88
In the last twenty years, NIH has created several grant programs that are
earmarked for riskier research and younger scientists. Their High-Risk, High-
Reward Research program now includes a Pioneer Award for scientists âpursuing
new research directionsâ and a New Innovator Award for younger academics.89
âItâs so important to be able to fund the people and ideas that might be a little bit
out there,â said Patricia Labosky, a program leader in NIHâs High-Risk, High-
Reward initiative. âYou want some science in low-or medium-risk areas where
youâre confident that youâre going to learn something, but you also need this
high-risk aspect, where you can learn something different and you can push the
envelope.â The New Innovator Award initiative, which Labosky oversees, is
structured very differently than typical NIH grants, known as R01s. âWith a
standard grant, you often have to show that you can accomplish everything youâre
proposing, and youâre graded on a very high feasibility level,â she said. âFor a New
Innovator Award, we like to see a little plausibility, sure, but mostly they just need
a cool idea and the equipment to plausibly get it done.â90
116The NIHâs own research indicates that Pioneer Award recipients seem to
produce influential, highly cited research.91 But despite efforts to help younger
scientists, the share of basic NIH funding going to scientists under thirty-five
continues to decline. In the 2024 fiscal year, the High-Risk, High-Reward
Research program allocated about $200 million to scientists, a moderate decline
since 2019. The amount was an almost negligible fractionâless than half of 1
percentâof the NIHâs annual budget for that year.
If we want a fully new approach to funding breakthrough science and
invention, maybe we should look outside the NIH for the best ideas about how
the government can accelerate invention.
The Idea Factories
In October 1957, a strange-looking device breached our planetâs atmosphere and
entered space. It resembled a kind of robotic daddy longlegs, with four spindly
antennas connected to a spherical head made of polished metal. This space-age
The DARPA Innovation Engine
- The 1957 launch of Sputnik by the Soviet Union triggered a technological crisis in the US, leading to the creation of the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA/DARPA).
- DARPA's unique organizational model allows it to punch above its weight, funding foundational technologies like the internet, GPS, and mRNA vaccines.
- The agency's success is driven by empowered program managers who operate without the constraints of peer review or fear of failure.
- Program managers act as 'talent scouts with a vision,' handpicking diverse experts to collaborate on high-risk, high-reward projects.
- The creation of ARPANET illustrates this model, where leaders like Licklider and Taylor built an 'offline network of minds' to create the first online network.
To invent an online network of information, Licklider and Taylor built an offline network of minds.
insectoid robot didnât live a long life. By January, it had fallen back to earth and
incinerated. But in its three-month lifespan, the little machine changed the world.
Sputnik, as it was called, was the first man-made object to orbit the earth. And to
the great astonishment of many Americans, it was not launched by the United
States but rather by its chief rival, the Soviet Union.
Sputnik ignited the space race, pushing the US to invest in propulsion and
rocket technology that would eventually put an American flag on the moon and
leave boot prints in the moondust. It also sparked an innovation race for
terrestrial inventions. In 1958, vowing that the US should never again be on the
other side of a technological surprise, the Department of Defense established the
Advanced Research Projects Agency. Later renamed the Defense Advanced
Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, it produced a gaudy rĂŠsumĂŠ of ingenuity.
The internet, GPS, personal computers, and self-driving vehicles all trace their
roots back to DARPA-funded research. What started as a bureaucratic reaction to
a Soviet satellite became the seeds of the communications revolution that would
shape the next sixty-five years of American innovation. Years before most people
had heard of mRNA vaccines, DARPA invested $25 million in Moderna in
2013.92
The science and tech community has fervently debated what makes DARPA
so special.93 With an annual budget of $4 billion94âabout one-tenth of the NIH
117âDARPA punches well above its weight. One answer is that DARPA empowers
domain experts called program managers to pay scientists and technologists to
work together on projects of their own design. âThereâs no question to me that
program managersâespecially program managers with vision, creativity, and
independenceâare the most important part of DARPA,â said Erica R. H. Fuchs,
a professor of engineering and public policy at Carnegie Mellon.95 Unlike
traditional scientists, these program managers do not face peer review. They can
make big counterintuitive bets, are not punished for failure, and are not hauled
before congressional committees for supporting weird-sounding projects.
To explain how a successful program manager works, Fuchs pointed to the
invention of ARPANET, the worldâs first internet. In 1962, J. C. R. Licklider, a
psychologist and computer scientist from MIT, joined ARPA to lead its
information-processing division. Licklider, who had previously sketched out the
concept for a global computer network, set out to assemble a dream team of
researchers to bring his idea to life. Like a Hollywood producer handpicking his
favorite director, designers, and actors to make a new film, Licklider paid far-flung
geniuses across the country to work together. Computer scientists at the Carnegie
Institute of Technology (now Carnegie Mellon) and engineers at Stanford
University collaborated to link computing systems to send coast-to-coast
messages. In 1966, Bob Taylor, a psychologist who had worked at NASA, took
over Lickliderâs program. He vastly expanded the network of collaborators,
pulling in pioneers of science and engineering from several more universities,
engineering firms, and government labs, including MIT, the RAND
Corporation, and UCLA. When ARPANET went online in 1969, the worldâs
originalâand very basicâinternet required the collaboration of individuals and
firms who would never have otherwise come together. To invent an online
network of information, Licklider and Taylor built an offline network of minds.
Every worthwhile DARPA project is a bit like this, Fuchs said. The agencyâs
most successful people are talent scouts with a vision. âThey say, âIf we get this
person over here, working with this person over here, and then we bring in this
third person, we could solve this unsolvable problem.âââ In the early 2000s, the
Department of Defense was worried that Mooreâs lawâthe frequent doubling of
Architects of American Innovation
- DARPA successfully bypassed the slowing of Moore's Law by funding an unlikely alliance between industry giants like IBM and academic experts.
- The DARPA model succeeds by empowering program managers with open-ended budgets and the freedom to pursue radical, high-risk ideas.
- Modern scientific funding is criticized for 'infantilizing' researchers through excessive paperwork and restrictive grantsmanship.
- Bell Labs thrived as a state-sanctioned monopoly, allowing for decades-long investments in technologies like fiber optics without short-term profit pressure.
- Both institutions prove that innovation flourishes when brilliant minds from different fields are given the space and time to collaborate freely.
Their time is colonized by paperwork, and their ambition is pinched by grantsmanship.
the density of transistors on a computer chipâwas slowing down and
threatening the cost and quality of our military software. DARPA was asked to
come up with a solution. One program manager Fuchs interviewed at length
convened an unlikely alliance of industry giants and academic luminaries.96 He
brought together computer scientists and engineers from Hewlett-Packard and
118MIT, along with promising California start-ups collaborating with the software
firm Sun Microsystems, who collaborated with nanotube experts at Harvard and
UCLA; all of them received millions in DARPA funds. This group contributed
to a breakthrough in silicon germanium technology, which was ultimately
commercialized by IBM. In 2015, IBM told the Wall Street Journal that theyâd
âbroken through major bottlenecksâ in advancing Mooreâs law.97 The
announcement was IBMâs. But the breakthrough itself began with DARPA.
If the DARPA model holds a lesson, it is that the agency works because it
empowers program managers to pursue their most radical ideas with an open-
ended budget and vast connections throughout science and industry. By contrast,
as John Doench of the Broad Institute said, many scientists seeking funding today
are disempowered to the point of infantilization. Their time is colonized by
paperwork, and their ambition is pinched by grantsmanship. The American
innovation system would benefit from trusting individuals more and
bureaucracies less.
DARPA isnât the only midcentury factory of innovation that we can turn to
for inspiration. Bell Labs, officially known as Bell Telephone Laboratories, was
established in 1925 as the research and development arm of AT&T and Western
Electric. Between the 1930s and 1950s, it became one of the most prolific research
institutions in the world, responsible for a staggering list of accomplishments. In
1947, its engineers built the first transistor, which enabled the development of
smaller and more efficient electronic devices. In 1954, Bell Labs demonstrated the
first practical silicon solar cell, opening the door to solar energy as a viable power
source. In 1958, the lab published a paper outlining the principles of the laser.
While DARPA and Bell Labs are both considered icons of innovation, their
success took place in very different contexts. DARPA emerged in a period of
geopolitical insecurity. Bell Labs thrived in an environment of extraordinary
security. As a state-sanctioned monopoly, AT&T could invest in every facet of
telecommunications science without concern for short-term profits, which gave
its scientists and engineers the freedom to pursue ambitious projects over decades.
This long-term security was essential for many of Bell Labsâs most important
technological advances, such as fiber optics and electronic switching, which took
decades to develop.
Bell Labs benefited from a unique moment in history. âAfter spending six
years writing a book about Bell Labs, Iâve often wondered whether it would be
possible to recreate it today,â said Jon Gertner, the author of The Idea Factory.
âMy answer is no.â98 After World War II, AT&T was a goliath within a goliathâa
119huge government-sanctioned monopoly inside a country that dominated fields
like chemistry and quantum mechanics when Nazi Germanyâs assault on Europe
forced many of the continentâs best minds to flee to America.
But its success still holds lessons for us, as we think about a national invention
agenda. âIf Bell Labs had a formula, it was to hire the smartest people, give them
space and time to work, and make sure that they talk to each other,â Gertner
said.99 Like DARPA, the program thrived by identifying brilliant people who
wouldnât normally work together and by giving them freedom to pursue their
most ambitious ideas together. This blending of minds got scientists to think
The Science of Invention
- Bell Labs succeeded by integrating fundamental scientific inquiry with a focus on manufacturability and commercial utility.
- Institutional structures dictate the boundaries of researcher curiosity, often leading to self-censorship and bias in grant applications.
- The American innovation system is currently reliant on mid-twentieth-century habits that may no longer be suited for modern challenges.
- Metascience is emerging as a field to study how science actually works and how to optimize the allocation of research funding.
- A national invention agenda should prioritize running experiments on the funding process itself to identify more efficient models.
- Proposed reforms include reducing administrative burdens for NIH applicants and empowering individual program directors with more autonomy.
The US government is the single largest source of science funding in the world, and yet we know shockingly little about how science actually works.
about their work in new ways. Gertner visited the home of Morris Tanenbaum,
who invented the silicon transistor at Bell Labs in the 1950s before he became the
first chief executive officer of the AT&T Corporation in the 1980s. âWhen I was
at his house, Tanenbaum brought me upstairs and showed me an entry in his
notebook, from the day he had invented the transistor made from silicon. He had
written, âThis is the transistor weâve been looking for! It should be very
manufacturable!âââ100 The journal entry struck Gertner as a microcosm of Bell
Labsâs unusual approach to science. Here was a chemist, tinkering with the
fundamental principles of electrons, thinking about how his invention would
become a product that went through factory assembly and ended up in peopleâs
houses.
Our institutions shape the way we think, and new institutions can make new
kinds of thinking possible. For decades, too many university researchers applying
for NIH funding have constrained their own curiosity. The perceived biases of
the NIH became their own biases. By contrast, the best DARPA program
managers see the world as a set of puzzle pieces to snap together in the creation of
a new initiative. The Bell Labs scientists worked in an offshoot of AT&T, which
made it natural for them to consider the commercial potential of their work,
which might explain how they created so many useful products.
Americaâs innovation system still relies on agencies and habits that were
developed in the middle of the twentieth century. Decades have now passed. The
world has changed, and todayâs scientific challenges are getting harder. So, how
do we build new centers that are as transformative in our time as DARPA was in
its own? Where are the brand-new government research labs for the 2020s? Such
institutions are not guaranteed to succeed, but they represent the sort of risk-
taking that American science needs more of.
120Experimenting with Experiments
âScientific research and invention are the key drivers of economic growth and
improvements in human well-being,â Dartmouthâs Heidi Williams said. âThis is a
fact, and it naturally raises a question: How could we get more of that?â101
Todayâs politics is alarmingly vacant when it comes to answering this question.
Neither liberals nor conservatives have articulated a clear politics of invention.
Neither have prioritized the rigorous analysis of public policy in sciences.
We could do so much better. We could fix the manufactured scarcities of our
immigration system and make it easier for the worldâs most brilliant peopleâwho
often graduate from American schoolsâto stay and work in the US. We could
increase federal research and development spending rather than allow it to decline
as a share of the economy, as we did for much of the second half of the twentieth
century. But perhaps most important, we could fix the incentives of the American
innovation system to help each dollar of funding find the right scientist taking the
right risk at the right time.
In the last few years, a small group of researchers have advanced a theory of
change in American politics that they call âmetascience.â Their thesis is
straightforward. The US government is the single largest source of science
funding in the world, and yet we know shockingly little about how science
actually works.102 Our laws, rules, and habits have accreted over decades without
much of a grand strategy. A national invention agenda ought to operate from the
first principle that if we donât understand the science of invention at all, we should
do what scientists do. We should run experiments. Lots of experiments.
We could start with the NIH. To reduce the paperwork burden, we could run
pilots that eliminate major parts of the application process. Or we could expand
programs that prioritize the funding of younger scientists. To mimic the program
directorâs power at DARPA, we could give some NIH panel members a âgolden
A Meta-Laboratory for Discovery
- The current scientific funding model could be improved by experimenting with 'golden tickets' for high-risk ideas or random lotteries for grants.
- Studies comparing NIH project-based funding to HHMI's person-based funding show that open-ended support leads to more failures but significantly more high-impact breakthroughs.
- Reviving the 'magic' of midcentury institutions like Bell Labs and DARPA requires a willingness to accept the possibility of failure in exchange for ambitious progress.
- The author proposes turning the federal government into a 'meta-laboratory' that treats the funding process itself as a subject for scientific experimentation.
- Accelerating the timeline for revolutionary inventions like fusion energy or universal vaccines requires a 'science of science' to better identify and nurture unconventional talent.
It would mean creating a layer of the American science system that specializes in self-experimentation.
ticket,â such that they would have the power to independently approve one
proposal each year, regardless of how crazy the idea sounds to their peers. Or, for
some applications, we could replace the existing selection process with a random
lottery. Or we could announce that, for a lucky group of grantees, no scientists
would have to fill out yearly progress reports.
And then, after we run all these experiments, we should have independent
scientists study the results. In 2009, several researchers compared a group of
typical NIH grant recipients to scientists funded by the Howard Hughes Medical
121Institute. Whereas the NIH pays scientists for specific projects, HHMI funds
scientists without attaching strings to their research. They found that HHMI
funding led to more âflopsâ but also more âhitsââmore original discoveries and
more high-impact articles.103 Is it better to fund individual projects, or to give
open-ended grants to scientists and hope for the best? As Pierre Azoulay says: We
donât know for sure. But we should run the experiment.104 As we tinker with the
basic funding models of science, we could also pay for the creation of new federal
research organizations, where full-time scientists pursue ambitious projects over
many years without having to stress over quarterly paperwork. The ambition
would be to rebottle the magic of midcentury DARPA and Bell Labs. It might
not work. But thatâs what high-risk science does: it takes on projects with a keen
possibility of failure.
âYou donât want the entire innovation system made up of DARPA, and you
donât want the entire innovation system made up of NIH grants, and you donât
want it made up of any one thing,â Azoulay said. âWe want a well-tempered
balance of experiments: let a thousand initiatives bloom, track their long-term
success, and determine whether there are better ways to finance the sort of
scientific breakthroughs that can save or improve millions of lives.â105 This
approach to science and invention would be genuinely novel. It would mean
creating a layer of the American science system that specializes in self-
experimentation. It would mean turning the federal government into a kind of
meta-laboratory for the study of science itself.
Generations from now, inventions that we can scarcely imagine will feel core
to modern life: all-disease saliva and blood tests, vaccines that wipe out whole
classes of virus and disease, materials stronger than steel and lighter than air,
infinite clean energy from fusion reactors. If these things are possible in the realm
of physical reality, then they are possible to discover; and if they can be discovered
in a century, they can be discovered in a decade, or in a year. These achievements
will require a level of risk-taking and ambition that we are too effective at snuffing
out. For all the wonders of American invention, it is astonishing to realize that we
donât know for sure how the process of discovery actually works. We still donât
know how to identify and nurture the Katalin KarikĂłs of the world. To find
them, we need a better science of science.
1225
Deploy
IN THE FALL OF 1928, the Scottish scientist Alexander Fleming returned from a long
holiday to his lab in London. He had been working with staphylococcus, a
bacterium that caused common infections. Deriving its name from the Greek
staphyle, meaning âa bunch of grapes,â and kokkos, meaning âberry,â its colonies
resemble a cluster of white grapes under a microscope. But when Fleming looked
closely at his samples, he saw something unexpected in a dish heâd left open to the
air. While he was away, a substance of unknown origin had contaminated the
sample and killed much of the bacteria.1 Fleming later identified the mysterious
The Eureka Myth
- Alexander Fleming's discovery of penicillin was a serendipitous event that initially struggled to move beyond the laboratory.
- Howard Florey and Ernst Chain advanced the research by demonstrating penicillin's efficacy in mice, yet faced significant hurdles in human trials.
- Thirteen years after its discovery, penicillin had only been tested on five humans, resulting in two deaths and negligible real-world impact.
- The 'eureka theory of history' incorrectly prioritizes the moment of invention over the arduous process of implementation.
- True progress is defined not by the birth of an idea, but by the complex journey from a prototype to a functional, scalable solution.
If so, it was carried by a heavenly breeze.
material as a mold belonging to the genus Penicillium.2 As for the bacteria-killing
substance it produced, he called it penicillin.
Fleming later claimed that the spore of mold blew into his lab through an
unlocked window. If so, it was carried by a heavenly breeze. For millennia,
humankind fought bacteria in war after war within our bodies and died by the
millions at the hands of the unseen enemy. As late as 1900, bacterial infections
were the most common cause of death in the US; more people died of bacterial
pneumonia during the 1918 influenza pandemic than from the virus itself. When
Fleming tested the mold against other bacteria, he saw it was even more powerful
at neutralizing the nemeses of diphtheria and meningococcus. He suspected that
he might have something miraculous on his hands. But after several more
experiments, his work hit a wall.
In 1939, an Australian-born professor at Oxford University named Howard
Florey and a German-born biochemist named Ernst Chain picked up where
Fleming left off. Whereas the Scottish scientist had shown that penicillin could
zap microbes on glass, Florey and Chain wanted to know if it might do the same
inside animals. Their lab divided 150 mice into three groups and injected each
with, respectively, staphylococci, streptococci, and a bacterium that causes gangrene.
123
Half of the mice were left untreated to serve as the control group, and the other
half were given penicillin. In the control group, all 75 untreated mice died. In the
intervention group, 70 survived.3 Penicillin seemed quite special indeed.
But people are not mice, and Florey, Chain, and their group had more trouble
testing the effect of penicillin in humans. After nearly two years of work, they,
too, were stuck. By the spring of 1941, with Europe submerged in war, five
human patients in their experiments had been treated with penicillin. Two of
them had died.4
Letâs pause the narrative here, as strange as this interruption might seem.
Flemingâs discovery of penicillin is world-famous: cherished by scientists and
hailed as one of the most significant breakthroughs in the history of health, or any
other field. Floreyâs portrait adorned the Australian $50 note for decades. Chain,
along with Fleming and Florey, won the 1945 Nobel Prize in Physiology or
Medicine.
For many, progress appears to be a mere timeline of such eureka moments.
Our mythology of invention treats the moment of discovery as a sacred scene. In
school, students memorize the dates of major inventions, along with the names of
the people who made themâEdison, lightbulb, 1879;5 Wright brothers, airplane,
1903. The great discoverersâFranklin, Bell, Curie, Teslaâget bestselling
biographies, and millions of people know their names. You can think of this as the
âeureka theory of history.â Itâs the story of progress you might expect to see in
Hollywood or to read in nonfiction books that hail the lonely hero whose flash of
insight changes the world.
But this approach to history is worse than incomplete; itâs downright wrong.
Inventions do matter greatly to progress. But too often, when we isolate these
famous scenes, we leave out the most important chapters of the storyâthe ones
that follow the initial lightning bolt of discovery. Consider the actual scale of
penicillinâs achievement in 1941: five human subjects and two deaths. Thirteen
years after one of the most famous discoveries in science history, penicillin had
accomplished practically nothing.
124The Eureka M yth
When a good idea is born, or when the first prototype of an invention is created,
we should celebrate its potential to change the world. But progress is more about
implementation than it is about invention. An idea going from nonexistence to
existenceâfrom zero to oneâintroduces the possibility of change. But the way
The Implementation Gap
- Progress is defined not just by discovery, but by the successful scaling of ideas from one to one billion.
- The United States excels at scientific discovery and winning Nobel Prizes but increasingly fails at domestic deployment and industrial translation.
- Regulatory burdens and procedural kludge have made new ideas harder to use, leading to inflated costs for basic infrastructure like elevators.
- Critical technologies invented in America, such as nuclear reactors and LFP batteries, are now dominated by foreign markets due to manufacturing failures.
- Modern politics is trapped between a progressive fear of growth and a conservative allergy to government intervention, stalling technological implementation.
Progress is our escape from the status quo of suffering, our ejection seat from history.
individuals, companies, and governments take an idea from one to one billion is
the story of how the world actually changes.
And it doesnât always change, even after a truly brilliant discovery. The ten-
thousand-year story of human civilization is mostly the story of things not getting
better: diseases not being cured, freedoms not being extended, truths not being
transmitted, technology not delivering on its promises. Progress is our escape
from the status quo of suffering, our ejection seat from historyâit is the less
common story of how our inventions and institutions reduce disease, poverty,
pain, and violence while expanding freedom, happiness, and empowerment. Itâs a
story that has been at risk of grinding to a halt in the United States.6
The US has thrown tens of billions of dollars annually into scientific discovery.
But it hasnât brought as much progress as weâd expect. As we explained in the
previous chapter, we have haphazardly burdened the scientific process with the
same flavor of procedural kludge that has slowed down other critical parts of the
economy. Whatâs more, as weâll explain in this chapter, we have gotten worse at
translating our inventions into domestic industries. To borrow some familiar
language, itâs not just that ideas are getting harder to find. The problem is also
that new ideas are getting harder to use.7
What went wrong? There are many answers, but one is that we have become
too enthralled by the eureka myth and, more to the point, too inattentive to all
the things that must follow a eureka moment. The US has more Nobel Prizes for
science than the UK, Germany, France, Japan, Canada, and Austria combined.
But if there were a Nobel Prize for the domestic deployment of technologyâeven
technology that we inventedâour legacy wouldnât be so sterling.8
An American craftsman, Elisha Otis, invented the first safe passenger elevator
in 1853.9 This only deepens the irony that, 170 years later, the US struggles to
build tall apartments efficiently, in part because American elevators have become
âover-engineered, bespoke, handcrafted and expensive pieces of equipment that
are unaffordable in all the places where they are most needed,â according to
Stephen Jacob Smith, executive director of the Center for Building in North
125
America.10 Burned by regulations and inattention to cost-effective production,
basic elevators cost four times more in New York City than in Switzerland.
Americans invented the worldâs first nuclear reactor and solar cell. But today,
weâre well behind various European and Asian countries in deploying and
developing these technologies.11 Thirty years ago, a group at the University of
Texas developed next-generation technology to create lithium iron phosphate
(LFP) batteriesâwhich car companies need for the top-performing electric
vehicles. But in the early 2020s, no American company knew how to manufacture
these batteries at scale, and China held a monopoly on the market.12
Politics should take technology more seriously. Innovation can make
impossible problems possible to solve, and policy can make impossible
technologies possible to create. The fundamental link between the two is not at
the core of the Democratic or the Republican agenda. Instead, we are stuck
between a progressive movement that is too afraid of growth and a conservative
movement that is allergic to government intervention.
In the last seventy years, we have too often followed the same playbookâ
invent, but donât implement. We cannot afford to follow this playbook for the
next seventy years. To appreciate the deeper story of progressâand to see how it
illuminates Americaâs own problems in the twenty-first centuryâletâs return to
the 1940s to watch how penicillin went from a scientific discovery in a lab to a
medicine that saved millions of lives.
In 1941, Howard Florey and Ernst Chain were stumped. The British research
The Industrialization of Penicillin
- Faced with wartime resource shortages in England, Florey and Chain sought American assistance to scale antimicrobial medicine.
- The U.S. Office of Scientific Research and Development transformed a 'science project' into a mass-produced medical product through chemical innovation.
- Key breakthroughs included using 'corn steep' to increase yields tenfold and identifying more productive mold strains for large-scale vats.
- Mass production caused costs to plummet by 95 percent while clinical trials proved the drug's safety and efficacy against severe infections.
- The drug revolutionized modern life by making surgeries, childbirth, and war wounds significantly less lethal, saving millions of lives.
- The success of penicillin demonstrates that implementation and scaling, rather than mere invention, are the true drivers of progress.
The same accident of contamination which led to the discovery of penicillin very nearly prevented its use.
teams that were investigating the potential for antimicrobial medicine had hit a
dead end. Deep in war, England didnât have resources to scale the technology.
Florey and Chain needed help from overseas.
By some providence, America had everything the scientists wanted. President
Roosevelt had just approved Vannevar Bushâs vision of a centralized agency to
coordinate wartime innovation. Bushâs Office of Scientific Research and
Development included a division focused on new treatments that could be useful
for soldiers and other military personnel. This agency, called the Committee on
Medical Research (CMR), had already invested in malaria medicine and new
research on novel influenza vaccines.13
CMR took Florey and Chainâs science project and turned it into a medical
product. First, the US solved penicillinâs chemistry problem. It was one thing to
126make a small batch of penicillin in a little flask. But if you used the same
ingredients to make larger amounts, microorganisms would mess up the mixture,
producing a worthless sludge. (The historian James Phinney Baxter III elegantly
described the irony: âThe same accident of contamination which led to the
discovery of penicillin very nearly prevented its use.â) With OSRDâs
encouragement, scientists in Peoria, Illinois, discovered that adding âcorn
steepââwater soaked with cornâcould increase penicillin production tenfold.14
The military collected and tested new strains of mold, which, mixed in the larger
vats and with further modifications to the process, made mass production
possible.
With the help of the War Production Board, OSRD spent millions of dollars
paying firms to set up penicillin plants. Penicillin production went exponential,
rising from an average of 10 million units per plant per month in 1942 to 646
million units by June 1945.15 As production scaled, the cost of making the
antibiotic plummeted by more than 95 percent. Meanwhile, CMR conducted
clinical trials on penicillin to ensure its effectiveness. In the spring of 1943, with
the chemical procedures standardized, the US government turned to distribution.
An advisory board and the American Medical Association chose one thousand
hospitals across the country to store and distribute the drug, which was also made
available to local communities. In December, a report on 209 soldiers and
civilians across the country with severe wound and bloodstream infections found
that those treated with penicillin experienced both lower mortality rates and
shorter hospitalizations. Just as important, the medication obliterated bacteria
without any toxic effects.
By March 1945, there was enough penicillin for just about everyone in
America. In short order, the little mold that blew in through the window
revolutionized modern medicine and life. Bacterial infections become manageable
health problems. Surgeries became safer, childbirth less deadly, and war wounds
less lethal. Penicillin saved the equivalent of full battalions by reducing the
mortality rate of bacterial pneumonia in soldiers from 18 percent to 1 percent.
One source estimated that 1 in 7 wounded British soldiers lived thanks to the
drug.16 From 1945 to 2023, considering global disease burden data, and
accounting for antibiotic effectiveness against bacterial diseases, itâs reasonable to
assert that penicillin and its progeny have saved hundreds of millions, if not
billions, of lives around the world.
127Building W hat W e Invent
The development of penicillin offers a usefully complete story, where humanity
triumphed over a natural adversary. The lesson, which the US seems to have
forgotten in the last few decades, is that implementation, not mere invention,
determines the pace of progress.
In 1941, penicillin was a stalled science project, languishing in the resource-
starved labs of warring Europe. It became a lifesaving product only thanks to
hundreds of American scientists and engineers. Almost every technology is like
The Power of Microinventions
- Major inventions rarely work well initially and require a long process of tinkering, infrastructure embodiment, and scaling to become viable.
- Economic historian Joel Mokyr argues that 'microinventions'âincremental improvementsâare often more critical than the original breakthrough.
- Thomas Edison's true contribution was not the lightbulb itself, but the system of filaments, generators, and meters that made electric light commercially useful.
- The United States has historically funded 'eureka moments' but often fails to support the long-term scaling necessary to maintain a technological frontier.
- Solar technology followed this path, moving from a million-dollar-a-day curiosity at Bell Labs to a specialized tool for the US space program.
- The success of the Vanguard 1 satellite proved the utility of solar cells, triggering a decade of intensive development through government investment.
In his chambers, he painstakingly burned hundreds of materials inside a glass vacuum until he settled on a carbonized bamboo to serve as an efficient lightbulb filament.
this. âMost major inventions initially donât work very well,â the economic
historian Joel Mokyr said. âThey have to be tweaked, the way the steam engine
was tinkered with by many engineers over decades. They have to be embodied by
infrastructure, the way nuclear fission canât produce useful electricity until itâs
contained inside a working reactor. And they have to be built at scale, the way
Fordâs Model T came down in price before it made a big difference to the
country.â17
Tinkering, embodiment, scaling: these are examples of what Mokyr calls
microinventions, or the incremental improvements needed to turn a new idea into
a significant product. These microinventions are often more important than the
original breakthrough. For example, itâs broadly understood that Thomas Edison
âinventedâ the incandescent lightbulb in his Menlo Park, New Jersey, lab in 1879.
But what exactly did he invent? Certainly not electric power. In 1800, the Italian
physicist Alessandro Volta reportedly built the first battery with an electric
current.18 Not electric light, either. In 1809, Humphry Davy built the first
practical âarc lampâ that sent a span of sparks across two rods.19 Edison didnât
even invent lightbulbs. In 1841, the English inventor Frederick de Moleyns was
granted the first patent for a charcoal-powered incandescent lamp.20
So, what did Edison actually do? In his chambers, he painstakingly burned
hundreds of materials inside a glass vacuum until he settled on a carbonized
bamboo to serve as an efficient lightbulb filament. Understanding that electric
light required the steady delivery of electricity, Edison also built a system of
generators to make power, wires to carry it, sockets and switches to turn it on and
off, and meters to measure usage and allow for the billing of customers. Edison
did not make electric light possible. But his microinventions did something even
more important. Through exhaustive tinkering, embodying, and scaling, he made
electric light useful.
128Making technology useful often means building it at scale. For many decades,
however, US policy hasnât taken this lesson as seriously as it should. After World
War II, the American approach to innovation has been to throw money at the
initial eureka moment, sporadically support its development, and then watch idly
as the technological frontier moves to other countries.
In 1954, three American researchers at Bell Labs built the first device for
turning sunlight into energy: a silicon-based solar cell. When light struck the
silicon chip, electrons in the metal splashed around, as if cannonballed into
activity. Lab engineers found a way to convert the electrons into a current:
electricity. At last, sunlight from our nearest star could be technologically
photosynthesized into energy for human use. On April 25, the laboratoryâs
managers gathered for a press conference to unveil the worldâs first solar-powered
machine, a miniature Ferris wheel. The New York Times heralded the
demonstration as âthe beginning of a new eraâ that might finally realize
âmankindâs most cherished dreamsâthe harnessing of the almost limitless energy
of the sun for the uses of civilization.â21
Yet despite the initial fanfare, the first solar cells were impractical for daily use.
If you tried to use these earliest models to heat and light your home tomorrow, it
would cost you about $1 million a day. Despite little utility on earth, solar
technology found early promise in orbit. The first American satellite, Explorer 1,
which had relied on heavy mercury batteries, lasted less than four months.22 In a
bold move, the US Navy turned to solar cells for its Vanguard 1 satellite, launched
in March 1958. The gamble paid off: Vanguard 1âs six solar cells powered its radio
transmitter for six years.23
This success triggered a decade of intensive development. From 1958 to 1969,
the US space program poured tens of millions of dollars into solar cells for its
The Global Solar Shift
- The 1973 oil crisis catalyzed a massive US federal push for solar energy, leading to tripled efficiencies and a fivefold cost reduction within a decade.
- The Reagan administration's conservative shift in 1980 decimated the industry, slashing R&D by 60 percent and literally removing solar panels from the White House.
- A combination of cheap Saudi oil and a lack of consistent US policy caused the domestic solar industry to wither, with renewable energy shares hitting record lows by 2001.
- Germany and China filled the leadership vacuum, with Germany creating a robust market through subsidies and China eventually making solar cheap through massive industrial scaling.
- China's existential need for energy independence led to consistent, long-term investments that avoided the 'boom and bust' policy cycles seen in the United States.
- The history of solar energy illustrates Wrightâs law, where manufacturing costs decline consistently as cumulative production volume increases.
Some of the dismantling was painfully literal: in 1986, Reagan removed the solar hot-water panels installed on the White House roof by Jimmy Carter.
satellites.24 Just as the environmental movement gained momentum, the 1973 oil
crisis sent shock waves through the American economy and exposed the nationâs
vulnerability to foreign energy suppliers. In response, the US government
launched a strong push to develop alternative energy sources. Solar power became
a centerpiece of these efforts. Federal funding for its research and development
took off. New agencies like the Energy Research and Development
Administration and the Solar Energy Research Institute were established to
coordinate and accelerate its progress.25 The results were undeniable. Over the
course of the decade, solar cell efficiencies tripled while costs plummeted by a
factor of five, according to Gregory Nemet, a professor at the University of
129Wisconsin and the author of the book How Solar Energy Became Cheap.
Thousands of scientists, engineers, and entrepreneurs flocked to the field, sensing
the dawn of an energy revolution.
The election of Ronald Reagan in 1980, however, decimated the solar
revolution in America. Driven by a conservative ideology that favored free
markets and limited government intervention, Reagan dismantled much of the
solar infrastructure built up over the previous decade. For secretary of energy, he
appointed James Edwards, a dentist with no expertise or interest in developing
nascent energy technology.26 Solar R&D spending under Reagan fell by over 60
percent his first year in office.27 Some of the dismantling was painfully literal: in
1986, Reagan removed the solar hot-water panels installed on the White House
roof by Jimmy Carter.
Reaganâs election was the most important factor in the slowdown of US solar
development, according to Nemet.28 His conservative revolution coincided with a
huge drop in gasoline prices, as Saudi Arabia flooded the market with cheap oil in
the 1980s. Consumers embraced gas-guzzling SUVs, and alternative energy fell
out of favor. The spirit of imagining life after oil seemed to shrivel up and die. As
late as the early 2000s, federal energy R&D spending was still 80 percent below its
level in the 1970s.29 The US solar industry gradually withered. Many companies
couldnât survive without government support. By 2001, renewable energy
accounted for 5 percent to 6 percent of total energy consumptionâthe lowest
share since at least 1989.30
As American firms pulled back from solar power, other countries picked up
the slack. In the 1990s, Germany subsidized solar technology from both sidesâ
paying companies to make panels and paying consumers to buy them.31 The solar
market took off. Between 2001 and 2011, German employment in the industry
surged alongside rooftop solar installations.32
If the US invented solar energy in the 1950s, and Germany made it a market in
the 1990s, China made solar energy cheap in the 2000s.33 Without sufficient oil
and gas resources to power a billion-person economy, China has had existential
motivation to develop its own domestic energy technology. In the 2010s, Beijing
got serious about building out a solar energy business, lavishing subsidies, loans,
and free land to upstart solar-panel makers. Recognizing this lasting commitment,
Chinese solar companies invested for the long run. Whereas America whiplashed
between âboom and bust cyclesâ in solar policy that have âsurely slowed down its
130progress,â Nemet wrote that Chinaâs consistent policy has allowed its firms to
build more, faster, and cheaper.34
There is an idea in manufacturing history known as Wrightâs law, which says
that some things get cheaper as we learn to build more.35 The theory is named
after Theodore Wright, an American aeronautical engineer who served as vice
chairman of NASAâs predecessor, the National Advisory Committee for
Aeronautics.36 In the 1930s, Wright recognized that the cost of building airplanes
had declined with an eerie consistency since World War I: for every quadrupling
The Power of Wright's Law
- Wrightâs law suggests that innovation is a virtuous cycle where unit costs decrease as total production increases through the act of making.
- This principle challenges the 'eureka myth' by showing that progress is enmeshed in manufacturing and scaling rather than just initial invention.
- China leveraged this law to dominate the solar market, reducing panel costs by 90 percent over fifteen years through efficient scaling and automation.
- The United States lost decades of progress by treating solar energy as a trifling inessential without a long-term plan for national deployment.
- Stagnation in solar adoption has resulted in higher electricity bills, fossil fuel dependency, and missed opportunities for energy-intensive breakthroughs.
- True progress requires a combination of invention and implementation, supported by policy rather than relying on markets alone to scale technology.
Innovation is not a two-stage process, where a loner genius conceives of a brilliant idea and then a bunch of thoughtless brutes manufacture it.
of total aircraft production, unit costs consistently fell by about one-third. In
1936, Wright proposed that some products enjoy a kind of virtuous cycle of
building and learning.
Wrightâs law runs counter to the eureka myth. It says that innovation is not a
two-stage process, where a loner genius conceives of a brilliant idea and then a
bunch of thoughtless brutes manufacture it. Innovation is enmeshed in the act of
making. Wrightâs law is the story of penicillin, whose costs declined as the
government learned to cook larger batches of the medicine. It is the story of the
Model T automobile, which became more affordable as Ford built larger and
larger factories. It is also the story of the computer chip. In the 1960s, Gordon
Moore, the founder of Intel, wrote that the number of transistors on a chip might
double every two years.37 His prediction became prophecy. Fifty years later,
transistor costs declined by a factor of one billion.38
Wrightâs law echoes loudly in the history of Chinaâs solar energy revolution.
Drawing from the countryâs expertise at making cheap textiles and shoes, Chinese
firms gradually learned how to make solar panels more efficiently. In one case, a
Chinese company bought a saw from a Swiss company that could cut thinner and
thinner silicon wafers, which meant more panels from the same crystal ingot.39
They built machines to automate production lines. As they figured out what
worked, they scaled up their lessons to build more production lines and larger
factories. In 2000, China had barely enough solar energy to power a small town.
By 2020, the nation was making 70 percent of the worldâs photovoltaic panels.40
As China ramped up manufacturing, the cost of solar panels in the last fifteen
years has declined by about 90 percent.41
Seventy years ago, the New York Times had anticipated that Americaâs solar
energy revolution would lead to âlimitless energy.â But rather than treat limitless
clean energy as a project of national urgency, the US treated solar panels as a
trifling inessential, with no long-term plan to make or deploy them at scale. And
131
we lost decades of progress because of it. In Germany, between 1990 and 2015,
the share of electricity production that came from renewable energy like solar rose
from about 3.5 percent to 30 percent.42 But in the US over the same period,
solarâs share of electricity stagnated. These were wasted decades, which we are
paying for in the form of more modern pollution, more dependency on fossil
fuels, less total energy, and more expensive electricity bills.
All is not lost. After a long hiatus, solar energy has taken off again to become
Americaâs fastest-growing electricity source, partly thanks to subsidies passed in
the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022.43 But while todayâs solar progress deserves
our celebration, the policy errors of the last forty years deserve our attention. The
US led the world in solar energy development throughout the 1970s. In a parallel
universe where we had continued to develop and deploy solar, we might today
have the green energy paradise of our dreams: an economy fully fueled by the sun.
With such abundance of electricity, we might untap businesses that today are
science fiction given their high energy demands, like machines that suck carbon
dioxide from the sky and factories that grow animal meat without animal
suffering.
But for too long, America fell for the eureka myth and its attending faith in
markets alone to solve the problem of scaling new technology. Progress is now, as
it has always been, about the combination of invention and implementation.
John Arnold, the cochair of Arnold Ventures philanthropy, put it pithily:
The Myth of the Laissez-Faire State
- The common narrative that governments are 'lousy at picking winners' ignores the historical reality that most foundational modern technologies were state-funded.
- Key components of the iPhone, including GPS and the internet, were developed through government entities like the Defense Department and the National Science Foundation.
- Economist John Maynard Keynes argued that the state's role is not to compete with private industry, but to undertake vital projects that are beyond the scope of any single company.
- The decline of the US solar industry after 1980 serves as a cautionary tale of what happens when the government withdraws support from capital-intensive innovation.
- Operation Warp Speed is presented as a modern parallel to the WWII-era penicillin project, demonstrating the government's unique power to turn invention into rapid implementation.
- The success of mRNA vaccines challenged the consensus of experts who believed a one-year development timeline was scientifically impossible.
The highest purpose of a pro-invention government is to make possible what would otherwise be impossible.
âAmerica has the ability to invent. China has the ability to build. The first
country that can figure out how to do both will be the superpower.â44
For the past few decades, the eureka myth has walked hand in hand with another
attractive fable: that the US government is helpless as an investor in new
technologies. One useful summary of this view came from a 2012 Economist essay,
which claimed âgovernments have always been lousy at picking winners, and they
are likely to become more so, as legions of entrepreneurs and tinkerers swap
designs online [and] turn them into products.â
This dual imageâthe state, as a lazy slowpoke, versus the market, as the self-
sufficient45 dynamo of innovationâbears little resemblance to history. As the
economist Mariana Mazzucato pointed out in The Entrepreneurial State, it is
strange that we still debate whether the government ought to pick winners when
132it is obvious that we live in a world that has amply âpickedâ for us.46 When you
use an iPhone, you are playing with a technology that bundles silicon chips, the
internet, GPS, voice-recognition software, and multi-touch technology, which
were in part funded by the Defense Department, NIH, the National Science
Foundation, and other government entities.47 If you heat and cool your home
with power drawn from natural gas, youâre tapping into an energy revolution that
began with federal research into drilling shale formations. If you own a home in
the suburbs, you drive down state-funded roads with federally subsidized
mortgages. We live in a ripely picked world.
The smartest question, then, is not if the government should intervene in
markets, but how to do so. Nearly one hundred years ago, the economist John
Maynard Keynes offered an elegant answer in his 1926 book The End of Laissez-
Faire. âThe important thing for government is not to do things which individuals
are doing already, and to do them a little better or a little worse; but to do those
things which at present are not done at all,â he wrote. If technological progress
requires money or resources that are beyond the scope of any one company, and
government does nothing, progress slows down. This is exactly what we saw after
1980 in the solar industry. As the private sector lacked the resources to scale solar
production, Washington slashed its support, and the industry went cold. The
highest purpose of a pro-invention government is to make possible what would
otherwise be impossible. No private company could orchestrate the national
production of penicillin in World War II, so OSRD did it. No private companies
were close to putting a man on the moon in the 1960s, so NASA did it.48
Government should have a vision of the future, and within that vision it can
create space for companies to do what they otherwise cannot, to make possible
what is otherwise impossible. The COVID pandemic was a crisis that required a
first-of-its-kind invention that no company could solve on its own. It was
inconceivable that a single firm might invent, test, approve, and manufacture a
therapy in record-breaking time. In the case of mRNA technology, an ingenious
invention wasnât enough. We needed an equally ingenious plan to bring that
invention to life. And, just as the US government did for penicillin in World War
II, the US succeeded by providing a model for how to turn invention into
implementation.
133Progress at âW arp Speedâ
In the spring of 2020, the typical timeline for new vaccine development was
thought to be a decade or longer. âThe grim truth,â the New York Times
journalist Stuart A. Thompson wrote in April, âis that a vaccine probably wonât
arrive any time soon.â49 Many scientists agreed. When the MSNBC host Brian
Williams asked Irwin Redlener, a public health expert at Columbia University,
about the prospects of a vaccine by the end of 2020, the scientist said the mission
was âimpossible.â
On May 15, 2020, with the COVID death count screaming toward 100,000,
The Mechanics of Warp Speed
- Operation Warp Speed (OWS) aimed to compress a decade-long vaccine development timeline into just ten months through a venture capital-style investment strategy.
- Officials diversified risk by funding three distinct vaccine platformsâmRNA, live-vector, and protein-subunitârather than betting on a single technology.
- The program addressed manufacturing bottlenecks by expanding twenty-seven facilities, recognizing that scaling production is often harder than the initial science.
- Logistical hurdles included solving materials science problems, such as developing specialized glass vials that would not shatter at ultracold temperatures.
- The distribution phase utilized military expertise from the Army Materiel Command to treat vaccine delivery with the precision and redundancy of a combat operation.
- Rather than commanding the private sector, OWS functioned by providing up-front subsidies and removing regulatory barriers to incentivize rapid innovation.
Science is the easy part of making a vaccine. The hard part will be manufacturing this stuff at scale.
the White House announced, in a Rose Garden kickoff, a mission to end the
pandemic. The goal of the new plan, Operation Warp Speed (OWS), was to create
the fastest vaccine development and distribution program in historyâa new
vaccine built, not in ten years, but in ten months.50
To succeed, officials had to map out the entire journey of a new therapyâ
research, clinical trials, regulatory approval, distribution. The people in charge of
OWS werenât students of Vannevar Bush. They werenât experts on the history of
the Office of Scientific Research and Development. In conversations with its top
officials, they said theyâd never heard of OSRD. But whether by accident or by
instinct, they retraced many of the steps that made penicillin a wartime reality.
First, they had to solve the problem of basic science. In May 2020, nobody
knew what kind of vaccine technology would have the best chance at knocking
out COVID. Officials decided to spread their bets. âWe embraced a venture
capital approach,â said Paul Mango, then deputy chief of staff for policy at the
Department of Health and Human Services and the author of Warp Speed, an
insiderâs history of the program. Rather than put all their money behind one type
of vaccine technology or one pharmaceutical company, they spread their
investments across three vaccine platforms, or technologies: synthetic mRNA,
replication-defective live-vector, and recombinant-subunit-adjuvanted protein.51
âWe wanted to spread out the risk, because we didnât know what technology
would solve the problem,â he said. âBut we also didnât want to make too many
bets, because it would have been a logistical nightmare to coordinate the
development of dozens and dozens of vaccine candidates at once.â52 Notably,
Warp Speed didnât force any company to make vaccines. Instead, firms were lured
with up-front subsidies and promises of future payouts.
134Second, OWS had to accelerate the approval and production pipeline, where
many drugs wait years to go to market. To reduce barriers that could slow down
vaccine approval, OWS helped to recruit populations for clinical trials and to
accelerate the timeline for FDA review. To fast-track production, OWS set up or
expanded twenty-seven manufacturing facilities.53 âScience is the easy part of
making a vaccine,â Moncef Slaoui, the head of OWS, said often to his team. âThe
hard part will be manufacturing this stuff at scale. Just because you know how to
make five liters of vaccine doesnât mean you can make one hundred liters of it.â54
A vaccineâs journey from the production plant to tens of thousands of
pharmacies created other challenges. For example, the Pfizer vaccine needed to be
stored at around minus 70° Celsius, a temperature at which most glass vials
shattered.55 So, Warp Speed approached the materials science company Corning
to produce, in quantity, a special glass they had developed a few years earlier.56
The program ultimately granted $347 million to Corning and one other glass
manufacturer to ensure ultracold transport.57
Third, OWS had to solve the distribution problem. âIt doesnât do any good to
have millions of vaccines sitting on the shelf,â Mango said. âWe had to get them
to seventy thousand sites, working with sixty-four separate health jurisdictions, in
all fifty states. We had to do it very quickly and all at once.â58 OWS brought a
combat-operation focus to procuring vaccines and ensuring their speedy delivery.
Warp Speed leaned on officials from the Defense Departmentâs Army Materiel
Command to help with logistics, and lessons from the battlefield were pulled into
the vaccine program. For example, for every 100 doses of vaccines sent to
pharmacies, the government sent 110 needles and 110 syringes. âThe equivalent
of a frontline soldier will sometimes drop a syringe or contaminate a needle, so
you need redundancy,â Mango said.59
OWS solved problems by enabling the private sector rather than commanding
The Success and Political Abandonment of Warp Speed
- Operation Warp Speed utilized private sector expertise by outsourcing manufacturing, logistics, and distribution to established giants like McKesson, UPS, and CVS.
- The federal government's decision to buy out vaccine supplies ensured that cutting-edge biotechnology was available to the public at no cost.
- The program's success relied on a 'whole-of-government urgency' that included extensive supply-chain mapping and high-risk bets on mRNA technology.
- Economically, the $40 billion investment yielded an estimated $6.5 trillion in value through saved lives and prevented hospitalizations.
- Despite its massive public health success, the program has become a 'political orphan' ignored by Democrats and shunned by many Republicans.
- The program's legacy is complicated by partisan polarization, with the 2024 administration appointing a prominent vaccine skeptic to lead health departments.
Operation Warp Speed is the oddest political orphan. A program named after Star Trek has disappeared into its own kind of black hole.
it. With few exceptions, such as the Veterans Administration, âno federal
employee was directly involved in manufacturing, packaging, shipping, or
injecting a single dose of any Warp Speed COVID vaccine,â Mango wrote in his
book on the program. âWe let one of the biggest pharmaceutical distributors in
the world (McKesson) handle the vaccines, let the most successful delivery
companies in the world (UPS and FedEx) deliver the vaccines, let those entities
who knew best how to vaccinate millions of Americans (CVS and Walgreens)
conduct vaccinations.â60
135Finally, the simplest part of OWS is perhaps the most important: the vaccines
were free. The federal government bought out the vaccines from pharmaceutical
companies, which allowed them to sell the shots to the public for any price they
wanted. They chose the price of $0.00. For much of 2021, the most cutting-edge
biotechnology in America was also the cheapest therapy in the world.
âThe single most important thing that Operation Warp Speed did was to
provide a whole-of-government urgencyâ to the goal of rapid deployment, Caleb
Watney, cofounder of the Institute for Progress, said. âGetting everything right
meant you needed to make a million correct decisions in the right order.â61 If the
government had bet only on traditional vaccine technology, we would have had
no mRNA therapies. If the government hadnât done extensive supply-chain
mapping in the summer of 2020, the initial vaccine rollout might have taken
months rather than weeks. And if the government hadnât bought out vaccines
from the pharmaceutical companies, they wouldnât have been free to consumers.
But because Operation Warp Speed did all this, the vaccines were expeditiously
approved, manufactured, and distributed at no cost to the public.62
In all, the US government spent less than $40 billion to develop, produce, and
buy mRNA COVID vaccines.63 It might be one of the best bang-for-buck
policies in US history. COVID vaccines prevented up to 20 million64 excess
deaths worldwide, with several million of those saved lives directly attributable to
the acceleration of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. Tens of millions of
hospitalizations were prevented by the further prevention of severe disease. One
analysis by three US economists estimated that the lives saved in just the eight
months of the vaccinations were worth $6.5 trillion.65 Stacked up against more
popular American programs, such as the Apollo program, Warp Speedâs
accomplishment shines even brighter. For all the wondrous drama and
exploratory genius of touching a human foot to moon dust, the Apollo missions
did not directly save any lives or unveil any new technologies, even as they
accelerated the development of computer chips and related fields.
Americans love to take credit for their accomplishments. So one might expect
that Warp Speed would receive universal adulation today. Quite the opposite,
however: Warp Speed has been practically abandoned by both parties. In January
2021, the incoming White House announced it would rename the program.66
Rather than officially rename it, they basically stopped talking about it.
Democrats rarely credit or mention Operation Warp Speed, perhaps because
theyâre reluctant to be caught lavishing praise on anything that bears the
136fingerprints of Donald Trump. Meanwhile, Republicansâincluding Trump
himselfârarely celebrate the vaccines, because much of the party is populated by
anti-vax conservatives who refused to take the shot and came up with wild
conspiracy theories to discredit its effectiveness. When Trump won reelection in
2024, he named Robert F. Kennedy Jr., perhaps the nationâs most famous vaccine
skeptic, to lead the Department of Health and Human Services.
Operation Warp Speed is the oddest political orphan. A program named after
Star Trek has disappeared into its own kind of black hole. A policy that
The Bottleneck Detective State
- Operation Warp Speed and World War II demonstrate that the government can act as an 'entrepreneurial state' to accelerate innovation.
- Critics often misinterpret these successes as proof that government should stay out of the way, despite the programs requiring massive federal intervention.
- The 'bottleneck detective' model suggests that the state should identify specific industry constraints rather than applying a one-size-fits-all ideology.
- A historical example of a manufactured bottleneck is the deliberate restriction of medical school enrollment in the 1980s, which led to a modern physician shortage.
- Progress in complex sectors like housing and energy requires a deep understanding of specific market barriers rather than generic policy solutions.
To be a bottleneck detective is to recognize that wise policy begins with an investigation rather than an ideology that tries to force the same key into a variety of ill-fitting locks.
stimulated the economy more than the Apollo program, and which may have
saved more lives than the Manhattan Project, has almost no loud champions in
politics. Even its scarce champions seem intent on taking the wrong lessons from
its success. In an essay for the Wall Street Journal, the University of Chicago
professor Casey B. Mulligan, who had served as chief economist for the Trump
White House, claimed that âthe urgent lessonâ from Operation Warp Speed was
that âtoo much government hinders private innovation.â67 But OWS increased
government spending by billions of dollars. With an urgency typically reserved for
war, the federal government directed the development of vaccines from their
testing to the final transport. Itâs odd to claim that a program that expanded
government powers succeeded by proving that one should never expand
government powers.
The right lesson from World War II and Warp Speed is that the state is no
enemy of invention or innovation. In fact, the government can accelerate both. In
the 1940s, the Office of Scientific and Research Development mapped out the
chemistry and production challenges for penicillin and turned an obstacle course
into a glide path. In 2020, the US government similarly identified the bottlenecks
to rapid vaccine development and removed them. In both cases, the government
served as a chief national problem solver, molding its policies to fit the moment. It
is a vision of a new kind of entrepreneurial state. It is the government as a
bottleneck detective.
The Bottleneck Detective
The US faces complex challenges in housing, energy, science policy, invention,
and innovation. Solving them must begin with the appreciation that these are
different industries, with different constraints, enmeshed in different markets.
Figuring out how to build more apartments in Los Angeles might not be relevant
137to the problem of adding solar energy in Massachusetts, which has nothing to do
with the question of how to accelerate scientific discovery in cancer. To be a
bottleneck detective is to recognize that wise policy begins with an investigation
rather than an ideology that tries to force the same key into a variety of ill-fitting
locks. Making progress in these industries requires first that we want to
understand: How does this industry actually work? From that question can
emerge an agenda for overcoming the barriers to growth.
Sometimes being a bottleneck detective is about removing restrictions that
shouldnât exist. The US has fewer primary-care physicians as a share of its
population than almost any other rich country, despite having the worldâs most
expensive health-care system. This shortage is partly by design. In the early 1980s,
a special committee established to review the state of American medicine reported
to the US Department of Health and Human Services that the US was on the
verge of a massive surplus of doctors. Physician groups backed up the finding.
âThe size of medical schools must be diminished,â Charles Evarts, the president
of the American Orthopaedic Association, said in a 1985 speech. âCertain
programs need to reduce their numbers, others must consolidate, and others need
to terminate voluntarily or be terminated.â68 Starting in the 1980s, the
government cut its support for medical schools and medical students, and many
universities agreed to freeze the number of new studies and stop construction on
medical programs. Between 1980 and 2005, the number of medical-school
matriculants essentially flatlined69 as the US added 70 million people.70
This policy of deliberate scarcity succeeded, and the inevitable result was a
scarcity of doctorsâespecially those, like primary-care physicians, who make the
least money. Years later, the US is still digging out from under the moratorium.
Fixing this problem is eminently within the powers of the federal government.
âThe first thing I would do is to expand the residency system so that more doctors
Solving Innovation Bottlenecks
- The U.S. physician shortage is driven by a residency funding bottleneck controlled by federal policy.
- Innovation can be accelerated through push funding, which pays for upfront effort and research costs.
- Pull funding, or advance market commitments, incentivizes success by guaranteeing a market for new technologies.
- Advance market commitments solve demand uncertainty, encouraging firms to invest in expensive or risky inventions.
- The pneumococcal vaccine initiative demonstrates how guaranteed funding can save hundreds of thousands of lives by unlocking global markets.
As opposed to push funding, this is called pull funding. If push funding pays for effort, pull funding pays for success.
can become residents after medical school,â Robert Orr, a policy analyst who
studies health-care policy at the Niskanen Center, said. âThis might be the key
bottleneck. The medical schools say they canât easily expand, because there arenât
enough residency slots for their graduates to fill. But there arenât enough
residency slots because Washington has purposefully limited federal residency
financing.â71 The arithmetic is simple: more funding means more residents;
accepting more residents allows medical schools to grow; more medical students
today means more doctors in a decade.
138Being a bottleneck detective isnât just about removing things that donât work.
Sometimes itâs about creating entirely new programs that donât exist but should.
Imagine somebody is trying to build a new kind of rocket, and youâre the czar of
rocket innovation policy at the Department of Defense. You have $1 billion that
you can use to accelerate the invention. There are several things you can do. You
can give the company $1 billion as a simple grant (âhere, have the money for
nothingâ). You can make it a loan (âpay me back later, plus interestâ). You can
create a so-called loan guarantee (âif you default on a $1 billion loan, Iâll pay the
lender in fullâ). These are all examples of push funding because the up-front
money pushes forward innovation.
But there is another, very different way to use that $1 billion. You can dangle a
reward if the rocket company meets some targetâsay, the construction of three
new rockets. As opposed to push funding, this is called pull funding. If push
funding pays for effort, pull funding pays for success.72 Warp Speed used both.
With push funding, it covered the early expenses of several vaccine makers. With
pull funding, it promised to buy a certain number of vaccine doses, provided that
the therapies received FDA authorization.
Pull funding is efficient because it only pays out if the technology pans out. Itâs
effective, because it solves a common bottleneck in new technology: demand
uncertainty. Some companies are rightly concerned that consumers cannot afford
the early, expensive versions of a product. These companies need more certainty
about future profits to invest in the final stages of invention. For example,
pneumococcal disease has been the worldâs most common form of bacterial
pneumonia and one of the leading causes of child mortality in low-income
countries. But for years, pharmaceutical companies seemed reluctant to invest in a
vaccine for African strains of the disease, in part because they assumed its
countries couldnât afford the medicine at full price. In 2007, the Bill & Melinda
Gates Foundation joined several nations to offer pharmaceutical companies a
deal: make a pneumococcal vaccine for low-income countries, and weâll pay you
$1.5 billion to produce it at volume. The promise of future funding proved
astonishingly effective. By 2020, several companies had developed the vaccine, and
hundreds of millions of doses were purchased and distributed around the world.
By one estimate, the vaccines saved seven hundred thousand lives.73
This policyâa promise to buy a certain number of early products to accelerate
their inventionâis called an âadvance market commitment,â or AMC. An AMC
is particularly effective when the world needs an abundance of a brand-new
technology that is currently too expensive. For example, pharmaceutical firms
139assumed that African buyers wouldnât pay back their investment in vaccines. So
the commitment to pay for millions of doses unlocked an invention that
otherwise wouldnât exist.
This AMC model could unlock other inventions. One of the most devilish
Scaling Climate Solutions with AMCs
- The world must scale carbon removal from 10,000 tons to 10 billion tons annually by 2050 to avoid climate catastrophe.
- Advance Market Commitments (AMCs) like Frontier are successfully incentivizing startups to enter the carbon-removal race by guaranteeing future demand.
- Cement production is a 'double whammy' for emissions, releasing CO2 both from the fossil fuels used for heat and as an inherent chemical byproduct of limestone conversion.
- If cement production were a country, it would rank as the third-largest carbon emitter globally, accounting for 8 percent of total emissions.
- Technological solutions include carbon-capture systems at factories or replacing limestone with alternative rocks like basalt or calcium silicate.
- Because governments purchase 40 percent of all cement, they are uniquely positioned to use pull funding to drive down the cost of green alternatives.
If it were a country, cement would be the third-biggest carbon emitter on the planet.
challenges in energy is how to efficiently remove CO2 from the atmosphere. By
2050, the world will need to permanently remove 10 billion tons of carbon
dioxide from the skies every year to avoid the most catastrophic effects of climate
change.74 But in all of history, only 10,000 tons of CO2 have been technologically
removedâone million times short of what weâll soon need to do every year.75 In
2022, Nan Ransohoff, the head of climate policy at the payment company Stripe,
launched Frontier, an AMC that raised $1 billion to pay any company that
develops carbon-removal technology that meets a high level of efficiency. The
initiative has already encouraged more carbon-removal companies to jump into
the race. One survey found that of all the firms that have launched since Frontier
began, 7 in 10 say Frontierâs launch was key to their founding.76 If we eventually
hit big with carbon-vacuuming machines that save the world from climate
change, it might very well be due to policies that guarantee a return for the best
early technologies.
Looking forward, AMCs could be used for a range of futuristic ideas. Staying
in the realm of climate technology, AMCs could accelerate the development of
clean cement. The traditional manufacture of cement is a major contributor to
climate change. Every year, the world produces about 4 billion tons of cement to
make concrete and other binding agents.77 By most estimates, cement is
responsible for 8 percent of the worldâs CO2 emissions.78 If it were a country,
cement would be the third-biggest carbon emitter on the planet, the New York
Times journalist David Wallace-Wells wrote.79
Cement poses a unique challenge to decarbonization. Cleaning up electricity
is conceptually simple: itâs possible to power an electric car battery with wind, or
to run air-conditioning with electricity from solar energy. But the cement-
manufacturing process is different. Making cement requires converting limestone
(calcium carbonate) into quicklime (calcium oxide) by heating it to about 1500°
F. This is a double whammy for carbon dioxide emissions. Not only does that
level of heat often require burning fossil fuels like coal, but also the chemical
reaction automatically produces carbon dioxide as a byproduct. To make
traditional cement without releasing an enormous amount of carbon dioxide
simply isnât possible.
140As billions of people transition to urban living in the coming decades, demand
for cement will only grow. The problem cannot be simply wished away. Itâs not
realistic to demand that the entire planet stop building things. The only truly
global solution is invention.
There are several technological paths. We can build machines and systems to
scrub up the carbon released from the chemical process that makes calcium oxide.
These carbon-capture technologies would trap emissions at the source,
preventing them from entering the atmosphere. Another possibility is to replace
limestone as the rock source of cement with a new material. âMaybe we donât
need to use limestone at all,â says the climate policy author Hannah Ritchie. âIf
we use a source rock that doesnât emit carbon, then thereâs nothing to scrub
up.â80 Several companies are innovating with alternate rocks to produce cement-
like products, such as basalt (the most abundant surface rock on earth) and
calcium silicate, which produces the key ingredient of cement, calcium oxide,
without releasing carbon dioxide in the process.
The few companies that are working on lower-emission cement replacements
face significant bottlenecks in terms of cost and scale. That could make them
prime candidates for pull funding. âCement could be perfect for an AMC,
because the government already buys forty percent of US cement, and suppliers
donât know who will pay high prices in the short run,â Ransohoff said. âWe need
a policy to move it down the cost curve.â81 If the US pledged to buy several
Incentivizing Innovation and Energy Demand
- Advance Market Commitments (AMCs) can accelerate green technology by guaranteeing payment for successful innovation rather than just subsidizing failure.
- The 'win-win-win-win' of AMCs includes funding for startups, cleaner infrastructure for the public, and a reprieve for the climate.
- Artificial Intelligence is emerging as a primary driver of energy demand, with data centers projected to triple their share of US energy use.
- Major tech firms are resorting to unconventional energy deals, such as reviving Three Mile Island, to meet the massive power needs of AI.
- The rapid growth of AI highlights the urgent need for energy abundance and the removal of bottlenecks in clean energy construction and permitting.
In September, Microsoft made a deal to buy the entire electricity output of the last working reactor of the Three Mile Island nuclear plant, which suffered a partial meltdown in 1979.
billions of dollarsâ worth of affordable green cement, it could encourage investors
and entrepreneurs to pour more time and treasure into its development. The up-
front funds could help green cement companies expand their production
facilities. As Wrightâs law works its magic, the cost of producing low-carbon
cement would decline over time. The result would optimistically be a win-win-
win-win: the start-ups would get funding, the public would get cleaner
infrastructure, the treasury would protect taxpayers by only paying for success,
and the climate would get a reprieve from carbon-coughing cement.
The most important lesson of AMCs is that they make government a more
active agent of invention, by identifying bottlenecks in public demand and filling
them. âThe US often makes financial commitments contingent on failure, like
loan guarantees, which pay a lender in the event of a default,â said Thomas Kalil,
the former deputy director for technology and innovation in the White House
Office of Science and Technology Policy. âBut we donât make enough financial
commitments contingent on success, like a prize, or advance purchase order.
141
Operation Warp Speed did it very successfully.â82 We should be looking for many
more opportunities to identify whatâs holding back the invention and
implementation of the most important technologies of the future and dangle
prizes and purchase orders to pull them closer to the present.
Artificial intelligence might be the most important technology of the decade. In
the last few years, tech firms have spent hundreds of billions of dollars to build
machines that can carry out a dizzying array of tasks: writing essays and code,
reading thousands of pages in seconds, carrying on fluent conversations, and even
producing animated movies. AI has not transformed the US economy in the hour
that weâre writing these words, but things are moving fast enough that it is
impossible to predict what effect AI will have had by the time you read them.
For all the uncertainties about AIâs larval potential, one thing is very certain:
its development will require a gigantic amount of energy. The computational
intensity of training artificial intelligence consumes significantly more power than
other computer systems. Data centers that house AI hardware are projected to
triple their share of total American energy use in the next decade, and AI is
already âwreaking havocâ on US power systems, Bloomberg reported in 2024.
The biggest tech firms, like Microsoft and Alphabet, have pledged to run their
data centers on low-carbon energy. But these promises are smashing up against
Americaâs inability to build clean energy fast enough. So tech companies are
hunting for electricity in surprising places. In March 2024, Amazon agreed to buy
energy from the Susquehanna nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania to power its
data centers. In September, Microsoft made a deal to buy the entire electricity
output of the last working reactor of the Three Mile Island nuclear plant, which
suffered a partial meltdown in 1979. Buying power from existing power plants is a
short-term stopgap. But itâs not a long-term solution. New nuclear power plants
can take years, even decades, to complete.
The AI revolution makes the cause of energy abundance even more urgent. In
the last few decades, US energy infrastructure projects have been slowed by all the
challenges weâve described: a lack of productivity in construction, permitting
The Geopolitics of Energy Abundance
- Regulatory bottlenecks and energy shortages threaten to drive AI infrastructure development away from the United States and toward foreign powers.
- The development of superintelligent AI is likened to a digital nuclear bomb, making domestic control of its infrastructure a critical national security priority.
- Energy abundance serves as a universal innovation policy, potentially enabling energy-intensive solutions like large-scale desalination for water-stressed regions.
- Failure to expand the energy supply could lead to rising consumer costs and a loss of strategic influence over the future of artificial intelligence.
- The success of the 21st century depends on merging breakthroughs in clean energy and computing to ensure domestic prosperity and global peace.
After thousands of years of scientific discovery and technological progress, we have figured out how to turn the most elemental functions of natureâthe sunâs light, the wind, the heat beneath the earthâinto a swarm of electrons that can run our machines and power our lives.
blockages, extended environmental reviews, and long interconnection queues.
These bottlenecks are largely self-made, and if we donât make it easier for AI
companies to build in America, we should expect them to build data centers
142abroad. Some AI executives have met with Gulf states leaders about siting data
centers in the Middle East.
In the next few decades, trillions of dollars of AI infrastructure could be built
somewhere in the world. The biggest question is where. If the US fails to add
energy supply in the US, the results could be chaotic, at best, and catastrophic at
worst. As new data centers demand more energy, electricity prices would rise for
consumers, in the absence of supply growth. More troublingly, itâs conceivable
that AI researchers are years, not decades, away from building a superintelligent
system with the ability to hack foreign government secrets, cripple their military
software systems, and partly collapse the energy grids of adversaries. This would
be a breakthrough akin to a kind of digital nuclear bomb. âDo we really want the
infrastructure for the Manhattan Project to be controlled by some capricious
Middle Eastern dictatorship?â the AI researcher Leopold Aschenbrenner wrote in
his 2024 manifesto âSituational Awareness.â It is paramount, he said, for the US
to prioritize energy construction in the next decade. âAmerica sorely regretted her
energy dependence on the Middle East in the â70s, and we worked so hard to get
out from under their thumbs. We cannot make the same mistake again.â83
An abundance of cheap and clean electricity would provide broad benefits,
even if AI didnât pan out. Abundant energy would reduce electricity bills for
households. It would make other futuristic technologies that need ample power
more feasible. For example, desalination facilities that turn saltwater into
drinkable water might be necessary to sustain populations in the American
Southwest in this century. This technology is extremely energy intensive. In Israel,
one of the world leaders in desalination, desalination accounts for about 3 percent
of the countryâs total energy consumption.84 In this light, energy abundance is
not strictly speaking a âdata center policyâ or an âAI policy.â It is an all-purpose
national affordability policy and an innovation policy. Simply put, energy
abundance might be the single most important technological bottleneck of our
time.
Twenty years from now, it is possible that we will consider the combination of
clean energy growth and AI the most important technology story of the decade.
In 2024, Sam Altman, the chief executive and cofounder of OpenAI, framed our
ability to make artificial intelligence in dramatic terms. âAfter thousands of years
of compounding scientific discovery and technological progress,â he wrote, âwe
have figured out how to melt sand, add some impurities, arrange it with
astonishing precision at extraordinarily tiny scale into computer chips, run energy
through it, and end up with systems capable of creating increasingly capable
143artificial intelligence.â85 Our breakthroughs in energy are no less mythic. After
thousands of years of scientific discovery and technological progress, we have
figured out how to turn the most elemental functions of natureâthe sunâs light,
the wind, the heat beneath the earthâinto a swarm of electrons that can run our
machines and power our lives. The direction of progress in the twenty-first
century might depend on Americaâs ability to merge these breakthroughsâAI
and clean energy, melted sand and swarming electronsâto bring broad prosperity
and peace, rather than the opposite. Doing so requires, at least, that US policy has
a say in directing AI. And that means building AI and its energy source here, in
America, where it was invented.
Focus Is a Choice
The Focusing Power of Crisis
- Operation Warp Speed succeeded because a singular, clear goal unified every level of the organization.
- History shows that major breakthroughs like penicillin and the Federal Reserve often require the 'focusing mechanism' of disaster.
- Crises like the Sputnik launch are socially constructed; the US chose to view a metal box in orbit as an existential threat to spur innovation.
- The Apollo program was surprisingly unpopular during its development, with a majority of Americans often viewing it as a waste of money.
- Progress is frequently born from a 'crucible of insecurity' where the worst circumstances bring out a nation's best performance.
Again and again in American history, we seem to be at our very best when things are at their very worst.
When we asked Paul Mango to name the single most important part of Operation
Warp Speed, he said it was focus. âOn the Warp Speed team, you could have asked
anyone what the projectâs goal was, from the generals and leaders, down to the
lowest-ranking officials, and they would all give the same answer: deliver at least
one safe and effective vaccine, manufactured at scale, before the end of the year,â
he said. âEvery decision we made was based on those constraints.â86 The health
crisis served as a focusing mechanismâa way of taking the tangles of competing
priorities and rightening them into a straight thread.
A regrettable feature of history is that progress often requires the focusing
mechanism of disaster. Penicillin took a world war, and mRNA vaccines took a
plague. The Federal Reserve was created only after a string of financial disasters,
culminating in the Panic of 1907. The tragedy of the Great Depression allowed
for the boldness of the New Deal. The Nazi domination of Europe galvanized the
creation of the Office of Scientific Research and Development. The Soviet
Unionâs successful launch of Sputnik in 1957 moved Washington to create the
Advanced Projects Research Agency, later renamed DARPA, which contributed
to the invention of the personal computer, GPS, and drone technology. It also
pushed the US to expand NASA and eventually launch the Apollo program.
Again and again in American history, we seem to be at our very best when things
are at their very worst.
This is a depressing thought. One interpretation might be that we are doomed
to sleepwalk through history until a catastrophe jolts us into action. But there is
comfort in the connection between perceived crisis and urgency. If crisis is the
144ultimate push-and-pull mechanismâboth galvanizing action and rewarding
successâwe must remember that it is always up to us to decide what counts as a
crisis.
In an alternate history of the twentieth century, the launch of Sputnik might
not have led the US to do anything. After all, there was no real existential danger
posed to any American by a metal box floating in orbit. Surely, if France or Britain
had, by some miracle, managed to launch the first object into space, it wouldnât
have caused much geopolitical angst in America. But the US government
determined that because Sputnik was a Soviet instrument, the achievement was a
crisis that required a response. And in that crucible of insecurity and inspiration,
the US created a set of institutions that ultimately put a man on the moon and
the internet in our pockets.
The moon race is remembered today as a necessary and broadly popular
response to the Soviet threat. But one of the most misunderstood aspects of the
space race is that the Apollo program survived because of political persistence, not
because of its popularity. In its brief history, the moon mission polled poorly. A
1965 Gallup survey found that âonly 39 percent of Americans thought that the
US should do everything possible, regardless of cost, to be the first nation on the
moon.â87 A majority of Americans consistently told pollsters that the Apollo
missions werenât worth the cost, with up to 60 percent saying the government
was spending too much on space.88 At one point, President John F. Kennedyâ
who famously said, âWe choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other
things, not because they are easy, but because they are hardââtold NASA chief
James Webb, âIâm not that interested in space.â89 A majority of Americans
supported the lunar missions only once in the 1960s: in a poll taken just after Neil
Armstrongâs televised landing.
One lesson of Apolloâs surprising unpopularity is that the program was
The Politics of Choice
- Major national achievements like the moon landing and vaccine development are the result of deliberate political choices rather than public consensus.
- Leaders possess the unique power to define what constitutes a crisis, from heart disease to climate change, and mobilize resources accordingly.
- Current scientific systems prioritize caution and bureaucracy over risk-taking, effectively stifling the serendipity required for breakthroughs.
- The 'eureka myth' has misled the US into overvaluing individual genius while neglecting the infrastructure needed to build and deploy inventions.
- Deep political polarization in the 2020s masks the potential for a new political order focused on national abundance and implementation.
The historian James Phinney Baxter III called penicillin âthe blue mold which blew in through Flemingâs window on that happy breeze.â
sustained by leaders within NASA and the White House, which never pulled the
plug on an audacious task that polled poorly among the public. Kennedy was
right when he said, âWe choose to go to the moon.â So did we choose to pass the
New Deal, just as we chose to build OSRD, just as we chose to invent the bones
of the internet in a government lab, just as we chose to break the record for
vaccine development during a pandemic. Yes, crisis is a focusing mechanism. But
leaders define what counts as a crisis. And leaders are the ones who choose to
focus.
145The US could announce a Warp Speed for heart disease tomorrow, on the
theory that the leading cause of death in America is a national crisis. We could
announce a full emergency review of federal and local permitting rules for clean
energy construction, with the rationale that climate change is a crisis. The US
could decide that the major diseases afflicting developing countries, such as
malaria, deserve a concerted global coalition to eradicate them within a decade.
Even in times without world wars and pandemics, crises abound. Turning them
into national priorities is, and has always been, a political choice.
In the last half century, we have made several choices about invention and
implementation and science and technology. We have chosen to create a system
that rewards caution and punishes outsider thinking and risk in scientific
research. We have chosen to embrace a political economy that encourages
offshoring the development of American inventions that are key to our national
security and flourishing. None of this was inevitable. These policies are the fruits
of human decisions. They are artifacts of our ripely picked world.
Breakthroughs often involve a flash of luck, even when they follow decades of
painstaking labor. The historian James Phinney Baxter III called penicillin âthe
blue mold which blew in through Flemingâs window on that happy breeze.â
Many scientific breakthroughs similarly shock their discoverers, blowing in
sideways through proverbial windows. Few people expected synthetic mRNA, an
idea that had languished in the wilderness of academia, to match up so perfectly
with the spiky crowns of a novel coronavirus. The serendipity of science is one
reason why itâs so important to untether research from politics and allow
scientists to seek the truth freely without spending half their time deluged by
bureaucratic paperwork and paralyzed by fear that their ideas might diverge from
the momentâs conventional wisdom.
But the next stages of technology are not about luck. Building, deployment,
and implementation are not the stuff of happy breezes. They require deliberate
acts, laws, and policies. They require choices. For too long, the US has been
enthralled by the eureka mythâthe idea that flashes of individual genius are the
most important moments in the history of technology. This mind-set governed
our approach to economic growth in the last forty years. In the next generation,
the US needs a plan to build what it invents.
146Conclusion
Toward Abundance
POLITICS IS A WAY OF organizing conflict, and so our attention is naturally drawn to
divisions. That is particularly true now, when the divisions are so fundamental.
The Democratic and Republican parties do not merely disagree over the details of
tax policy. They disagree over the legitimacy of elections, of institutions, of the
structure of American government. They are split in their views of speech and
history and decency and truth. Distinguished scholars write books considering
the nearness of another civil war and wondering whether fascism is resurgent on
American soil. The polarization of the 1990s feels quaint against the chasmic
conflict of the 2020s.
These divisions are real. They are dangerous. But behind them is the murky
outline of something very different. Perhaps a path out of the morass weâre in. A
new political order.
The Rise of Political Orders
- Gary Gerstle defines a political order as a constellation of ideologies and policies that create consensus across party lines for decades.
- The New Deal order established that the federal government must actively manage the economy and protect workers, a view even Republicans like Eisenhower embraced.
- Eisenhower supported New Deal policies largely to prove that American capitalism could provide better for its citizens than Soviet communism.
- The New Deal order collapsed in the 1970s due to stagflation, the Vietnam War, and a cultural shift toward individualism over collective action.
- The subsequent neoliberal order was characterized by deregulation and tax cuts, initiated by Democrats like Jimmy Carter and cemented by Ronald Reagan.
- Both the New Left and the New Right contributed to the neoliberal shift by prioritizing individual participation and autonomy over state-led systems.
Eisenhower needed to prove that âhe could take better care of his ordinary citizens than the leaders of Soviet communism could provide for theirs.â
The term âpolitical orderâ is the coinage of Gary Gerstle, an American
historian and a professor at Cambridge University. Many historians focus on how
Republicans and Democrats have fought and disagreed over the years. Gerstleâs
work focuses instead on how hidden points of consensus between the parties
create distinctive periods of history, which he calls political orders. He defines a
political order as âa constellation of ideologies, policies, and constituencies that
shape American politics in ways that endure beyond the two-, four-, and six-year
election cycles.â1 Two such constellations have extended across the last hundred
years of American history, according to Gerstle. The New Deal order rose in the
1930s and collapsed in the 1970s. The neoliberal order rose in the 1970s and
declined in the 2010s.
The New Deal order brought the agreement that the federal government must
take an active role in managing the American economy and protecting workers.
Begun under Franklin Roosevelt, a Democrat, it continued under Dwight
Eisenhower, a Republican, who endorsed its basic framework. Rather than rail
147against big government programs, Eisenhower signed legislation to create the
Interstate Highway System. Rather than bemoan welfare, he celebrated its
growth. âWe want a broader and stronger system of unemployment insurance,â
Eisenhower said, sounding much more like a Democrat from the 2020s than a
Republican of the 1980s.2
Why did Eisenhower and the GOP of his era acquiesce to the New Deal order?
âIt had far less to do with Eisenhower the man than with the geopolitical
situation in which the new president and his party had been thrust,â Gerstle
writes. The Cold War wasnât just an arms race or a military conflict with the
Soviet Union. It was a competition over whose philosophy of government would
produce the best outcomes for people. Eisenhower needed to prove that âhe could
take better care of his ordinary citizens than the leaders of Soviet communism
could provide for theirs.â3 That meant embracing the policies of Roosevelt and
the Democrats, who had succeeded in raising Americaâs living standards after the
Great Depression.
In the 1970s, the New Deal order collapsed beneath the weight of crises it
could not containâstagflation and the Vietnam War, most notably. But there was
more to it than that. Abroad, the horrors and absurdities of communism became
clearer. At home, millions of oppressed Americans marched, sat-in, and organized
for rights. A change in values took hold. The promise of collective action lost its
luster. Nurturing the dignity and genius of the individual, in the face of regimes
that seemed to squelch both, became the reigning ethos.
A new kind of individualism was ascendant, and not just on the right. The
New Deal Democrats found themselves challenged by the New Left. âWe seek the
establishment of a democracy of individual participation, governed by two central
aims,â read the Port Huron Statement, a left-wing student activist manifesto
written in 1962. âThat the individual share in those social decisions determining
the quality and direction of his life; that society be organized to encourage
independence in men and provide the media for their common participation.â4
Policy is downstream of values, and by the 1970s, Washington was a changed
place. Jimmy Carter, a Democrat, deregulated large parts of the economy,
including the trucking and airline industries.5 In the 1980s, Ronald Reagan
slashed the high tax rates that Harry Truman had imposed and that Dwight
Eisenhower had kept.6 Much of even the liberal legislation of the ageâincluding
the major environmental bills weâve discussed throughout this bookâworked by
centering the individual, making it easier for Americans to slow the government
148by suing it. The Soviet Union collapsed, proving the supremacy of the American
model. Bill Clinton emerged as the Eisenhower to Reaganâs FDR, cementing the
The Breaking Political Order
- The neoliberal political order established by Reagan and solidified by Clinton is collapsing as its core promises of prosperity through deregulation fail.
- Historical shifts in political orders occur when once-implausible ideas become inevitable due to systemic crises like the Great Depression or the 1970s inflation.
- A series of 21st-century shocks, including the Great Recession, the climate crisis, and the pandemic, have shattered public trust in established market and government narratives.
- The rise of populist movements on both the left and right signifies a rejection of the 'good life' story previously sold by party establishments.
- The current 'molten moment' of political interregnum presents a choice between a future defined by a politics of abundance or a reactionary politics of scarcity.
- Right-wing populism leverages scarcity by framing social and economic shortages as a zero-sum competition between citizens and outsiders.
One way of understanding the era weâre in is as the messy interregnum between political orders; a molten moment when old institutions are failing, traditional elites are flailing, and the public is casting about for a politics that feels like it is of today rather than of yesterday.
principles of a once-radical presidency into a political order. Clinton said the era
of big government was over, and he proved it: he did what Reagan had only
promised to do and slashed the federal budget while deregulating the financial
and IT sectors.
When the spell of a political order breaks, ideas once regarded as implausible
and unacceptable become possible and even inevitable. This happened in the
1930s, when the Great Depression created space for the rise of Rooseveltâs social-
democratic collectivism. It happened in the 1970s, when an upswing of
individualism changed the way people thought about taxing and spending,
regulating the economy, and managing our relationship to the environment.
It may be happening again.
We are in a rare period in American history, when the decline of one political
order makes space for another. The crack-up was decades in the making. It started
with the Great Recession, which shattered a broad belief in deregulated markets.
The climate crisis revealed how much the profit motive missed. The aftermath of
normalizing trade with China proved that the prophets of free trade understood
neither China nor America.
Throughout the 2010s, a slow economic recovery fueled public resentment of
inequality, and an affordability crisis gathered steam. In 2020, the pandemic
obliterated many Americansâ trust in government, or what was left of it. And
between 2021 and 2024, inflation brought national attention to our interlocking
crises of scarcity, supply, and unaffordability. For years, the boundaries of
American politics had felt fixed, even settled. But now they are falling.
âFor a political order to triumph, it must have a narrative, a story it tells about
the good life,â Gerstle says. Todayâs politics are suffused with cynicism and
pessimism about government because âa way of living sold to us as good and
achievable is no longer good, or no longer achievable.â7 In 2016, the rise of Bernie
Sanders on the left and the rise of Donald Trump on the right revealed how many
Americans had stopped believing that the life they had been promised was
achievable. What both the socialist left and the populist-authoritarian right
understood was that the story that had been told by the establishments of both
parties, the story that had kept their movements consigned to the margins, had
come to its end.
Transitions between orders are provoked by crises that can feel like
derangements. As the tectonic plates of American politics shift, once-settled
149questions reopen, and once-unthinkable answers vie to become a new consensus.
One way of understanding the era weâre in is as the messy interregnum between
political orders; a molten moment when old institutions are failing, traditional
elites are flailing, and the public is casting about for a politics that feels like it is of
today rather than of yesterday.
A Fork in the Road: Scarcity or Abundance?
This may be the moment for a politics of abundance. But the arc of history does
not always bend toward our beliefs. There is no guarantee that the next political
order will align with our values. Its opposite is just as likely.
The politics of scarcity can be seductive. When there is not enough to go
around, we look with suspicion on anyone who might take what we have. In the
2024 election, JD Vance spoke often of the inadequacy of housing supply, which
he wielded as a cudgel against immigrants. âIllegal aliens competing with
Americans for scarce homes is one of the most significant drivers of home prices
in the country,â he said in the vice presidential debate.8 Donald Trump sounded
the same themes. Voters âcannot ignore the impact that the flood of 21 million
illegal aliens has had on driving up housing costs,â he warned.9
Right-wing populism seeks power by closing doors, halting change, and
venerating the businesses and dominance hierarchies of the past. Scarcity is its
The Rise of Scarcity Politics
- Liberal zoning regulations and housing shortages have fueled an affordability crisis that right-wing populists successfully harnessed.
- The perception of government weakness and corruption has led to a growing desire for strongmen who promise to deliver on failed democratic goals.
- China's rapid infrastructure development and industrial capacity have created a sense of envy and insecurity within the American political establishment.
- Donald Trump's political rise was centered on a visceral obsession with manufacturing and a rejection of the 'learn to code' economic consensus.
- While Trump successfully shattered the existing political consensus on trade and China, he struggled to implement a constructive building program.
- The Biden administration has surprisingly maintained and even expanded upon several of Trump's protectionist and anti-China economic premises.
The tendency to turn against outsiders in the face of critical shortages is not restricted to a basket of deplorables. Itâs in all of us.
handmaiden. So too is the sense that governments today are weak and corrupt
and, therefore, that strongmen are needed to see the world clearly and deliver on
democracyâs failed promises.
Liberals might detest the language that Trump and Vance use to demonize
immigrants. But blue America practices its own version of scarcity politics.
Zoning regulations in liberal states and cities that restrict housing supply have
increased costs far more than the recent influx of immigrants. These restrictions
exacerbated an affordability crisis that was harnessed by the right. Thus, the
mistakes of liberals contributed to the rise of illiberalism. âThe tendency to turn
against outsiders in the face of critical shortages is not restricted to a basket of
deplorables,â Jerusalem Demsas wrote in the Atlantic. âItâs in all of us. Most
people see others as a threat to their resources, whether itâs immigrants coming for
your housing, yuppies pushing up rents, other students taking slots at all the
good schools, or just more people on the road, adding to congestion.â10
150As the chronic housing shortage and affordability crisis destabilized the
reigning political order internally, Americaâs greatest external threat has been the
rise of China, a superpower that many now fear and even envy. How could they
build so much as we struggled to complete even simple projects? As sluggishness
and process came to feel like the defining features of American governance, it
became common, even at the heights of American power, to hear Chinaâs speed
and capacity spoken of wistfully. âSit and watch us for seven daysâjust watch the
[Senate] floor,â Senator Michael Bennet said in 2010. âYou know what youâll see
happening? Nothing. When Iâm in the chair, I sit there thinking, I wonder what
theyâre doing in China right now?â11
China has been the great shadow pressure on American politics over the past
two decades. The confidence brought by the fall of the Soviet Union has been
replaced by a fear that China has learned what weâve forgotten. In Washington, a
consensus began to crumble. Republicans and Democrats alike had been too
complacent about what Chinaâs rise meant for American workers and too certain
that a richer China would embrace American values. But the blindness was not
just about what China was capable of. It was also about what America was losing
the capacity to do.
Itâs no accident that the most forceful challenge to this miasma of
complacency and fear came from Donald Trumpâa âbuilderâ whose economic
appeal centered around an obsession with manufacturing jobs and a deep
suspicion of trade. Americaâs political and economic class had ceased to see the
value in making things. Workers were told to learn how to code even as
Washington kept proving that America had forgotten how to build. Trump
didnât care whether you knew how to code, but he seemed viscerally disgusted
that America couldnât build as it once could, and that it didnât value the people
whoâd once done that work.
âI have been talking about China for many years. And you know what?
Nobody listened,â Trump said in 2016. âBut they are listening now. That, I can
tell you.â12
The temperament needed to shatter a consensus does not often coexist with
the judiciousness and patience needed to build something better in its place.
Trump slapped tariffs on China and called Covid the âKung Flu,â13 but he did
little to solve the problems he ran on. He promised one âinfrastructure weekâ
after another without ever passing an infrastructure bill. Trump understood the
151dark side of competition, but he never understood the possibilities of
cooperation.
To the surprise of many, Joe Biden, as thorough a creature of the Washington
establishment as has ever held the presidency, accepted many of Trumpâs
premises. He kept Trumpâs anti-China tariffs and added more.14 He barred the
export of key technologies to China.15 He never sought to revise or revisit the
The Rise of Abundance Politics
- President Biden adopted a Trump-like view of China's manufacturing supremacy as a challenge to the American spirit, leading to a shift in national investment strategy.
- The Biden administration passed historic legislation including the CHIPS Act and the Inflation Reduction Act to revitalize domestic manufacturing and infrastructure.
- While Donald Trump focused on a politics of scarcity and border closure, he largely abandoned his own successes like Operation Warp Speed.
- A new 'politics of abundance' is emerging among liberals, characterized by the YIMBY movement's push for massive housing construction.
- Environmentalists have shifted from a rhetoric of sacrifice to a strategy of expanding clean energy supply to match the lifestyle Americans desire.
- External threats from China and internal crises have converged to make a new, supply-side liberal agenda politically possible.
Under Trump, âinfrastructure weekâ was a meme. Under Biden, it became an ethos.
Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal that the Obama administration had
negotiated, which would have reduced trade barriers between the US and several
countries on either side of the Pacific Ocean.16 Biden even seemed to accept the
way that Trump saw Chinaâs manufacturing supremacy as an indictment of the
American spirit. âSomewhere along the way, we stopped investing in ourselves,â
Biden said in 2021. âWe stopped investing in our people. And weâve risked losing
our edge as a nation. I donât even think it was conscious, but thatâs just whatâs
happened. And China and the rest of the world are moving to catch up and, in
some cases, in certain areas, move ahead.â17
Under Trump, âinfrastructure weekâ was a meme. Under Biden, it became an
ethos. In his four years in office, Biden put his name to several laws that broke
with the anti-build trend of modern politics. With the bipartisan infrastructure
bill, he signed the largest authorization of infrastructure spending since the
Interstate Highway program of the 1950s.18 With the CHIPS and Science Act, he
announced Americaâs intention to invest billions of dollars in scientific discovery
and inventionâand tens of billions more to build advanced computer chips
within our borders.19 With the Inflation Reduction Act, the US passed the largest
clean energy bill in its history, with record investments in electric vehicles,
batteries, solar and wind manufacturing, and next-generation climate technology,
such as carbon-removal plants.20 The core of this agendaâsubsidies for
computer chips and clean energy, historic investments in infrastructureâused
the spur of China to get America building and manufacturing at home again. As
in the 1930s, and again in the 1970s, external threats and internal crises are
converging and making possible a new kind of politics.
Abundance Emerging?
This book has offered a critique of the ways that liberals have governed and
thought over the past fifty years. It also reflects an opportunity open to liberals
152now.
Donald Trump won the 2024 election in part because of the failures of
present-day liberalism. But that is very different from saying that he won by
offering a compelling vision for Americaâs future. Trump could have run on
bringing the Texas housing miracle to the nation. Instead he ran on closing the
border. He could have run on the success of Operation Warp Speed. Instead, he
has disowned it as his coalition has rebuilt itself around skepticism of scientists
and vaccines. Elon Musk has led some of the most innovative companies of the
modern era, but according to the earliest reports of his role in Trumpâs
government, he is focused on slashing what government does rather than
reimagining what it can do. The right is abandoning many of its successes to
embrace a politics of scarcity.
That has left room for liberals to embrace what Republicans have abandoned:
a politics of abundance. In fact, there are signs that they already are.
We see it in the rise of the Yes In My Back Yard (or YIMBY) movement, a
motley collection of housing obsessives who went from haranguing officials at
public hearings in San Francisco to wielding influence nationally. Democratic
governors across the nation have passed bill after bill trying to make it easier to
build homes. In the 2024 election, one of Kamala Harrisâs first policy proposals
was to build 3 million new homes:21 a supply-side policy that reflected a decade of
persuasion and organizing by liberals whoâd come to see the suffering that
housing scarcity was causing in their cities.
We see it in the climate movement, which helped persuade the Biden
administration to pass a slew of bills intended to expand the supply of clean
energy and pull forward needed innovations like green hydrogen.
Environmentalists realized that sacrifice and scarcity was a losing politics. They
needed a strategy that married the life Americans want with the clean energy the
The Fettering of Abundance
- Despite massive investments in green energy and housing, bureaucratic layers and compliance costs have stalled actual construction.
- The slow rollout of infrastructure, such as EV charging stations, creates a political irony where future administrations may benefit from current legislation.
- The 'abundance' agenda requires dismantling decades of regulatory hurdles and interest-group compromises that prioritize process over completion.
- A growing 'degrowth' movement on the left argues for regression as a solution to environmental damage, contrasting with traditional leftist goals.
- Classical Marxism originally viewed the acceleration of productive forces as a necessary step toward a post-scarcity society.
- The current economic paradigm is described as 'fettering' production by prioritizing immediate profit over transformative technological advancement.
The bitter irony is that Trump and the Republicans might benefit from legislation Biden and the Democrats passed simply because the government spends and builds so slowly, so the changes Biden promised will now happen on Trumpâs watch.
planet could tolerate. Investments in solar and wind installation, in electric vehicle
plants and factories to manufacture next-generation batteries, have rocketed
upward since.
But none of this will be easy. In California broadly, and San Francisco
specifically, dozens of pro-housing bills have not led to the construction of more
homes, in part because those bills are layered with additional requirements and
standards that builders must meet in order to take advantage of the newly
streamlined processes. For developers we spoke to, the added costs of compliance
werenât worth it, so the legislation hadnât led them to build any new homes at all,
much less build them faster.
153The breakneck deployment of wind and solar infrastructure and battery
manufacturing has been slowed by outdated permitting and procurement rules
that split the Democratic coalition. A difficulty that Biden and Harris had in
trying to run on their record in 2024 was that few communities were yet seeing
benefit from all this construction their policies were meant to spark. The
infrastructure bill, for instance, included $7.5 billion to build a national network
of 500,000 electric vehicle charging stations; by March 2024âmore than two
years after the bill passedâonly seven new chargers were up and running.22 The
bitter irony is that Trump and the Republicans might benefit from legislation
Biden and the Democrats passed simply because the government spends and
builds so slowly, so the changes Biden promised will now happen on Trumpâs
watch.
The word âabundanceâ speaks of a cornucopia, all good things for everybody.
But the world of abundance has trade-offs, and trade-offs require choices. Liberals
spent decades working, at every level of government and society, to make it harder
to build recklessly. They got used to crafting coalitions and legislation that gave
everyone a bit of what they wanted, even if it meant the final product was
astonishingly expensive, or slow to construct, or perhaps never found its way to
completion at all. To unmake this machine will be painful. It will require
questioning treasured nostrums and splitting old alliances.
It will also require opposing visions of scarcity that are gaining adherents on
the left. The values of the degrowther movement have gained momentum among
Western intellectuals. The environmental devastation that has accompanied
modernity seems like an equation with an obvious solution: If this is what
progress has wrought, then regress is necessary. If this is the cost of going forward,
then we must go backward. In its strongest versions, this philosophy is too
politically impractical to gain many adherents or wield much power. But its
weaker manifestations are everywhere and have been since âSmall Is Beautifulâ
became a rallying cry in the â70s.
Comparatively, abundance is a return to an older tradition of leftist thought.
In The Com m unist M anifesto, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels acknowledged that
capitalism was superior to its predecessor, feudalism, at producing goods and
wealth. âThe bourgeoisie, during its rule of scarce one hundred years, has created
more massive and more colossal productive forces than have all preceding
generations together,â they wrote.23 They did not want to end this revolution in
production. They wanted to accelerate it.
154Just as feudalism blocked production that only capitalism could unleash, so
did capitalism constrain an abundance that a new paradigm might unleash. Core
to this analysis of the economy was an idea that has come to be called the
âfettering of production.â24 Marx observed that many companiesâ obsession with
profit kept the entire economy from exploring ideas that threatened incumbent
margins or failed to produce immediate returns. Among capitalismâs many sins,
Marx wrote, was that it prevented the most wondrous and useful technology
The Abundance Agenda
- Marx's analysis suggests that an economy filled with 'useless fettering' serves the elite while stifling shared abundance.
- A simple list of policy proposals is insufficient because the core issues involve conflicting values and jurisdictional disputes.
- Current systems designed for grassroots participation have often been captured by incumbents to block necessary growth.
- The 'Abundance Agenda' is proposed as a new lens for politics, focusing on what is scarce that should be plentiful.
- The authors argue for a cultural and legal shift similar to the environmentalist movement of the 1960s and 70s.
It can be difficult, in a raucous town meeting, to look around and remember who is not there: the mother working two jobs, the young family who couldnât afford the apartment they so badly wanted to move into.
from being invented and deployed in the first place. An economy run amok with
useless fettering serves the rich few at the expense of the poorer many.
Marxâs aim was not to turn the production machine off, but to direct its ends
toward a shared abundance: to unburden the forces of production and make
possible that which had been impossible to imagine. There is much he got wrong,
but one need not be a communist to see the wisdom in this analysis.
A Lens, Not a List
We considered calling this book âThe Abundance Agenda.â We could have easily
filled these pages with a long list of policy ideas to ease the blockages we fear.
On housing, for example, cities should reform their zoning laws to make it
easier to build homes and apartments of all sizes, legalize the construction of
accessory dwelling units, reduce parking requirements, and pass new laws to
create maximum permitting wait times. Stopping individuals or developers from
building places for people to live on land they own should require unusual cause.
Building homes, at a time when housing is scarce, should not.
The political economy of those ideas is fraught. It requires passing law after
law in city after city. Todayâs housing rules are exquisitely local, which would be
appropriate if housing policy was bound by city limits. But the consequences of
housing policy reverberate across states, and even across the nation. Gate the great
cities of California and families flee to Texas and Arizona. When you allow
housing to become scarce where the wages are highest, you shut down a powerful
engine that long kept social mobility in America high. So what level of
governmentâand of societyâis appropriate for housing policy? Should it be run
by states? By the federal government?
This is where the shortcomings of a list of policy proposals become clear. It is
easy to unfurl a policy wish list. But what is ultimately at stake here are our values.
How do we weigh the role that the current inhabitants of a community should
155have in who enters that community next? How do we balance the interests of a
town against the interests of a country?
Changing the processes that make building and inventing so hard now
requires confrontations with whether the systems liberals have built really reflect
the ends theyâve sought. Much that was designed to foster grassroots participation
has been captured by incumbents and special interests. It can be difficult, in a
raucous town meeting, to look around and remember who is not there: the
mother working two jobs, the young family who couldnât afford the apartment
they so badly wanted to move into. âThis is what democracy looks likeâ is a
common chant at protests, but what democracy should look like is a devilishly
hard question to answer.
What we are proposing is less a set of policy solutions than a new set of
questions around which our politics should revolve. What is scarce that should be
abundant? What is difficult to build that should be easy? What inventions do we
need that we do not yet have?
In the 1960s and â70s, environmentalism wasnât just a legislative sea change, a
legal revolution, or a cultural phenomenon. It was all of them at once. Americans
developed new ideas about their relationship to land and their stewardship of
nature. New ideas gave way to new laws, new arguments, and new customs.
People working at all levels of society, inside and outside government, brought
those ideas into their labors.
The environmentalist movement bequeathed both correction and
overcorrection, but it transformed the country for decadesâit is transforming the
country even nowâbecause it touched something weightier than the legislatorâs
Abundance Versus Scarcity
- The text proposes that policy and law should act as a lens to identify specific barriers to progress across different sectors.
- While various national challenges share common themes, they are distinct enough to require tailored solutions rather than a single unified answer.
- The 1964 Worldâs Fair in New York serves as a historical symbol of American genius, transforming a 'valley of ashes' into a vision of the future.
- Exhibits like the 'Futurama II' predicted a future of lunar colonies and advanced infrastructure, reflecting a mid-century era of high ambition.
- President Lyndon B. Johnson framed the American trajectory as a choice between two faces of progress: abundance or annihilation.
- Modern technological possibilities now exceed the boldest prophecies of the past, yet the challenge of choosing development over desolation remains.
There are rhymes that we have found across these challenges, echoes across these problems, but they are not unified enough to yield a single set of answers.
pen. More than a law, it was a lens. A US senator could look through it and see
the bills that needed to be written. A judge could look through it and see new
decisions that needed to be made. A family could look through it and see that
they were wasting too much and recycling too little. A heady college student
could look through it and see a cause.
A lens is what we have sought to offer here. What keeps an apartment building
from being built in San Jose is not what keeps a new transmission line from being
built in Oklahoma. What keeps the IRS from successfully updating its software is
not what has kept a high-speed rail system from being completed in California.
What keeps an ambitious young scientist from proposing his best ideas is not
what keeps us from discovering and scaling new ways to make cement. There are
rhymes that we have found across these challenges, echoes across these problems,
but they are not unified enough to yield a single set of answers.
156Abundance Versus Scarcity
In 1964, at the turning point between two orders, New York City hosted a
Worldâs Fair to show off the stuff of our national genius. The scene was Flushing,
a three-mile stretch of natural marshlands in Queens. In the 1920s, the area had
been so full of trash and vermin that F. Scott Fitzgerald described it in The Great
Gatsby as âthe valley of ashes.â25 But for the Worldâs Fair, this grim meadow was
transformed into a glistening global sensation, with 140 pavilions across almost
700 acres, celebrating US history and accomplishment.
More than 50 million people passed through the event gates, strolling by
inventions that would soon fill their department stores and homes. Bell Labs had
an exhibition that introduced millions of Americans to their first
âPicturephone.â26 Westinghouse showed off a new electric toothbrush and credit
card, before placing both in a time capsule to be opened in several thousand
years.27 At the fairâs most popular event, the General Motors âFuturama IIâ
exhibition, tens of millions of people glided through elaborate dioramas that
imagined life at the end of the twentieth century. âIt is now tomorrow⌠on the
moon,â a voiceover began, as the audience rolled up to a model of astronaut
farmers building their first lunar bridgehead.28 At another station in the
exhibition, the diorama of a cityscape imagined a new system of double-decker
highways connecting downtowns, whose skyscrapers had taken on the shape of
towering, elongated eggs.
At the fairâs opening ceremony, President Johnson delivered a dramatic
keynote address, with this remarkable passage:
The abundance and the might represented here is far beyond the vision of
those early settlers. America has been transformed from an outpost of the
edge of wilderness to one of the great nations of the world. The number of
people who will visit your fair will be seventy times the entire population of
North America when New York was born.
The last time New York had a Worldâs fair, we also tried to predict the
future. A daring exhibit proclaimed that in the 1960âs it would really be
possible to cross the country in less than 24 hours, flying as high as 10,000
feet; that an astounding 38 million cars would cross our highways. There
was no mention of outer space, or atomic power, or wonder drugs that
could destroy disease.
157These were bold prophecies back there in 1939. But, again, the reality
has far outstripped the vision.
Then Johnson issued a warning. âOur pride in accomplishment must not ignore
the fact that our progress has had two faces,â he said. âIts final directionâ
abundance or annihilationâdevelopment or desolation⌠is in your hands.â29
Six decades later, our technological frontier gleams with greater possibilities
The Politics of Abundance
- Modern society faces an existential binary between abundance and scarcity, requiring a shift toward supply-side solutions for housing, energy, and technology.
- Pursuing abundance necessitates institutional renewal and a willingness to critique government failures even when one supports the state's role.
- Systemic failures like infrastructure delays and manufacturing loss are not exceptions but the predictable results of outdated rules and movements.
- Political orders are complex projects requiring long-term investment, think tanks, and a moral vision that inspires voters with a 'good life.'
- Successful movements bridge the future and the past, framing new policy agendas within traditional national virtues like freedom.
The purpose of a system is what it does.
than the 1964 Worldâs Fair could imagine. Medicines that erase complex diseases.
Factories that slurp pollution from the sky. Intelligent machines that assist in the
great project of living longer, healthier, and happier lives. But just as Johnson saw
his own age darkened by the possibility of catastrophic politics, so too do we face
an existential binary for our own time: abundance or scarcity.
Abundance reorients politics around a fresh provocation: Can we solve our
problem s with supply? Many valuable questions bloom from this deceptively
simple prompt. If there are not enough homes, can we make more? If not, why
not? If there is not enough clean energy, can we make more? If not, why not? If
the government is repeatedly failing to complete major projects on time and on
budget, then what is going wrong and how do we fix it? If the rate of scientific
progress is slowing, how can we help scientists do their best work? If we need new
technologies to solve our important problems, how do we pull these inventions
from the future and distribute them in the present?
To pursue abundance is to pursue institutional renewal. One of the most
dangerous political pathologies is the tendency to defend whatever your enemies
attack. Decades of attacks on the state have turned liberals into reflexive
champions of government. But if you believe in government, you must make it
work. To make it work, you must be clear-eyed about when it fails and why it
fails.
What has surprised us most in this project have been the blind spotsâour
own, as much as anyone elseâs. Stories we once saw as exceptions to the rule of
well-functioning governmentâa public works project that went over budget and
remained unfinished; an absurd price tag on a public toilet; the explosion of
homelessness in blue cities; the profusion of lawsuits against even well-meaning
infrastructure projects; the loss of manufacturing leadership in core technologies;
the absence of an agenda that harnesses invention to social purposeânow seem
frighteningly close to the norm. The purpose of a system is what it does. If an
outcome recurs again and again, across time and place, it is the result of choices
that became rules. Which means it is the result of ideas and movements.
158The ideas and movements of the last few decades are not our villains. They
were the responses to the crises of another time. They succeeded, often brilliantly.
That we have not matched our institutions to our moment is our failure, not
theirs. If we succeed, then future generations will have to grapple with our
excesses to meet their moment. Let us hope.
But before the future, the present. âEstablishing a political order demands far
more than winning an election or two,â Gerstle writes.
It requires deep-pocketed donors (and political action committees) to
invest in promising candidates over the long term; the establishment of
think tanks and policy networks to turn political ideas into actionable
programs; a rising political party able to consistently win over multiple
electoral constituencies; a capacity to shape political opinion both at the
highest levels (the Supreme Court) and across popular print and broadcast
media; and a moral perspective able to inspire voters with visions of the
good life. Political orders, in other words, are complex projects that require
advances across a broad front.30
Political movements succeed when they build a vision of the future that is imbued
with the virtues of the past. In the 1930s, Franklin D. Roosevelt pitched his
expansive view of government as a sentinel for American freedomsâof speech, of
worship, from want, from fear. Five decades later, Reagan hailed the same virtues,
this time by casting government as freedomâs nemesis rather than its protector.
Just as freedom has historically loomed large in the American consciousness,
The American Story of Abundance
- Early European settlers and visitors were consistently awestruck by the continent's unprecedented natural wealth and soil quality.
- Historian David Potter argues that the American character was fundamentally forged by both the reality and the belief in perpetual plenitude.
- Modern standards of living have advanced so far that the 'abundance' of the past would be considered absolute deprivation today.
- The authors argue that America is currently shifting toward a narrative of scarcity, which threatens to diminish the national character and political ambition.
- A 'politics of abundance' is proposed as a return to a liberalism that builds tangible things like homes, energy, and medical cures.
- This vision of abundance requires aligning technological progress with institutional renewal to meet the needs of both people and the planet.
That is a measure of our success, but it is also a reminder that both abundance and scarcity are stories we tell ourselves.
so has abundance. The theme of plenty filled the journals and letters of the first
European writers who took stock of the continent. âTake foure of the best
kingdomes in Christendome and put them all together, they may no way
compare with this countrie either for commodities or goodnesse of soil,â Sir
Thomas Dale, the deputy governor of Virginia, said of his colony in 1611. In the
following centuries, visitors and residents gawked at Americaâs wealth of land,
food, and opportunities. In 1817, William Cobbett, a British writer, wrote of the
American diet that âsuch an abundance is spread before you⌠that you instantly
lose all restraint.â31
It was this abundance, Potter argues in People of Plenty, that formed the
American character. It was in the midst of not just actual plenitude, but the belief
in plenitude, that our peculiar set of ideals and aspirations could form. The
abundance of his dayâto say nothing of the abundance of the first decades of the
159American experimentâwould be absolute deprivation by our standards. That is a
measure of our success, but it is also a reminder that both abundance and scarcity
are stories we tell ourselves. Right now, we see an America that is turning toward a
story of scarcity. That turn is changing not just our politics, but our national
character.
We seek a politics of abundance that delivers real marvels in the real world. We
want more homes and more energy, more cures and more construction. This is a
story that must be built out of bricks and steel and solar panels and transmission
lines, not just words. But it is a story, and we believe it is truer to the American
character and experience, truer to both what we have done and what we will do,
than the narrow narrative of scarcity that has taken hold.
Abundance contains within it a bigness that befits the American project. It is
the promise of not just more, but more of what matters. It is a commitment to
the endless work of institutional renewal. It is a recognition that technology is at
the heart of progress, and always has been. It is a determination to align our
collective genius with the needs of both the planet and each other. Abundance is
liberalism, yes. But more than that, it is a liberalism that builds.
160Acknowledgments
THE BOOK ABUN DAN CE IS ONLY possible because of the abundance of support,
partnership, and provocation in our professional and personal lives.
Letâs begin with the professional. Gail Ross is a dream agent and the best kind
of person to have in your corner. She was boundlessly supportive of the bookâ
but also of us, the harried human beings who were often struggling to write it.
We couldnât have had a better editorial partner than Ben Loehnen, whose
intelligent edits and pitch-perfect balance of cheer and urgency saw the project
through completion. His team at Avid Reader Press is top-notch. Many thanks to
Carolyn Kelly for guiding the book through production; to Alison Forner, for
spearheading the design of our beautiful jacket; and to Meredith Vilarello and
Alexandra Primiani, for coordinating the marketing and book tour with such
grace. The fact-checking process was overseen with painstaking expertise by Janet
Byrne. Alayna Kennedy provided essential research for the project while we were
putting together the outlines and core arguments for the chapters.
Behind this book lurk more conversations with more people than we can
thank here. But weâve particularly benefited from a community of thinkers and
writers whoâve been chiseling away at these ideas, including Alex Tabarrok, Brink
Lindsey, Henry Farrell, Heidi Williams, Jennifer Pahlka, Jesse Jenkins, Jerusalem
Demsas, Marc Dunkelson, Matthew Yglesias, Noah Smith, Patrick Collison,
RogĂŠ Karma, Saul Griffith, Steven Teles, Tyler Cowen, and the folks at the
Institute for Progress. Special thanks go to Heidi, Jesse, and Jerusalem, for reading
early chapters and offering generous comments; and to Steve, the Center for
Acknowledgments of Support and Gratitude
- The authors express deep gratitude to academic institutions like Johns Hopkins and Stanford for providing early intellectual workshops.
- They credit their respective media organizations, The New York Times and The Atlantic, for fostering high-quality journalism and long-form arguments.
- A significant portion of the text is dedicated to the editors and production teams who refined the book's reporting and historical context.
- The authors reflect on personal milestones, including Derek Thompson's transition into fatherhood during the writing process.
- Family members are honored as foundational influences, with specific credit given to parents for instilling a passion for politics and social conscience.
- The section concludes with intimate tributes to partners and children, highlighting the personal sacrifices made during the book's creation.
When I started writing this book, I was just a husband. When I finished writing this book, I was a dad.
Economy and Society at Johns Hopkinâs SNF Agora Institute, and the Center for
Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford for an early workshop that
helped sharpen our ideas.
We are lucky to be employed by two institutions, the N ew York Tim es and the
Atlantic, whose support for and commitment to high-quality journalism are
unparalleled. Derek would like to thank Bob Cohn for hiring him when he didnât
really know what he was doing, Jeffrey Goldberg for kindly maintaining his
161employment, Juliet Lapidos for her relentlessly wise and efficient edits, and Don
Peck for his masterly ability to shape argument in long-form. He would also like
to thank the wonderful team at the Ringer for supporting his podcast, the
conversations for which deepened much of the reporting for this book (and
which is also just a lot of fun to do).
Ezra thanks A. G. Sulzberger, Sam Dolnick, and Kathleen Kingsbury for their
remarkable support and counsel. Aaron Retica is a truly astonishing editor,
mentor, and friend, and this book benefited enormously from his insight,
wisdom, and esoteric historical references. And it is hard to know how to
properly thank the entire Ezra Klein Show teamâAman Sahota, Annie Galvin,
Claire Gordon, Jack McCordick, Elias Isquith, Jeff Geld, Kristin Lin, Michelle
Harris, and Rollin Huâfor their partnership and incisiveness.
As lucky as we are in employment, we are even more so in friends and family.
For Derek: Thanks first and forever to my parents, for their undying love. To
my dad, in whose lap I first learned to care about politics and journalism, and to
my mom, in whose arms I learned everything else. You are both so missed and so
eternally present. To Momi, danke for your love and support. To Kira, my
extraordinary sister, thank you for being the rock of the family and an inspiration
to me. Thanks to my friendsâthe Potomac crew, the Northwestern crew, and the
Cultâand to Drew, for a lifetime of friendship and true brotherhood.
Thanks to the ones I call home. Laura, thank god I found you. Your wisdom,
your counsel, your softness and light: you are the most extraordinary partner and
the one I want to come running to when the writing is done. And then there is
Isla. When I started writing this book, I was just a husband. When I finished
writing this book, I was a dad. Thanks to my little one, the gift of a lifetime.
For Ezra: This is the hardest part of the book to write. All words fall short.
Thank you to my friends: to the kuddelmuddel; to Charlie and Bess and Theo
and Harry, for all the Blobbing; to PJ, for long hangs and much-needed lightness;
to Tristan, for decades of friendship and insights and arguments; to Teresa, for the
meandering voice notes, for asking the right questions, and for so much care and
kindness; to Grant, for seeing me so clearly, for continually bringing me back to
the reasons for this work, and for always being there.
Thank you to my family: to my mother, for reading me those 400 books and
keeping me at the table while she canvassed, and for always, always seeing the best
in me; to my father, who was my first and best example of taking ideas and news
seriously, and for modeling an insistence that sense could be made of this world;
to my brother, whose social conscience sparked my own, and whose activism
162made me believe that politics was a realm you could simply choose to be part of;
to my sister, who makes me laugh like no one else does and who understands
what no one else does; to Linda and Sara, for their thoughtfulness and
compassion; and to John and Celine Lowrey, for being such wonderful
grandparents.
And then thereâs the family I have built. To Moses and Kieran, who light my
world. I am so glad to have my weekends with them back. And to Annie. To
Annie. To Annie. I have benefited so much from her brillianceââthe
Acknowledgments and Author Profiles
- The author expresses deep personal and intellectual gratitude to his wife, crediting her for key concepts like the 'affordability crisis.'
- Ezra Klein is highlighted as a New York Times columnist and author of the bestseller 'Why Weâre Polarized.'
- Derek Thompson is introduced as an Atlantic staff writer and author of 'Hit Makers' and 'On Work.'
- The text transitions into backmatter, including promotional offers for Simon & Schuster ebooks and social media links.
- The notes section begins by citing historical economic concepts like the Laffer Curve and presidential addresses from Carter and Clinton.
- Initial citations focus on the 'cost disease' and the societal impact of rising housing and healthcare expenses.
Every day, I wake up wanting to know what sheâll say next. It is my great gift to be in partnership with her. She is my abundance.
affordability crisisâ is her coinage and concept, and so much else that lodges in my
mind is rooted in the unending conversation that is our marriage. And I have
benefited beyond measure from her support: When I didnât see a path to finishing
this book, she cleared one for me. As with this book, so with my life. Every day, I
wake up wanting to know what sheâll say next. It is my great gift to be in
partnership with her. She is my abundance.
163More from the Authors
Why W e're Polarized
164About the Authors
Š LUCAS FOGLIA
EZRA KLEIN is an opinion columnist and host of the award-winning Ezra Klein
Show podcast at the N ew York Tim es. He is the author of W hy W eâre Polarized,
an instant N ew York Tim es bestseller, named one of Barack Obamaâs top books of
2022. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.
Š SHAUGHN AND JOHN, INC.
165DEREK THOMPSON is a staff writer at the Atlantic and the host of the podcast
Plain English. He is the author of the national bestseller H it M akers and On
W ork, an anthology of his writing on labor and technology. He lives in Chapel
Hill, North Carolina.
AvidReaderPress.com
SimonandSchuster .com
www .SimonandSchuster .com/Authors/Ezra-Klein
www .SimonandSchuster .com/Authors/Derek-Thompson
@avidreaderpress
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166ALSO BY EZRA KLEIN
Why Weâre Polarized
ALSO BY DEREK THOMPSON
Hit Makers:
The Science of Popularity in an Age of Distraction
On Work:
Money, Meaning, Identity
167We hope you enjoyed reading this
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168Notes
Introduction: Beyond Scarcity
1. Laffer Curve Napkin, National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution, September
14, 1974, https://www.si.edu/object/laffer-curve-napkin%3Anmah_1439217; âCan Countries Lower
Taxes and Raise Revenues?,â Economist, June 18, 2019, https://www.economist.com/graphic-
detail/2019/06/18/can-countries-lower-taxes-and-raise-revenues.
2. President Jimmy Carter, State of the Union Address Delivered Before a Joint Session of the Congress,
January 19, 1978, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/the-state-the-union-address-
delivered-before-joint-session-the-congress-1.
3. President William Jefferson Clinton, State of the Union Address, US Capitol, January 23, 1996,
https://clintonwhitehouse4.archives.gov/WH/New/other/sotu.html.
4. Steven Teles, Samuel Hammond, and Daniel Takash, âCost Disease Socialism: How Subsidizing Costs
While Restricting Supply Drives Americaâs Fiscal Imbalance,â Niskanen Center, September 9, 2021,
https://www.niskanencenter.org/cost-disease-socialism-how-subsidizing-costs-while-restricting-
supply-drives-americas-fiscal-imbalance/.
5. Derek Fidler and Hicham Sabir, âThe Cost of Housing Is Tearing Our Society Apart,â World
Economic Forum, January 9, 2019, https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/01/why-housing-
appreciation-is-killing-housing/; Alexander Hermann, âHousing Perspectives,â Joint Center for
Housing Studies of Harvard University, January 22, 2024, https://www.jchs.harvard.edu/blog/home-
price-income-ratio-reaches-record-high-0.
6. KFF, â2023 Employer Health Benefits Survey,â October 18, 2023, https://www.kff.org/report-
section/ehbs-2023-section-1-cost-of-health-insurance/#figure11.
7. Digest of Education Statistics, table 330.10: Average Undergraduate Tuition and Fees and Room and
Board Rates Charged for Full-Time Students in Degree-Granting Postsecondary Institutions, by Level
and Control of Institution: Selected Years, 1963â64 Through 2018â19, National Center for
The Great Affordability Crisis
- Comprehensive data tracks the escalating costs of higher education and child care across the United States.
- Economic analysis suggests that despite periods of growth, American families are being 'bled dry' by rising living expenses.
- Global environmental reports identify the primary contributors to carbon dioxide emissions and the urgency of climate action.
- Renewable energy sectors are showing increased competitiveness even in the face of global cost inflation.
- Legislative and industrial shifts are documented through California's clean car regulations and the aging infrastructure of U.S. nuclear power plants.
In One of the Best Decades the American Economy Has Ever Recorded, Families Were Bled Dry.
Education Statistics, https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d19/tables/dt19_330.10.asp; Melanie
Hanson, âAverage Cost of College by Year,â EducationData.org, September 9, 2024,
https://educationdata.org/average-cost-of-college-by-year; Melanie Hanson, âAverage Cost of College
by State,â EducationData.org, September 16, 2024, https://educationdata.org/average-cost-of-college-
bystate; College Board, âTrends in College Pricing: Highlights,â 2023â24 school year, date of report:
2024, https://research.collegeboard.org/trends/college-pricing/highlights.
8. Eric Cutler, âTrue Cost of Child Care by State,â January 23, 2024,
https://tootris.com/edu/blog/parents/cost-of-child-care-in-all-50-states-for-2022/.
9. Annie Lowrey, âThe Great Affordability Crisis Breaking America: In One of the Best Decades the
American Economy Has Ever Recorded, Families Were Bled Dry,â Atlantic, February 7, 2020,
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/02/great-affordability-crisis-breaking-
america/606046/.
10. âRemarks by President Biden on the December 2021 Jobs Report,â January 7, 2022,
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2022/01/07/remarks-by-president-
biden-on-the-december-2021-jobs-report/.
11. Aaron Bastani, Fully Automated Luxury Communism (London: Verso, 2019), 150â52.
16912. Bastani, Fully Automated Luxury Communism, 10.
13. Andriy Blokhin, âThe 5 Countries That Produce the Most Carbon Dioxide (CO2),â Investopedia,
July 26, 2024, https://www.investopedia.com/articles/investing/092915/5-countries-produce-most-
carbon-dioxide-co2.asp; Wolfgang Fengler, Indermit Gill, and Homi Kharas, âMaking Emissions
Count in Country Classifications,â Brookings Institution, September 7, 2023,
https://www.brookings.edu/articles/making-emissions-count-in-country-classifications/; UN
Environment Programme, âEmissions Gap Report 2023,â
https://www.unep.org/interactives/emissions-gap-report/2023/#section_0; âGlobal Emissions,â
Center for Climate and Energy Solutions, https://www.c2es.org/content/international-emissions/;
Kamwoo Lee, Jia Li, and Divyanshi Wadhwa, âFrom Climate Scient to Global Action: Who
Contributes Most to Global Greenhouse Gas Emissions?,â October 11, 2023, World Bank Blogs,
https://blogs.worldbank.org/en/opendata/climate-science-global-action-who-contributes-most-
global-greenhouse-gas-emissions.
14. âRenewables Competitiveness Accelerates, Despite Cost Inflation,â International Renewable Energy
Agency, press release, August 29, 2023,
https://www.irena.org/News/pressreleases/2023/Aug/Renewables-Competitiveness-Accelerates-
Despite-Cost-Inflation.
15. State of California Air Resources Board, Advanced Clean Cars II Regulations, Resolution 22-12,
August 25, 2022,
https://ww2.arb.ca.gov/sites/default/files/barcu/board/books/2022/082522/prores22-12.pdf.
16. US Energy Information Administration, âMost U.S. Nuclear Power Plants Were Built Between 1970
and 1990,â April 27, 2017, https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=30972; US Energy
Information Administration, âHow Old Are U.S. Nuclear Power Plants, and When Was the Newest
One Built?,â May 8, 2024, https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=228&t=21; US Energy
Information Administration, âU.S. Commercial Nuclear Capacity Comes from Reactors Built
Primarily Between 1970 and 1990,â June 30, 2011, https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?
id=2030; World Nuclear Association, âNuclear Power in the USA,â August 27, 2024, https://world-
nuclear.org/information-library/country-profiles/countries-t-z/usa-nuclear-power; Nuclear Energy
Institute, âDecommissioning Status for Shutdown U.S. Nuclear Plants,â US Nuclear Regulatory
Commission, US Department of Energy, and the International Atomic Energy Agency, updated
August 2022, https://www.nei.org/resources/statistics/decommissioning-status-for-shutdown-us-
plants; Elesia Fasching, Tyler Hodge, and Slade Johnson, âFirst New U.S. Nuclear Reactor Since 2016
Citations of American Decline
- The text provides a comprehensive list of citations focusing on the operational status of modern nuclear power plants and energy infrastructure.
- It references significant demographic shifts, specifically the 'population drain' from California to other states like Texas.
- The sources highlight a growing political and economic crisis, linking cost-of-living indices to the 'partycide' of modern progressivism.
- Historical perspectives on American abundance and the 'Consumersâ Republic' are contrasted with contemporary urban family exoduses.
- The data points toward a shifting political landscape, noting how specific California demographics moved toward Trump in the 2024 election.
The Urban Family Exodus Is a Warning for Progressives.
Is Now in Operation,â US Energy Information Administration, August 1, 2023,
https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=57280; Georgia Power, âVogtle Unit 4 Enters
Commercial Operation,â press release, April 29, 2024,
https://www.georgiapower.com/company/news-hub/pressreleases/vogtle-unit-4-enters-commercial-
operation.html; Bechtel, âAmericaâs Next Nuclear Power Plant Begins Construction,â press release,
June 10, 2024, https://www.bechtel.com/newsroom/pressreleases/americas-next-nuclear-power-
plant-begins-construction/.
17. Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business (New York:
Penguin Books, 2006), 157.
18. Tyler Cowen, âWhat Libertarianism Has Become and Will BecomeâState Capacity Libertarianism,â
Marginal Revolution, January 1, 2020,
https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2020/01/what-libertarianism-has-become-and-
will-become-state-capacity-libertarianism.html.
19. âParty Affiliation of the Mayors of the 100 Largest Cities,â Ballotpedia,
https://ballotpedia.org/Party_affiliation_of_the_mayors_of_the_100_largest_cities.
20. âCalifornia Elected Officials,â 270toWin, https://www.270towin.com/elected-officials/california.
21. âCost of Living Index by State 2024,â World Population Review,
https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/cost-of-living-index-bystate.
17022. Bruce E. Cain and Preeti Hehmeyer, âCaliforniaâs Population Drain,â Stanford University Institute
for Economic Policy Research, October 2023, https://siepr.stanford.edu/publications/policy-
brief/californias-population-drain; Alix Martichoux, âLeaving California: These Were the Top
Destinations for Californians Who Moved in 2022,â KTLA 5, October 20, 2023,
https://ktla.com/news/local-news/are-californians-still-taking-over-texas-new-census-data-reveals-
where-people-are-moving-most/.
23. William G. Howell and Terry M. Moe, Presidents, Populism, and the Crisis of Democracy (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 2020), Kindle, 6.
24. Christine Leonard, âMap Shows Which California Demographic Shifted Most Toward Trump,â San
Francisco Chronicle, November 14, 2024, https://www.sfchronicle.com/election/article/trump-vote-
california-county-19897935.php.
25. Kevin Schaul and Kati Perry, âHow Counties Are Shifting in the 2024 Presidential Election,â
Washington Post, November 6, 2024, updated November 22, 2024,
https://www.washingtonpost.com/elections/interactive/2024/11/05/compare-2020-2024-
presidential-results/.
26. US Census Bureau, âState-to-State Migration Flows,â https://www.census.gov/data/tables/time-
series/demo/geographic-mobility/state-to-state-migration.html.
27. Jerusalem Demsas, âThe Democrats Are Committing Partycide,â Atlantic, November 14, 2024,
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2024/11/democrat-states-population-
stagnation/680641/.
28. Derek Thompson, âThe Urban Family Exodus Is a Warning for Progressives,â Atlantic, August 5,
2024, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/08/the-urban-family-exodus-is-a-warning-
for-progressives/679350/.
29. David M. Potter, People of Plenty: Economic Abundance and the American Character (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1954), 164.
30. Potter, People of Plenty, 173.
31. From the title of her book: Lizabeth Cohen, A Consumersâ Republic: The Politics of Mass Consumption
in Postwar America (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2003).
1. Grow
1. Horace Greeley, The Autobiography of Horace Greeley (New York: E. B. Treat, 1872), 38, 50.
2. Potter, People of Plenty, 94.
3. Alan Brinkley, The End of Reform: New Deal Liberalism in Recession and War (New York: Vintage
Books, 1996), 132.
4. Brinkley, The End of Reform, 133.
5. Housing and Home Finance Agency, Washington, DC, âThe Housing Situationâ1950: An Analysis
of Preliminary Results of the 1950 Housing Census,â February 1951, 3,
https://www.huduser.gov/portal/sites/default/files/pdf/Housing-Situation-1951.pdf.
Economic Geography and Mobility Sources
- The citations highlight a critical tension between urban economic success and the rising cost of housing that makes many homeowners 'house poor.'
- Research from Edward Glaeser and Enrico Moretti emphasizes that cities remain the primary engines of wealth, health, and innovation despite high costs.
- The 'Wrong-Apartment Problem' suggests that even in a strong labor market, the inability to find affordable housing near jobs creates a sense of economic malaise.
- Data from major tech firms like Apple, Tesla, and Alphabet illustrates the concentration of corporate wealth within specific innovation hubs.
- Studies on intergenerational mobility by Raj Chetty reveal that the 'American Dream' is highly dependent on the specific geography and social exposure of where a person grows up.
- The decline in regional income convergence suggests that barriers to movingâsuch as housing costsâare preventing lower-income workers from relocating to high-opportunity areas.
The Wrong-Apartment Problem: Why a Good Economy Feels So Bad
6. OECD, âHousing Stock and Construction,â figure HM1.1.1, 2,
https://www.oecd.org/content/dam/oecd/en/data/datasets/affordable-housing-database/hm1-1-
housing-stock-and-construction.pdf.
7. Chamber of Commerce, âCities with the Most House Poor Homeowners,â
https://www.chamberofcommerce.org/cities-with-the-most-house-poor-homeowners/.
8. Annie Lowrey, âThe Wrong-Apartment Problem: Why a Good Economy Feels So Bad,â Atlantic, July
22, 2023, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/07/us-economy-labor-market-inflation-
housing/674790/.
9. Glaeser, Triumph of the City: How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, Greener,
Healthier, and Happier (New York: Penguin Press, 2011), Kindle, 131.
10. Diane Cardwell, âMayor Says New York Is Worth the Cost,â New York Times, January 8, 2003,
https://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/08/nyregion/mayor-says-newyork-is-worth-the-cost.html.
11. Glaeser, Triumph of the City, Kindle, 6.
17112. David Stringer, âInside Foxconnâs Plan to Build EVs,â Bloomberg, November 2, 2023,
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2023-11-02/what-does-foxconn-make-iphones-now-
but-evs-are-on-the-way-big-take?sref=VpNSse6l.
13. US Securities and Exchange Commission, Form 10-Q, Apple Inc, for the quarterly period ended April
1, 2023, https://d18rn0p25nwr6d.cloudfront.net/CIK-0000320193/52f2576b-2775-4676-b40c-
a63e2b5d8e60.pdf; Matthew Johnston, âHow Apple Makes Money,â Investopedia, June 27, 2024,
https://www.investopedia.com/how-apple-makes-money-4798689.
14. âAlphabet Announces Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2023 Results,â January 30, 2024,
https://abc.xyz/assets/95/eb/9cef90184e09bac553796896c633/2023q4-alphabet-earnings-
release.pdf.
15. US Securities and Exchange Commission, Form 10-K, Tesla, Inc., for the fiscal year ended December
31, 2023, https://ir.tesla.com/_flysystem/s3/sec/000162828024002390/tsla-20231231-gen.pdf.
16. Glaeser, Triumph of the City, Kindle, 6.
17. Katie Deighton, âGoldman Sachs Embeds Software Developers Deeper into the Business,â Wall Street
Journal, October 19, 2022, https://www.wsj.com/articles/goldman-sachs-embeds-software-
developers-deeper-into-the-business-11666218724.
18. Enrico Moretti, The New Geography of Jobs (New York: Mariner Books/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt,
2013), Kindle, loc. 1641.
19. Moretti, The New Geography of Jobs, Kindle, loc. 1673.
20. Jackson Walker, âZoom CEO Advises Employees to Return to Office or Risk Losing âTrust,â Report
Says,â CBS Austin, August 24, 2023, https://cbsaustin.com/news/nation-world/zoom-ceo-advises-
employees-to-return-to-office-or-risk-losing-trust-report-says-remote-work-telework-conferencing-
virtual-hybrid-economy-employee-face-to-face.
21. Glaeser, Triumph of the City, Kindle, 37.
22. Moretti, The New Geography of Jobs, Kindle, loc. 173.
23. Raj Chetty et al., âThe Fading American Dream: Trends in Absolute Income Mobility Since 1940,â
NBER Working Paper 22910, December 2016,
http://www.nber.org/papers/w22910andDOI10.3386/w22910.
24. Derek Thompson, âThe Secret to Reclaiming the American Dream,â Atlantic, August 26, 2022,
https://www.theatlantic.com/newsletters/archive/2022/08/american-dream-raj-chetty-
friendship/671235/.
25. Raj Chetty, Nathaniel Hendren, Patrick Kline, and Emmanuel Saez, âWhere Is the Land of
Opportunity? The Geography of Intergenerational Mobility in the United States,â June 2014,
https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/hendren/files/mobility_geo.pdf.
26. Alexander M. Bell, Raj Chetty, Xavier Jaravel, Neviana Petkova, and John Van Reenen, âDo Tax Cuts
Produce More Einsteins? The Impacts of Financial Incentives vs. Exposure to Innovation on the
Supply of Inventors,â NBER Working Paper 25493, January 2019,
http://www.nber.org/papers/w25493.
27. Peter Ganong and Daniel W. Shoag, âWhy Has Regional Income Convergence in the U.S. Declined?,â
NBER Working Paper 23609, July 2017, 2, DOI 10.3386/w23609.
The Roots of Housing Scarcity
- Scholarly citations link the decline of regional income convergence in the U.S. to restrictive land use and zoning regulations.
- Historical case studies of mid-century suburbs like Lakewood, California, illustrate the transition from rapid growth to shrinking 'California Dreams.'
- Data from the U.S. Census and Federal Reserve highlight a dramatic disparity in housing permits, noting that Dallas often permits more housing than the entire state of California.
- Research identifies antigrowth politics and historic preservation as significant factors in the development of modern liberal urban policy.
- Multiple studies conclude that homelessness is primarily a structural housing problem driven by high costs and low supply rather than individual pathologies.
Life in This Iconic Mid-Century Suburb Shows How California Dreams Are Shrinking.
28. Ganong and Shoag, âWhy Has Regional Income Convergence in the U.S. Declined?,â 4â5.
29. Ganong and Shoag, âWhy Has Regional Income Convergence in the U.S. Declined?,â 3.
30. See Lloyd A. Free and Hadley Cantril, The Political Beliefs of Americans: A Study of Public Opinion
(New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1967).
31. Wendell Cox, â2022 Residential Building Permits by Housing Market,â March 14, 2023,
NewGeography, https://www.newgeography.com/content/007766-2022-residential-building-permits-
housing-market.
32. William A. Fischel, Zoning Rules!: The Economics of Land Use Regulation (Cambridge, MA: Lincoln
Institute of Land Policy, 2015), Kindle, 190.
33. Fischel, Zoning Rules!, Kindle, 195.
34. Fischel, Zoning Rules!, Kindle, 214.
17235. Meghan McCarty Carino, âLife in This Iconic Mid-Century Suburb Shows How California Dreams
Are Shrinking,â LAist, July 2, 2018, https://laist.com/news/kpcc-archive/life-in-this-iconic-mid-
century-suburb-shows-how-c.
36. âCity of Tomorrow,â The Lakewood Story, City of Lakewood, California,
https://www.lakewoodcity.org/About/Our-History/The-Lakewood-Story/02-City-of-Tomorrow.
37. âSuburban Pioneers,â The Lakewood Story, City of Lakewood, California,
https://www.lakewoodcity.org/About/Our-History/The-Lakewood-Story/03-Suburban-Pioneers.
38. US Census Bureau, âNew Privately-Owned Housing Units Authorized by Building Permits in
Permit-Issuing Places,â Annual History by State,
https://www.census.gov/construction/bps/pdf/annualhistorybystate.pdf.
39. âCaliforniaâs Housing Future: Challenges and Opportunities, Final Statewide Housing Assessment
2025,â p. 6, fig. 1.2, https://www.hcd.ca.gov/policy-research/plans-
reports/docs/SHA_Final_Combined.pdf.
40. Jacob Anbinder, âCities of Amber: Antigrowth Politics and the Making of Modern Liberalism, 1950â
2008,â PhD diss., Harvard University Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, 18â19. Regarding âmore
than fifteen thousand buildingsâ: Anbinderâs source, Ingrid Gould, Ellen Brian, J. McCabe, Eric
Edward Stern, âFifty Years of Historic Preservation in New York City,â distinguishes between âlotsâ
and âbuildings.â See Gould et al., pp. 2, 14 (incl. fig. 2.3) and p. 4,
https://furmancenter.org/files/NYUFurmanCenter_50YearsHistoricPresNYC_7MAR2016.pdf.
41. Mac Taylor, Chas Alamo, and Brian Uhler, âCaliforniaâs High Housing Costs: Causes and
Consequences,â Legislative Analystâs Office, March 17, 2015,
https://lao.ca.gov/reports/2015/finance/housing-costs/housing-costs.pdf.
42. âNew Private Housing Units Authorized by Building Permits for California,â Federal Reserve Bank of
St. Louis, updated October 24, 2024, https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CABPPRIVSA. Also see
Kenneth Schrupp, âWhy Dallas Permits More Housing Than All of California,â PaciďŹc Research
(blog), July 23, 2024, https://www.pacificresearch.org/why-dallas-permits-more-housing-than-all-of-
california/.
43. Margot Kushel and Tiana Moore, âToward a New Understanding: The California Statewide Study of
People Experiencing Homelessness,â University of CaliforniaâSan Francisco, Benioff Homelessness
and Housing Initiative, June 2023, https://homelessness.ucsf.edu/our-impact/studies/california-
statewide-study-people-experiencing-homelessness.
44. Heather Mac Donald, âSan Francisco, Hostage to the Homeless,â City Journal, Autumn 2019,
https://www.city-journal.org/article/sanfrancisco-hostage-to-the-homeless.
45. Gregg Colburn and Clayton Page Aldern, Homelessness Is a Housing Problem: How Structural Factors
Explain U.S. Patterns (Oakland: University of California Press, 2022), Kindle, loc. 1086.
46. Colburn and Aldern, Homelessness Is a Housing Problem, Kindle, loc. 1054â1071 and loc. 1166 and
fig.8.
47. Colburn and Aldern, Homelessness Is a Housing Problem, Kindle, loc. 1238.
48. Matthew Yglesias, The Rent Is Too Damn High (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2012).
49. Matthew Yglesias, âHomelessness Is About Housing,â Slow Boring (Substack), May 17, 2021,
Foundations of Housing and Environment
- The text provides a comprehensive bibliography linking the decline of rooming houses to modern homelessness.
- It cites historical shifts in homeownership and the economic impact of zoning rules on housing affordability.
- The references document the environmental crisis of the mid-20th century, including lethal smog events in Los Angeles and Donora.
- Multiple sources highlight the 1969 Cuyahoga River fire as a catalyst for the modern environmental movement.
- Legal and political milestones are noted, including the California Environmental Quality Act and Ronald Reagan's environmental addresses.
- The collection bridges the gap between urban planning history and the legislative birth of the Clean Air Act.
The Cuyahoga River Caught Fire at Least a Dozen Times, but No One Cared Until 1969.
https://www.slowboring.com/p/homelessness-housing.
50. âRooming Houses,â American Planning Association, Report No. 105, December 1957,
https://www.planning.org/pas/reports/report105.htm, citing the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, October 18,
1957, p. 20, https://www.newspapers.com/search/results/?
keyword=If+rooming+houses+are+permitted+to+spread+to+the+city%27s+&publication-
ids=4064.
51. Yglesias, âHomelessness Is About Housing,â citing âRooming Houses,â American Planning
Association, Report No. 105.
52. Yglesias, âHomelessness Is About Housing.â
53. âHow Long Does It Take to Save for a House?,â WTF Happened in 1971?,
https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/.
17354. Jonathan Skinner, âHousing and Saving in the United States,â NBER Working Paper 3874, October
1991, p. 1, https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w3874/w3874.pdf.
55. Fischel, Zoning Rules!, Kindle, 205.
56. Jerusalem Demsas, âThe Homeownership Society Was a Mistake,â Atlantic, December 20, 2022,
https://www.theatlantic.com/newsletters/archive/2022/12/homeownership-real-estate-investment-
renting/672511/.
57. Anbinder, âCities of Amber,â 46.
58. Fischel, Zoning Rules!, Kindle, 225.
59. Lyndon B. Johnson, âRemarks at the University of Michigan,â May 22, 1964, University of
Virginia/Miller Center, https://millercenter.org/the-presidency/presidential-speeches/may-22-1964-
remarks-university-michigan.
60. John Kenneth Galbraith, The AďŹuent Society (New York: New American Library, 1958), 200.
61. Anbinder, âCities of Amber,â 3.
62. Federal Highway Administration, âState Motor Vehicle Registrations, by Years, 1900â1995,â
https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/ohim/summary95/mv200.pdf.
63. Jess McNally, âJuly 26, 1942: L.A. Gets Its First Big Smog,â Wired, July 26, 2010,
https://www.wired.com/2010/07/0726la-first-big-smog/.
64. Elizabeth T. Jacobs, Jefferey L. Burgess, and Mark B. Abbott, âThe Donora Smog Revisited: 70 Years
After the Event That Inspired the Clean Air Act,â American Journal of Public Health 108, S2 (April
2018): S85âS88, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5922205/.
65. Devra Lee Davis, When Smoke Ran Like Water: Tales of Environmental Deception and the Battle
Against Pollution (New York: Basic Books, 2002). Twenty people âdied during the fog itselfâ (22);
fifty more died later, âin the month after the smog liftedâ (27).
66. Nell Porter-Brown, âPaddling the Merrimack in Lowell and Lawrence,â Harvard Magazine, Julyâ
August 2017, https://www.harvardmagazine.com/2017/06/reflections-on-a-river.
67. Lorraine Boissoneault, âThe Cuyahoga River Caught Fire at Least a Dozen Times, but No One Cared
Until 1969,â Smithsonian Magazine, June 19, 2019,
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/cuyahoga-river-caught-fire-least-dozen-times-no-one-
cared-until-1969-180972444/; âThe 1969 Cuyahoga River Fire,â National Park Service,
https://www.nps.gov/articles/story-of-the-fire.htm; âCuyahoga River Fire,â Encyclopedia of Cleveland
History, Case Western Reserve University, https://case.edu/ech/articles/c/cuyahoga-river-fire.
68. âForgotten History: Dookerâs Hollow,â The Historical Dilettante, February 19, 2021,
https://historicaldilettante.blogspot.com/2021/02/forgotten-history-dookers-hollow.html.
69. Ronald Reagan, âRadio Address to the Nation on Environmental Issues,â July 14, 1984, Ronald
Reagan Presidential Library & Museum, https://www.reaganlibrary.gov/archives/speech/radio-
address-nation-environmental-issues.
70. Friends of Mammoth v. Board of Supervisors, 8 Cal.3d 247, September 21, 1972, Sac. No. 7924,
Supreme Court of California, https://scocal.stanford.edu/opinion/friends-mammoth-v-board-
supervisors-32943; also available at https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/ca-supreme-
court/1826825.html.
71. John Zierold, âEnvironmental Lobbyist in Californiaâs Capital, 1965â1984,â California Legal History
Citations of Environmental History
- The text provides a dense collection of citations focusing on the legal and oral histories of the environmental movement in California.
- It references the 'Californicated West' and the evolution of the Environmental Quality Act during the 1970s.
- A transition occurs toward modern climate discourse, citing Bill Gates and Jason Hickel on the tension between growth and 'degrowth.'
- The data highlights the urgent UN goal of reducing global emissions by 45 to 50 percent by 2030 to limit warming to 1.5°C.
- The citations link geopolitical energy crises, such as fuel protests in 90 countries, to the broader struggle of transitioning away from fossil fuels.
- The section concludes with historical context on labor and power, referencing the enslaved population at Thomas Jeffersonâs Monticello.
American Scene: The Great Wild Californicated West.
Journal 13 (2018): 330â331. An oral history conducted in 1984 by Ann Lage, Sierra Club History
Series, Regional Oral History Office, the Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, 1988,
https://www.cschs.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Legal-Hist-v.-13-Environ-Oral-History-
Zierold.pdf.
72. Sacramento Bee, October 22, 1972, p. 109, https://www.newspapers.com.
73. Anbinder, âCities of Amber,â 363.
74. Anbinder, âCities of Amber,â 365â66; Anne Jackson, âAgonizing Reappraisal for the Environmental
Quality Act,â California Journal 7 (1976): 59; Gladwin Hill, âEnvironmental Impact Statements,
Practically a Revolution,â New York Times, December 5, 1976.
17475. Lewis Mumford, âThe Highway and the City,â Architectural Record, April 1958,
https://google.it.ao/books?
id=DmcWAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA371&dq=editions:HARVARDHWNP7V&lr=&output=html_text;
and see Lewis Mumford, The Highway and the City (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1963),
234.
76. As measured in percentage change. See US Census Bureau, âBooming Cities Decade-to-Decade,
1830â2010,â October 4, 2012, https://www.census.gov/dataviz/visualizations/017/508.php.
77. Anbinder, âCities of Amber,â 183.
78. âAmerican Scene: The Great Wild Californicated West,â Time, August 21, 1972,
https://time.com/archive/6815691/american-scene-the-great-wild-californicated-west/.
79. Gilliam, For Better or for Worse: The Ecology of an Urban Area (San Francisco: Chronicle Books,
1972), cited by Anbinder, âCities of Amber,â 207.
2. Build
1. Bill Gates, How to Avoid a Climate Disaster: The Solutions We Have and the Breakthroughs We Need
(New York: Vintage Books, 2021), 19, 24.
2. Jason Hickel, Less Is More: How Degrowth Will Save the World (London: Penguin Books, 2022),
Kindle, 32.
3. Hickel, Less Is More, Kindle, 28, 203.
4. Hickel, Less Is More, Kindle, 217.
5. âGlobal emissions need to fall by 45 to 50 per cent by 2030 in order to ensure temperatures donât rise
above 1.5°C by 2100â: UN Environment Programme, âHow Do Countries Measure Greenhouse Gas
Emissions?,â citing the Emissions Gap Report, September 13, 2022, https://www.unep.org/news-
and-stories/story/how-do-countries-measure-greenhouse-gas-emissions; Chris Mooney, Naema
Ahmed, and John Muyskens, âWe Looked at 1,200 Possibilities for the Planetâs Future. These Are
Our Best Hope,â Washington Post, December 1, 2022, updated May 22, 2023,
https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/interactive/2022/global-warming-1-5-
celsius-scenarios/.
6. Hickel, Less Is More, Kindle, 146.
7. The BBC went back to 2021 and tracked and compared the two years. Efrem Gebreab, Thomas
Naadi, Ranga Sirilal, and Becky Dale, âFuel Protests Gripping More Than 90 Countries,â BBC,
October 17, 2022, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-63185186.
8. Kevin Liptak, Phil Mattingly, Natasha Bertrand, M. J. Lee, and Kylie Atwood, âBiden Turns to
Countries He Once Sought to Avoid to Find Help Shutting Off Russiaâs Oil Money,â CNN, March
8, 2022, https://www.cnn.com/2022/03/08/politics/joe-biden-saudi-arabia-venezuela-iran-russia-
oil/index.html.
9. Erik Voeten, âIs There a Green Policy Backlash?,â Good Authority, September 21, 2023,
https://goodauthority.org/news/is-there-a-green-policy-backlash/.
10. Charles C. Mann, The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Dueling Visions
to Shape Tomorrowâs World (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2018), 254â55.
11. âAt any given time, around 130 people were enslaved at Monticelloâ: Thomas Jefferson Foundation,
https://www.monticello.org/slavery/people-enslaved-at-monticello/; Jefferson âenslaved over 600
human beings throughout the course of his life,â four hundred at Monticello, two hundred âonâŚ
other properties.â See also Annette Gordon-Reed, The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family
(New York: W. W. Norton, 2008), and Lisa Mann, âThe Enslaved Household of President Thomas
Jefferson,â White House Historical Association, November 20, 2019,
Energy Transitions and Climate Data
- The text provides a comprehensive list of citations tracking the historical shift from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources.
- Key references highlight the rapid decline in renewable energy costs and the increasing competitiveness of solar and wind power.
- Data points from 'Our World in Data' compare per capita CO2 emissions and the impact of trade on national carbon footprints.
- The sources document major milestones in decarbonization, such as the United Kingdom ending its 142-year reliance on coal power.
- Technological breakthroughs like fusion ignition and the electrification of 'one billion machines' are presented as pathways to a sustainable future.
- The final citations address the emerging energy demands of artificial intelligence compared to traditional computing workloads.
The Dystopia We Fear Is Keeping Us from the Utopia We Deserve.
https://www.whitehousehistory.org/slavery-in-the-thomas-jefferson-white-house.
12. Thomas Jefferson to Thomas Mann Randolph, November 28, 1796, Monticello,
https://www.monticello.org/exhibits-events/blog/i-shudder-at-the-approach-jefferson-on-winter/;
Thomas Jefferson to âMr. Volney,â January 8, 1797, National Archives,
https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-29-02-0202.
17513. Hans Rosling, âThe Magic Washing Machine,â TEDWomen 2010, December 2010,
https://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_the_magic_washing_machine/transcript?subtitle=en.
14. Hannah Ritchie, âWhat the History of Londonâs Air Pollution Can Tell Us About the Future of
Todayâs Growing Megacities,â Our World in Data,â June 20, 2017,
https://ourworldindata.org/london-air-pollution.
15. Hannah Ritchie, Not the End of the World: How to Be the First Generation to Build a Sustainable
Planet (New York: Little, Brown Spark, 2024), 48.
16. âRenewables Competitiveness Accelerates, Despite Cost Inflation,â International Renewable Energy
Agency, press release, August 29, 2023,
https://www.irena.org/News/pressreleases/2023/Aug/Renewables-Competitiveness-Accelerates-
Despite-Cost-Inflation; Felix Creutzig, JĂŠrĂ´me Hilaire, Gregory Nemet, Finn MĂźller-Hansen, and Jan
C. Minx, âTechnological Innovation Enables Low Cost Climate Change Mitigation,â Energy
Research & Social Science 105 (November 2023): 103276,
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S2214629623003365?dgcid=author.
17. David WallaceWells, âWhat Will We Do with Our Free Power?,â New York Times, August 28, 2024,
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/28/opinion/solar-power-free-energy.html
18. Rupert Way, Matthew C. Ives, Penny Mealy, and J. Doyne Farmer, âEmpirically Grounded
Technology Forecasts and the Energy Transition,â Joule 6 (September 2022): 2057â082,
https://www.cell.com/action/showPdf?pii=S2542-4351%2822%2900410-X.
19. US Energy Information Administration, âLevelized Costs of New Generation Resources in the
Annual Energy Outlook 2022,â p. 3, table 1a; p. 8, table 1b; p. 9.
20. Bill McKibben, âIn a World on Fire, Stop Burning Things,â New Yorker, March 18, 2022,
https://www.newyorker.com/news/essay/in-a-world-on-fire-stop-burning-things?_sp=71841c1f-
c05f-43bb-8cad-c1176340938e.1727888742505.
21. âPer Capita CO2 Emissions, 2022,â Our World in Data, https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/co-
emissions-per-capita; âCO2 Emissions per Capita,â 2022, Worldometer,
https://www.worldometers.info/co2-emissions/co2-emissions-per-capita/#google_vignette.
22. âPer Capita CO2 Emissions, 1979,â Our World in Data, https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/co-
emissions-per-capita?time=1979.
23. Hannah Ritchie, âHow Do CO2 Emissions Compare When We Adjust for Trade?,â Our World in
Data, October 7, 2019, https://ourworldindata.org/consumption-based-co2.
24. âI Thought Most of Us Were Going to Die from the Climate Crisis. I Was Wrong,â Guardian, excerpt
from Ritchie, Not the End of the World, January 2, 2024,
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/jan/02/hannah-ritchie-not-the-end-of-the-world-
extract-climate-crisis.
25. Mark Poynting and Esme Stallard, âUK to Finish with Coal Power After 142 Years,â BBC, September
30, 2024, https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c5y35qz73n8o.
26. âLawrence Livermore National Laboratory Achieves Fusion Ignition,â Lawrence Livermore National
Laboratory, December 14, 2022, https://www.llnl.gov/article/49306/lawrence-livermore-national-
laboratory-achieves-fusion-ignition.
27. Ezra Klein, âThe Dystopia We Fear Is Keeping Us from the Utopia We Deserve,â New York Times,
January 8, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/08/opinion/nuclear-fusion-flying-cars.html.
28. Saul Griffith and Sam Calisch, âOne Billion Machines,â Rewiring America, June 2021,
https://www.rewiringamerica.org/research/one-billion-electric-machines-report.
29. âAI workloads require substantially more energy than traditional computing. Estimates suggest that
The Rising Cost of AI
- Artificial intelligence tools like ChatGPT consume significantly more energy than traditional search engines, with estimates suggesting a tenfold increase in power usage.
- Data centers are projected to become the primary driver of electricity demand growth in the United States through 2030.
- The surge in energy demand is forcing a reevaluation of state-level energy profiles, from solar expansion in South Dakota to clean energy leadership in Washington.
- Transitioning to a net-zero economy requires massive infrastructure investments and overcoming significant transmission bottlenecks.
- Political leaders are increasingly framing the energy and infrastructure crisis as an opportunity for systemic reform and high-speed development.
using ChatGPT requires up to 10x more power than a traditional web search.
using ChatGPT requires up to 10x more power than a traditional web search. Further, it seems likely
that data centers will be the largest contributor to U.S. power demand growth through the end of this
decadeâ: JPMorgan, âA Strong Economy in a Fragile World,â 2024,
https://assets.jpmprivatebank.com/content/dam/jpm-pb-aem/global/en/documents/mid-year-
outlook-2024.pdf.
17630. US Energy Information Administration, âWhat Is U.S. Electricity Generation by Energy Source?,â
https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=427&t=8.
31. Bart Pfankuch, âSolar Surge: South Dakota Sees New Interest in Solar Power,â South Dakota News
Watch, April 8, 2024, https://www.sdnewswatch.org/south-dakota-solar-power-wind-renewable-
energy-electricity/.
32. Amanda Zhou, âHow Clean Is WAâs Electricity? We Lead the Country in One Way,â Seattle Times,
February 13, 2024, https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/environment/how-clean-is-was-
electricity-we-lead-the-country-in-one-way/.
33. Nevada Governorâs Office of Energy, âStatus of Energy Report 2023,â
https://energy.nv.gov/uploadedFiles/energynvgov/content/Home/Features/2023_Status_of_Energy_
Report.pdf.
34. US Energy Information Administration, âWyoming State Energy Profile,â updated June 20, 2024,
https://www.eia.gov/state/print.php?sid=WY.
35. US Department of Energy, Office of Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy, âQuarterly Solar
Industry Update,â August 2024, https://www.energy.gov/eere/solar/quarterly-solar-industry-update;
US Energy Information Administration, âFlorida: Profile Analysis,â 2024,
https://www.eia.gov/state/analysis.php?
sid=FL#:~:text=In%202022%2C%20Florida%20was%20third,of%20Floridaâs%20total%20net%20gen
eration.&text=About%20four%2Dfifths%20of%20the,1%20megawatt%20or%20larger)%20facilities.
36. Ezra Klein, interview with Jesse Jenkins.
37. Eric Larson et al., âNetZero America: Potential Pathways, Infrastructure, and Impacts,â Interim
report, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, December 15, 2020,
https://netzeroamerica.princeton.edu/img/Princeton_NZA_Interim_Report_15_Dec_2020_FINA
L.pdf, 172.
38. J. B. Ruhl and James E. Salzman, âThe Greensâ Dilemma: Building Tomorrowâs Climate
Infrastructure Today,â Emory Law Journal 73, no. 1 (May 2023): 15,
https://ssrn.com/abstract=4443474.
39. US Department of Energy, âQueued Up⌠but in Need of Transmission,â April 2022, fig. 2, 3,
https://www.energy.gov/sites/default/files/2022-
04/Queued%20Up%E2%80%A6But%20in%20Need%20of%20Transmission.pdf; Jeff St. John,
âBidenâs Got a Plan for Ramping Up Energy Transmission,â Canary Media, May 17, 2023,
https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/transmission/bidens-got-a-plan-for-ramping-up-energy-
transmission.
40. Joseph H. Eto, âBuilding Electric Transmission Lines: A Review of Recent Transmission Projects,â
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Prepared for the Office of Electricity Delivery & Energy
Reliability and the Office of Energy Policy and Systems Analysis, US Department of Energy,
September 2016, LBNL-1006330, https://emp.lbl.gov/publications/building-electric-transmission-
lines.
41. âRahm Emanuel on the Opportunities of Crisis,â Wall Street Journal (video), November 19, 2008,
https://youtu.be/_mzcbXi1Tkk?t=9.
42. The White House, âRemarks by the President and the Vice President on High-Speed Rail,â April 16,
2009, https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/remarks-president-and-vice-president-
high-speed-rail.
43. Office of Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr., âGovernor Brown Delivers 2018 State of the State
Address: âCalifornia Is Setting the Pace for America,âââ January 25, 2018,
https://archive.gov.ca.gov/archive/gov39/2018/01/25/governor-brown-delivers-2018-state-of-the-
state-address-california-is-setting-the-pace-for-america/index.html.
44. Office of Governor Gavin Newsom, âGovernor Newsom Delivers State of the State Address,â
February 12, 2019, https://www.gov.ca.gov/2019/02/12/state-of-the-state-address/.
American Infrastructure and Productivity Stagnation
- The California High-Speed Rail project serves as a primary case study for escalating costs and delays in modern American infrastructure.
- Recent reporting highlights a significant rise in project estimates, with costs increasing by billions while progress remains focused on initial segments like Merced to Bakersfield.
- Economic analysis reveals a 'strange and awful' decline in U.S. construction productivity over several decades compared to other sectors.
- Researchers suggest that land-use regulations and complex permitting processes are primary drivers of the stagnation in building efficiency.
- The text references Mancur Olsonâs theories on how social rigidities and institutional accumulation can lead to the economic decline of nations.
- Current federal discourse emphasizes the need for a modern industrial strategy and permitting reform to 'make America build again.'
âWhat the hell happened to the California of the â50s and â60s?â
45. â2022 Business Plan, California High-Speed Rail Authority,â February 8, 2022,
https://hsr.ca.gov/about/high-speed-rail-business-plans/2022-business-plan/; Ralph Vartabedian,
177âCosts of Californiaâs Troubled Bullet Train Rise Again, by an Estimated $5 Billion,â Los Angeles
Times, February 8, 2022, https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-02-08/california-bullet-
train-costs-rise-roughly-5-billion.
46. Alia Shoaib, âCalifornia Train Line Gets a Boost,â Newsweek, May 7, 2024,
https://www.newsweek.com/california-train-line-boost-1897948.
47. Library of Congress, âThe Westinghouse Air Brake Co.,â n.d., https://www.loc.gov/collections/films-
of-westinghouse-works-1904/articles-and-essays/the-westinghouse-world/the-westinghouse-air-brake-
co/#:~:text=The%20first%20air%20brake%20invented,forms%20of%20the%20automatic%20brake.
48. Adam Rogers, âMake America Build Again,â Business Insider, November 16, 2023,
https://www.businessinsider.com/america-build-infrastructure-transportation-housing-regulation-
environment-2023-11.
49. Eight months later, the California High-Speed Rail Authority âapproved a contractor to begin
designing track and overhead contact systems (OCS) for the initial 171-mile passenger service
connecting Merced to Bakersfield,â press release, June 26, 2024, https://hsr.ca.gov/2024/06/26/news-
release-california-high-speed-rail-authority-approves-contractor-moves-design-of-track-and-overhead-
electrical-systems-forward/.
50. Here and below, Brian Kelly in conversation with Ezra Klein, October 2023.
51. Ezra Klein, âââWhat the Hell Happened to the California of the â50s and â60s?,âââ New York Times, June
18, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/18/opinion/newsom-california-building-permitting-
procurement.html.
52. Klein, âââWhat the Hell Happened?âââ; The White House, âRemarks as Prepared for Delivery by Senior
Advisor John Podesta on the Biden-Harris Administrationâs Priorities for Energy Infrastructure
Permitting Reform,â May 10, 2023, https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-
remarks/2023/05/10/remarks-as-prepared-for-delivery-by-senior-advisor-john-podesta-on-the-biden-
harris-administrations-priorities-forenergy-infrastructure-permitting-reform/.
53. The White House, âRemarks on a Modern American Industrial Strategy by NEC Director Brian
Deese,â April 20, 2022, https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-
remarks/2022/04/20/remarks-on-a-modern-american-industrial-strategy-by-nec-director-brian-
deese/.
54. Transit Costs Project, âWhat the Data Is Telling Us,â under the heading â4. Average Cost/km per
Country,â updated February 27, 2024, https://transitcosts.com/new-data/.
55. Austan Goolsbee and Chad Syverson, âThe Strange and Awful Path of Productivity in the U.S.
Construction Sector,â NBER Working Paper 30845, January 2023, rev. February 2023,
http://www.nber.org/papers/w30845.
56. Ezra Klein, âThe Story Construction Tells About Americaâs Economy Is Disturbing,â New York
Times, February 5, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/05/opinion/economy-construction-
productivity-mystery.html.
57. Klein, âThe Story Construction Tells.â
58. Klein, âThe Story Construction Tells.â
59. Mancur Olson, The Rise and Decline of Nations: Economic Growth, StagďŹation, and Social Rigidities
(1982; New Haven, CT: Veritas/Yale University Press, 2022), 3.
60. Olson, The Rise and Decline of Nations, 40.
61. Klein, âThe Story Construction Tells.â
62. Klein, âThe Story Construction Tells.â
63. Klein, âThe Story Construction Tells.â
64. Leonardo DâAmico et al., âWhy Has Construction Productivity Stagnated? The Role of Land-Use
Regulation,â December 30, 2023, https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4679195 and
https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4679195.
65. DâAmico et al., âWhy Has Construction Productivity Stagnated?,â 2.
66. DâAmico et al., âWhy Has Construction Productivity Stagnated?,â 17.
67. Olson, The Rise and Decline of Nations, 72.
The Rise of Adversarial Legalism
- The citations document the historical shift in American liberalism toward public interest law and whistle-blowing, spearheaded by figures like Ralph Nader.
- Legislative milestones such as the Clean Air Act and Motor Vehicle Safety Standards are highlighted as successes of this regulatory era.
- Scholars like Nicholas Bagley critique the resulting 'procedure fetish,' where complex legal processes can hinder effective governance.
- The concept of 'adversarial legalism' is explored as a uniquely American approach to law that emphasizes litigation and formal rules.
- Data from the Pew Research Center tracks a long-term decline in public trust in government alongside these procedural shifts.
- The text references a counterrevolution against federal litigation, suggesting a modern tension between regulatory rights and legal retrenchment.
Naderâs Raiders Is Their Name, and Whistle-Blowing Is Their GameâŚ
17868. Noah Smith, âInterview: Patrick Collison, Co-Founder and CEO of Stripe,â Noahopinion, March 8,
2021, https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/interview-patrick-collison-co-founder.
69. âTitle IâMotor Vehicle Safety Standards,â 718, https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-
80/pdf/STATUTE-80-Pg718.pdf; âTitle IIâAdministration and Reporting,â 735,
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-80/pdf/STATUTE-80-Pg731.pdf#page=5.
70. Julius Duscha, âNaderâs Raiders Is Their Name, and Whistle-Blowing Is Their GameâŚ,â New York
Times, March 21, 1971, https://www.nytimes.com/1971/03/21/archives/stop-in-the-public-interest-
stop-in-the-public-interest.html.
71. Christian Science Monitor quoted in Anon., âYour Book Review: Public Citizens,â Astral Codex 10
(Substack), June 23, 2023, https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/your-book-review-public-citizens;
reprinted in âPublic Interest Law and the Paradox of Justice by Lawsuit,â Candy for Breakfast
(Substack), October 23, 2023, https://www.candyforbreakfast.email/p/public-interest-law-and-the-
paradox.
72. Paul Sabin, Public Citizens: The Attack on Big Government and the Remaking of American Liberalism
(New York: W. W. Norton, 2021), Kindle, xviâxvii.
73. Sabin, Public Citizens, Kindle, 100â101.
74. Environmental Protection Agency, âProgress Cleaning the Air and Improving Peopleâs Health,â
updated April 30, 2024, https://www.epa.gov/cleanair-act-overview/progress-cleaning-air-and-
improving-peoples-health.
75. Environmental Protection Agency, âProgress Cleaning the Air and Improving Peopleâs Health,â
chart: âHealth Effect Reductions (PM2.5 & Ozone Only),â updated April 30, 2024; Natural
Resources Defense Council, âThe Clean Air Act at 40: A Clear Track Record of Success,â March
2011, https://www.nrdc.org/sites/default/files/cleanairactsuccess.pdf.
76. âAnnual Air Quality, Los Angeles County, Air Quality Days by Year, 1980â2023,â Los Angeles
Almanac, https://www.laalmanac.com/environment/ev01b.php.
77. The authors also thank the writer Max Nussbaum for his analysis of the rise of Naderâs revolution and
its legacy.
78. Jim Lehrer, interview with Ralph Nader, âNewsmaker: Ralph Nader,â PBS News Hour, air date June
30, 2000, https://www.pbs.org/newshour/spc/bb/politics/jan-june00/nader_6-30.html.
79. Sabin, Public Citizens, Kindle, xvii.
80. H.R.5âRegulatory Accountability Act of 2017, 115th Congress (2017â2018),
https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/5/allactions?overview=closed#tabs.
81. Nicholas Bagley, âThe Procedure Fetish,â Niskanen Center, December 7, 2021,
https://www.niskanencenter.org/the-procedure-fetish/. All quotes are from this iteration of the
paper.
82. Bagley, âThe Procedure Fetish.â
83. Bagley, âThe Procedure Fetish.â
84. Robert A. Kagan, Adversarial Legalism: The American Way of Law, 2d ed. (Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press, 2019), Kindle, 19.
85. Kagan, Adversarial Legalism, 2d ed., Kindle, 19.
86. Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America, vol. 1, ed. Phillips Bradley: the Henry Reeve Text as
Revised by Francis Bowen Now Further Corrected and Edited with a Historical Essay, Editorial
Notes, and Bibliographies by Bradley (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1945), 290 (the page number is to
the Vintage Books paperback).
87. Sean Farhang, âRegulation, Litigation, and Reform,â in Jeffrey A. Jenkins and Sidney M. Milkis, eds.
The Politics of Major Policy Reform in Postwar America (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University
Press, 2014), 48â76.
88. Bagley, âThe Procedure Fetish.â
89. Bagley, âThe Procedure Fetish.â
90. Pew Research Center, âPublic Trust in Government: 1958â2024,â June 24, 2024,
https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2024/06/24/public-trust-in-government-1958-2024/.
17991. See Stephen B. Burbank and Sean Farhang, Rights and Retrenchment: The Counterrevolution Against
Federal Litigation (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2017).
The Friction of Modern Governance
- Legal scholars analyze the inherent conflict between ambitious climate goals like the Green New Deal and established environmental protection laws.
- Research into infrastructure permitting reveals how regulatory frameworks and economic incentives often delay critical public works projects.
- Case studies of San Francisco housing projects highlight the tension between the need for rapid, affordable construction and complex local administrative codes.
- The concept of 'everything-bagel liberalism' is introduced to describe how adding multiple social goals to single projects can lead to paralysis.
- Legislative exemptions, such as those for semiconductor factories, are increasingly used as a workaround for burdensome environmental reviews.
- Philanthropic efforts and state-level streamlining (like California's SB 35) attempt to bypass traditional bureaucratic hurdles to address homelessness.
What Happens When the Green New Deal Meets the Old Green Laws?
92. J. B. Ruhl and James Salzman, âWhat Happens When the Green New Deal Meets the Old Green
Laws?,â Vermont Law Review 44 (2020): 694, https://scholarship.law.vanderbilt.edu/faculty-
publications/1168.
93. Ruhl and Salzman, âWhat Happens When the Green New Deal?,â 713.
94. Ruhl and Salzman, âThe Greensâ Dilemma,â 1 and throughout.
95. Ruhl and Salzman, âThe Greensâ Dilemma,â 24â25.
96. Derek Thompson, interview with Larry Selzer.
97. Ruhl and Salzman, âThe Greensâ Dilemma,â 28.
98. Zachary D. Liscow, âGetting Infrastructure Built: The Law and Economics of Permitting,â April 2,
2024, 18, https://ssrn.com/abstract=4775481 and http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4775481.
99. Liscow, âGetting Infrastructure Built,â 16.
100. Liscow, âGetting Infrastructure Built,â 12, 15.
101. David Shepardson, âBiden Exempts Some Semiconductor Factories from Environmental Reviews,â
Reuters, October 2, 2024, https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/boards-policy-regulation/biden-
signs-bill-exempting-some-semiconductor-factories-new-environmental-2024-10-02/.
3. Govern
1. Heather Knight, âA New S.F. Housing Complex for Homeless People Was Faster, Cheaper to Build.
So Why Isnât It Being Replicated?â San Francisco Chronicle, February 10, 2022,
https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/bayarea/heatherknight/article/Here-s-how-to-build-affordable-
housing-in-SF-16823736.php.
2. Nathaniel Decker, âStrategies to Lower Cost and Speed Housing Production: A Case Study of San
Franciscoâs 833 Bryant Street Project,â Turner Center for Housing Innovation, UC Berkeley,
February 2021, 2, https://ternercenter.berkeley.edu/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/833-Bryant-
February-2021.pdf.
3. Senate Bill 35, September 2017, California Legislative Information,
https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=201720180SB35.
4. San Francisco Administrative Code Chapter 14B, City and County of San Francisco, effective July 1,
2022, https://www.sf.gov/sites/default/files/2022-
09/14B%20Rules%20and%20Regulations%20v.2022_0.pdf; Chapter 14B: Local Business Enterprise
Utilization and Nondiscrimination in Contracting Ordinance,
https://www.sf.gov/sites/default/files/2022-
09/Chapter%2014B%20Local%20Business%20Enterprise%2007%2001%2022.pdf; âSec. 14B.1.
Purpose and Findingsâ notes that Ordinance No. 139-84 was passed on April 2, 1984.
5. Proposition 209: Text of Proposed Law,
https://vigarchive.sos.ca.gov/1996/general/pamphlet/209text.htm. It went into effect August 28,
1997.
6. San Francisco Board of Supervisors, âAdministrative CodeâLocal Business Enterprise Program,â
October 18, 2021, chart, p. 5, https://sfbos.org/sites/default/files/o0203-21.pdf.
7. Ezra Klein, âThe Problem with Everything-Bagel Liberalism,â New York Times, April 2, 2023,
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/02/opinion/democrats-liberalism.html.
8. Tipping Point, âCharles and Helen Schwab Invest $65M in Groundbreaking Homelessness Solutions
in SF,â October 21, 2020, https://tippingpoint.org/press/pressreleases/charles-and-helen-schwab-
invest-65m-in-groundbreaking-homelessness-solutions-in-sf/; Maria Di Mento, âBillionaire Charles
Schwab Gives $65 Million to House the Homeless,â Chronicle of Philanthropy, October 26, 2020,
https://www.philanthropy.com/article/billionaire-charles-schwab-gives-65-million-to-house-the-
homeless; J. K. Dineen, âSchwabs Donate $65 Million to Build Housing for Homeless in S.F.,â San
Francisco Chronicle, October 22, 2020, https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/Schwabs-
donate-65-million-to-build-housing-for-15665785.php.
1809. Krutika Amin, Imani Telesford, Rakesh Singh, and Cynthia Cox, âHow Do Prices of Drugs for
Weight Loss in the U.S. Compare to Peer Nationsâ Prices?,â Peterson-KFF Health System Tracker,
August 17, 2023, https://www.healthsystemtracker.org/brief/prices-of-drugs-for-weight-loss-in-the-
us-and-peer-nations/.
10. City of Houston, Texas, Planning and Development, Development Regulations, 2024,
Housing Policy and Urban Crisis
- The text provides a comprehensive bibliography of housing data, contrasting Houston's lack of traditional zoning with the restrictive environments of New York and New Jersey.
- Research from California YIMBY suggests that housing abundance is a necessary prerequisite for effectively ending homelessness.
- Data from the Los Angeles Housing Department tracks the slow progress of Proposition HHH, highlighting the difficulties in delivering supportive housing units.
- The citations point to a critique of 'everything-bagel liberalism,' where complex regulatory requirements hinder the construction of affordable housing.
- Specific case studies, such as the Venice Dell Community, illustrate the intense local opposition and naming controversies surrounding homeless housing projects.
The Way Los Angeles Is Trying to Solve Homelessness Is âAbsolutely Insane.â
https://www.houstontx.gov/planning/DevelopRegs/#:~:text=The%20City%20of%20Houston%20d
oes,how%20property%20can%20be%20subdivided.
11. Point2, âResidential Construction Trends,â https://www.point2homes.com/news/residential-
construction-data; New Jersey Department of Community Affairs, Housing Units Authorized by
Building Permits, December 2023, February 7, 2024,
https://www.nj.gov/dca/codes/reporter/2023monthly/HOUSE_12_2023.pdf; New York City,
Department of City Planning, press release, April 25, 2024,
https://www.nyc.gov/site/planning/about/pressreleases/pr-
20240425.page#:~:text=27%2C980%20new%20homes%20were%20constructed,has%20depressed%2
0new%20housing%20development.; US Census Bureau, Building Permits Survey,
https://www.census.gov/construction/bps/current.html. See also M. Nolan Gray, âA Bold Case
Against Zoning,â Fast Company, July 11, 2022, https://www.fastcompany.com/90766731/a-bold-
case-against-zoning.
12. California YIMBY, Ned Resnikoff, director, âHousing Abundance as a Condition for Ending
Homelessness: Lessons from Houston, Texas,â California YIMBY Education Fund, n.d.,
https://cayimby.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Housing-Abundance-as-a-Condition-for-Ending-
Homelessness-FINAL.pdf.
13. Roy Kent, âIs Buying a Home Easier or Harder in Houston? Hereâs How It Compares to Other Texas
Metros,â Rice University Kinder Institute for Urban Research, December 13, 2023,
https://kinder.rice.edu/urbanedge/home-buying-Houston-Texas-affordability; Maurice Backman,
âHouston Housing Market Forecast,â U.S. News & World Report, March 20, 2023,
https://realestate.usnews.com/realestate/housing-market-index/articles/houston-housing-market-
forecast.
14. âSan Francisco Housing Policy and Practice Review 2023,â California Department of Housing and
Community Development, https://www.hcd.ca.gov/sites/default/files/docs/policy-and-research/plan-
report/sf-housing-policy-and-practice-review.pdf.
15. Ezra Klein, âThe Way Los Angeles Is Trying to Solve Homelessness Is âAbsolutely Insane,âââ New York
Times, October 23, 2022, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/23/opinion/los-angeles-homelessness-
affordable-housing.html.
16. Los Angeles Housing Department, âCity of Los Angeles Prop HHH Progress Report,â tracks the
figures. By September 2024, 5,327 units had been built: https://housing2.lacity.org/housing/hhh-
progress-dashboard. Also see City of Los Angeles Inter-Governmental Correspondence, June 2024,
with charts, https://cao.lacity.gov/Homeless/PropHHHAOC-20240627c.pdf; Los Angeles Housing
Department, âSupportive Housing Update,â https://housing2.lacity.org/hhh-progress.
17. Los Angeles Housing Department, âCity of Los Angeles Prop HHH Progress Report.â
18. Klein, âThe Way Los Angeles Is Trying to Solve.â
19. Klein, âThe Way Los Angeles Is Trying to Solve.â
20. Klein, âThe Way Los Angeles Is Trying to Solve.â
21. Klein, âThe Way Los Angeles Is Trying to Solve,â and communication from Tong.
22. Eric Owen Moss, Venice Dell Community, https://ericowenmoss.com/project-detail/reese-davidson-
community-housing/; Steven Sharp, âEric Owen MossâDesigned Supportive Housing Gains
Approval in Venice,â Urbanize Network, June 1, 2021, https://la.urbanize.city/post/venice-eric-
owenmoss-reese-davidson-approval; Trevor Bach, âââGrandfather Would Be Appalledâ: Family Member
Wants Name Off Venice Homeless Housing,â The Real Deal, November 8, 2021,
https://therealdeal.com/la/2021/11/08/grandfather-would-be-appalled-family-member-wants-name-
off-venice-homeless-housing/.
18123. Klein, âThe Way Los Angeles Is Trying to Solve.â
24. Ezra Klein, interview with Heidi Marston.
25. Klein, âThe Way Los Angeles Is Trying to Solve.â
26. Michael B. Gerrard, âA Time for Triage,â The Environmental Forum 38 (2022): 40,
https://scholarship.law.columbia.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?
article=4885&context=faculty_scholarship.
27. Klein, âThe Problem with Everything-Bagel Liberalism.â
Infrastructure and Bureaucratic Failure
- The citations highlight the critical role of federal incentives in revitalizing domestic semiconductor manufacturing and national security.
- Case studies of California's high-speed rail and BART projects illustrate the tension between ambitious infrastructure goals and the reality of consultant-driven cost overruns.
- The concept of 'everything-bagel liberalism' is referenced to explain how layering multiple policy goals onto single projects can lead to systemic inefficiency.
- Reports on the California Employment Development Department and the State Department reveal chronic delays and failures in modernizing essential government IT systems.
- The documentation points to a broader crisis in state capacity, where legacy systems like the IRS's 60-year-old tax processing software remain unreplaced despite decades of effort.
How Californiaâs Faltering High-Speed Rail Project Was âCapturedâ by Costly Consultants.
28. Semiconductor Industry Association, âTurning the Tide for Semiconductor Manufacturing in the
U.S.,â SIA Summary of Boston Consulting Group Report, volume 4, October 1, 2020,
https://www.semiconductors.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/SIA-SUMMARY-OF-BCG-
REPORT.pdf.
29. Semiconductor Industry Association, âStudy Finds Federal Incentives for Domestic Semiconductor
Manufacturing Would Strengthen Americaâs Chip Production, Economy, National Security, Supply
Chains,â press release, September 16, 2020, https://www.semiconductors.org/study-finds-federal-
incentives-for-domestic-semiconductor-manufacturing-would-strengthen-americas-chip-production-
economy-national-security-supply-chains/.
30. Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO), CHIPS Incentives ProgramâCommercial Fabrication
Facilities, 2023, https://www.nist.gov/system/files/documents/2024/04/19/Amended%20CHIPS-
Commercial%20Fabrication%20Facilities%20NOFO%20Amendment.pdf.
31. Klein, âThe Problem with Everything-Bagel Liberalism.â
32. California High-Speed Rail Authority, âCentral Valley,â n.d., https://hsr.ca.gov/high-speed-rail-in-
california/central-valley/.
33. John J. DiIulio Jr., Bring Back the Bureaucrats: Why More Federal Workers Will Lead to Better (and
Smaller!) Government (West Conshohocken, PA: Templeton Press, 2014), Kindle, loc. 231 and loc.
1460.
34. Ralph Vartabedian, âHow Californiaâs Faltering High-Speed Rail Project Was âCapturedâ by Costly
Consultants,â Los Angeles Times, April 26, 2019, https://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-
california-high-speed-rail-consultants-20190426-story.html.
35. Ezra Klein, interview with Brian Kelly.
36. BART, âBest Scoring Bid to Build BARTâs Fleet of the Future,â April 23, 2012,
https://www.bart.gov/news/articles/2012/news20120423.
37. Darwin BondGraham and Jose Fermoso, âBART Says Itâs Saving $394M on New Train Cars,â The
Oaklandside, January 10, 2024, https://oaklandside.org/2024/01/10/bart-saving-millions-new-train-
cars-fleet-of-the-future/.
38. Bob Lettenberger, âBART New Car Fleet Under Budget,â Trains, January 17, 2024,
https://www.trains.com/trn/news-reviews/news-wire/bart-new-car-fleet-under-budget/.
39. Zachary D. Liscow, âGetting Infrastructure Built: The Law and Economics of Permitting,â 22.
40. âReport: EDD Delayed, Denied Benefits to Millions During Pandemic; Quick Response Not a
Priority,â CBS News, August 8, 2022, https://www.cbsnews.com/sanfrancisco/news/report-edd-
delayed-denied-benefits-to-millions-during-pandemic-quick-response-not-a-priority/.
41. Jennifer Pahlka, Recoding America (New York: Metropolitan Books/Henry Holt and Company,
2023), Kindle, 25, 26.
42. Pahlka, Recoding America, Kindle, 28.
43. Yolanda Richardson and Jennifer Pahlka, âEmployment Development Department Strike Team
Detailed Assessment and Recommendations,â September 16, 2020, https://www.govops.ca.gov/wp-
content/uploads/sites/11/2020/09/Assessment.pdf.
44. Michael Krigsman, âCalifornia Abandons $2 Billion Court Management System,â ZDNET, April 1,
2012, https://www.zdnet.com/article/california-abandons-2-billion-court-management-system/;
Maura Dolan, âCutbacks in California Court System Produce Long Lines, Short Tempers,â Los
Angeles Times, May 10, 2014, https://www.latimes.com/local/la-me-court-cuts-20140511-story.html.
18245. Office of the Inspector General, US Department of State, âReview of the Bureau of Consular Affairsâ
[CA] ConsularOne Modernization ProgramâSignificant Deployment Delays Continue,â November
2021, https://www.stateoig.gov/uploads/report/report_pdf_file/isp-i-22-03_7.pdf; Tom Temin,
âThis State Department IT Project Started in 2009 and Itâs Nowhere Near Finished,â Federal News
Network, January 3, 2022, https://federalnewsnetwork.com/agency-oversight/2022/01/this-state-
department-it-project-started-in-2009-and-its-nowhere-near-finished/.
46. US Government Accountability Office, âIRSâs Efforts to Modernize 60-Year-Old Tax Processing
Infrastructure and Scientific Innovation
- The text highlights the persistent challenges of modernizing the IRS's sixty-year-old tax processing systems, which remain nearly a decade away from completion.
- The rapid twelve-day reconstruction of the I-95 bridge in Philadelphia serves as a case study for high-speed infrastructure repair and effective state capacity.
- Governor Josh Shapiro utilized social media and live streams to maintain public transparency and build a national profile during the I-95 emergency response.
- The narrative transitions to the life of Katalin KarikĂł, focusing on her foundational biological research and the systemic difficulties of funding risky scientific endeavors.
- The text explores the philosophical relationship between experimental experience and human judgment, citing Leonardo da Vinci's views on scientific error.
Experience is never at fault; it is only your judgment that is in error in promising itself such results from experience as are not caused by our experiments.
System Is Almost a Decade Away,â November 4, 2021, https://www.gao.gov/blog/irss-efforts-
modernize-60-year-old-tax-processing-system-almost-decade-away; Tax Policy Center, âWhat
Technology Does the IRS Use?,â updated January 2024, https://taxpolicycenter.org/briefing-
book/what-technology-does-irs-use.
47. Pahlka, Recoding America, Kindle, 34â35.
48. Pahlka, Recoding America, Kindle, 58.
49. Pahlka, Recoding America, Kindle, 69â70.
50. Pahlka, Recoding America, Kindle, 68.
51. Pahlka, Recoding America, Kindle, 50.
52. Ezra Klein, interview with Mike Carroll. All further quotes are from this source.
53. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Proclamation of Disaster Emergency, June 12, 2023,
https://www.pa.gov/content/dam/copapwp-pagov/en/governor/documents/2023.6.12-Disaster-
Emergency-Proclamation-I-95-PDF.pdf.
54. United Union of Roofers, Waterproofers & Allied Workers, July 5, 2023,
https://unionroofers.com/philadelphia-building-trades-work-24-7-to-rebuild-i-95-collapse/.
55. Gregory Korte, Mark Niquette, and Skylar Woodhouse, âHow the I-95 Bridge Reopened Just 12 Days
After Fiery Collapse,â Bloomberg, June 28, 2023, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-
06-28/resurrection-of-i-95-in-just-two-weeks-is-dubbed-small-miracle; Heavy Construction Systems
Specialists, âGetting a City Back to Work When Every Minute Counts,â September 2023, blog post,
https://www.hcss.com/blog/construction-of-i-95-bridge-after-collapse/.
56. Julia Terrero, âFrom TikToks to a 24/7 Live Stream, Gov. Josh Shapiroâs I-95 Response Grows His
National Profile,â Philadelphia Inquirer, June 17, 2023,
https://www.inquirer.com/politics/pennsylvania/pennsylvania-governor-response-i95-repairs-
national-profile-20230616.html.
57. Josh Shapiro, âWe Fixed I-95 in 12 Days. Here Are Our Lessons for U.S. Infrastructure,â Washington
Post, July 16, 2023, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/07/17/interstate-95-repair-
infrastructure-shapiro-pennsylvania/.
58. Brink Lindsey, âState Capacity: What Is It, How We Lost It, and How to Get It Back,â Niskanen
Center, November 2021, p. 8, https://www.niskanencenter.org/wp-
content/uploads/2021/11/brinkpaper.pdf.
4. Invent
1. Katalin KarikĂł, with Ali Benjamin, Breaking Through: My Life in Science (New York: Crown, 2023),
Kindle, 4, 8.
2. KarikĂł, Breaking Through, Kindle, 10.
3. Biological Research Center, Szeged, SZTE Klebelsberg Library Gallery and Media Gallery,
https://mediateka.ek.szte.hu/exhibits/show/katalin_kariko_eng/brc_szeged; and
https://www.brc.hu/en.
4. Derek Thompson, interview with Katalin KarikĂł.
5. Derek Thompson, interview with Katalin KarikĂł.
6. Chiara Franzoni, Paula Stephan, and Reinhilde Veugelers, âFunding Risky Research,â NBER
Working Paper 28905, June 2021, 4â5, http://www.nber.org/papers/w28905 and
https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w28905/w28905.pdf.
1837. KarikĂł, Breaking Through, Kindle, 178. A variation on âExperience never errs; it is only your
judgments that err by promising themselves effects such as are not caused by your experiments,â The
Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci, trans. Jean Paul Richter, vol. 1, 1888, Project Gutenberg,
https://archive.org/stream/thenotebooksofle05000gut/7ldvc09.txt; and âExperience is never at fault;
it is only your judgment that is in error in promising itself such results from experience as are not
caused by our experiments,â The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci, Arranged, Rendered into English
and Introduced by Edward MacCurd (New York: George Braziller, 1955), 64.
8. KarikĂł, Breaking Through, Kindle, 183.
9. Andy Markowitz and Jenny Rough, âList of Coronavirus-Related Restrictions in Every State,â March
17, 2020, updated May 1, 2024, https://www.aarp.org/politics-society/government-elections/info-
2020/coronavirus-state-restrictions.html; Victor Fiorillo, âYes, Even Your Outdoor Socially Distanced
Thanksgiving Party Is Banned,â Philadelphia, November 17, 2020,
The Complexity of Pandemic Interventions
- The effectiveness of mask mandates is highly contingent on social factors such as public trust in government and state enforcement capacity.
- A cluster-randomized trial in Bangladesh provided empirical evidence on how community masking impacts COVID-19 transmission.
- Behavioral interventions often fail in environments where the public is not well-informed or lacks the motivation to adhere to rules.
- The rapid development of COVID-19 vaccines set a historical record, significantly outpacing the previous record held by the mumps vaccine.
- Global vaccination efforts are estimated to have prevented nearly 20 million deaths within a single year.
- Government-funded research and development, including loan programs, play a critical role in long-term economic productivity and technological breakthroughs.
âBut if Alabama tomorrow mandated mask-wearing, it would do nothing.â
https://www.phillymag.com/news/2020/11/17/outdoor-thanksgiving-philadelphia-covid/; Gabrielle
Connor, Vaishnavi Vaidya, Jennifer Kolker, and Ran Li, âIndoor Dining and COVID19: Implications
for Reopening in 30 U.S. Cities,â Urban Health Collaborative, Drexel University, September 2020,
https://drexel.edu/~/media/Files/uhc/Additional%20Project%20Documents/IndoorDiningCOVID
19.ashx?la=en; âState Alcohol-Related Laws During the COVID19 Emergency for On-Premise and
Off-Premise Establishments as of June 15, 2020,â National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and
Alcoholism/National Institutes of Health, June 15, 2020,
https://alcoholpolicy.niaaa.nih.gov/sites/default/files/file-page/apis_-_covid-
19_memo_6.15.20_508c.pdf.
10. Jason Abaluck et al., âThe Impact of Community Masking on COVID19: A Cluster-Randomized
Trial in Bangladesh,â August 31, 2021, https://poverty-
action.org/sites/default/files/publications/Mask_RCT____Symptomatic_Seropositivity_083121.pdf
.
11. So, did mask mandates work, or didnât they? The frustrating answer is it depends. Jason Abaluck, a
Yale professor who helped run the Bangladesh study, offered a sobering synthesis. The success of mask
mandatesâlike the success of most behavioral interventionsâhinges on many factors, including
public trust in government, civilian adherence to the mask rules, and state capacity to enforce them.
In places where a well-informed and motivated public conscientiously wore high-quality masks almost
all the time, mask mandates probably worked, he said. âBut if Alabama tomorrow mandated mask-
wearing, it would do nothing.â Derek Thompson, interview with Jason Abaluck.
12. Sandy Cohen, âThe Fastest Vaccine in History,â December 10, 2020, UCLA Health,
https://www.uclahealth.org/news/article/the-fastest-vaccine-in-history; Maya Prabhu, âMumps: The
Story of the Second Fastest Vaccine Ever Developed,â VaccinesWork/Gavi, April 22, 2022,
https://www.gavi.org/vaccineswork/mumps-story-second-fastest-vaccine-ever-developed.
13. Colin Dwyer, âModernaâs COVID19 Vaccine Becomes 2nd to Earn FDA Authorization,â NPR,
December 18, 2020, https://www.npr.org/sections/coronavirus-live-
updates/2020/12/18/947948227/modernas-covid-19-vaccine-becomes-2nd-to-earn-fda-
authorization; âModerna Announces FDA Authorization of Moderna COVID19 Vaccine in U.S.,â
Moderna, press release, December 18, 2020, https://investors.modernatx.com/news/news-
details/2020/Moderna-Announces-FDA-Authorization-of-Moderna-COVID19-Vaccine-in-
U.S/default.aspx.
14. Sarah Zhang, âThe COVID Strategy America Hasnât Really Tried,â Atlantic, February 14, 2022,
https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2022/02/vaccinate-old/622080/.
15. Emily Head and Dr. Sabine L. van Elsland, âVaccinations May Have Prevented Almost 20 Million
COVID19 Deaths Worldwide,â Imperial College London, June 24, 2022,
https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/237591/vaccinations-have-prevented-almost-20-million/.
16. Ezra Klein, âThe Economic Mistake the Left Is Finally Confronting,â New York Times, September 19,
2021, https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/19/opinion/supply-side-progressivism.html.
18417. Steven Overly, âThis Government Loan Program Helped Tesla at a Critical Time. Trump Wants to
Cut It,â Washington Post, March 16, 2017,
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/innovations/wp/2017/03/16/this-government-loan-
program-helped-tesla-at-a-critical-time-trump-wants-to-cut-it/; US Department of Energy Loan
Programs Office, âTesla,â https://www.energy.gov/lpo/tesla; Maddow Blog and Steve Benen, âTesla
Repaying Obama Admin Loan 5 Years Early,â NBC News, March 12, 2013,
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/tesla-repaying-obama-admin-loan-5-years-early-
flna1c8823565.
18. Andrew J. Fieldhouse and Karel Mertens, âGovernment-Funded R&D Produces Long-Term
Productivity Gains,â Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, February 13, 2024,
https://www.dallasfed.org/research/economics/2024/0213.
19. Derek Thompson, interview with Heidi Williams.
The Science of mRNA Success
- The text provides a comprehensive list of citations documenting the development and impact of mRNA vaccine technology during the COVID-19 pandemic.
- Data from the Commonwealth Fund suggests that two years of U.S. vaccinations prevented millions of hospitalizations and deaths.
- The narrative highlights the personal and professional journey of Katalin KarikĂł and Drew Weissman, whose long-overlooked research became the foundation for the vaccines.
- Citations explore the broader implications of mRNA technology, suggesting it has the potential to revolutionize medicine beyond the scope of the coronavirus.
- The section addresses the economics of innovation, citing research by Nicholas Bloom and others regarding whether scientific ideas are becoming harder and more expensive to find.
- It concludes with a focus on the future of medical productivity, emphasizing the goal of eliminating suffering and death from diseases like cancer.
But whether productivity in this all-important sector is flat or declining, the most important thing is that it is not obviously rising.
20. Meagan C. Fitzpatrick, Seyed M. Moghadas, Abhishek Pandey, and Alison P. Galvani, âTwo Years of
U.S. COVID19 Vaccines Have Prevented Millions of Hospitalizations and Deaths,â The
Commonwealth Fund (blog), December 13, 2022,
https://www.commonwealthfund.org/blog/2022/two-years-covid-vaccines-prevented-millions-
deaths-hospitalizations.
21. Derek Thompson, interview with Katalin KarikĂł; Ting Yu, âHow Scientists Drew Weissman
(MEDâ87, GRSâ87) and Katalin KarikĂł Developed the Revolutionary mRNA Technology Inside
COVID Vaccines,â Bostonia, November 18, 2021, https://www.bu.edu/articles/2021/how-drew-
weissman-and-katalin-kariko-developed-mrna-technology-inside-covid-vaccines/.
22. KarikĂł, Breaking Through, Kindle, 223.
23. KarikĂł, Breaking Through, Kindle, 227.
24. Gina Kolata, âLong Overlooked, Kati Kariko Helped Shield the World from the Coronavirus,â New
York Times, April 8, 2021, updated October 2, 2023,
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/08/health/coronavirus-mrna-kariko.html.
25. KarikĂł, Breaking Through, Kindle, 262.
26. KarikĂł, Breaking Through, Kindle, 263.
27. Derek Thompson, interview with Katalin KarikĂł.
28. Derek Thompson, âHow mRNA Technology Could Change the World,â Atlantic, March 29, 2021,
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/03/how-mrna-technology-could-change-
world/618431/.
29. John Holder, âTracking Coronavirus Vaccinations Around the World,â New York Times, updated
March 13, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/world/covid-vaccinations-tracker.html;
Pfizer, map of Pfizer-BioNTech COVID19 vaccine shipments, n.d.,
https://www.pfizer.com/science/coronavirus/vaccine/working-to-reach-everyone-everywhere;
Moderna, âU.S. Government Purchases Additional 100 Million Doses of Modernaâs COVID19
Vaccine,â February 11, 2021, https://investors.modernatx.com/news/news-details/2021/U.S.-
Government-Purchases-Additional-100-Million-Doses-of-Modernas-COVID19-
Vaccine/default.aspx.
30. KarikĂł, Breaking Through, Kindle, 195.
31. Derek Thompson, interview with Katalin KarikĂł.
32. Richard Harris, âScientists Win Nobel for Work on How Cells Communicate,â NPR, October 7,
2013, https://www.npr.org/2013/10/07/230192033/scientists-win-nobel-for-work-on-how-cells-
communicate.
33. Derek Thompson, interview with Pierre Azoulay.
34. Thomas D. Snyder, ed., â120 Years of American Education: A Statistical Portrait,â US Department of
Education, Office of Educational Research and Improvement, Center for Education Statistics,
January 1993, p. 75, table 23, https://nces.ed.gov/pubs93/93442.pdf.
35. According to IES/National Center for Education Statistics, âBetween fall 2011 and fall 2022, the total
annual number of faculty at degree-granting postsecondary institutions ranged from 1.5 to 1.6
185million. There were 1.5 million faculty in both 2011 and 2022, with a peak at 1.6 million in 2015,â
https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=61#fn1.
36. Nicholas Bloom, Charles I. Jones, John Van Reenen, and Michael Webb, âAre Ideas Getting Harder to
Find?,â American Economic Review 110, no. 4 (2020): 1104â144,
https://web.stanford.edu/~chadj/IdeaPF.pdf and https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?
id=10.1257/aer.20180338.
37. Derek Thompson, interview with Nicholas Bloom. Medical research productivity is hard to measure,
and Bloomâs conclusions are not universally supported. Some scholars have published persuasive work
suggesting that medical research productivity is more likely stable. See âDistilling Data from Large
Language Models,â by Maya M. Durvasula, Sabri Eyuboglu, and David M. Ritzwoller. But whether
productivity in this all-important sector is flat or declining, the most important thing is that it is not
obviously rising. Just as we should hope for rising productivity in any industry, we should hope for it
in science.
38. Andrew von Eschenbach, âNCI Sets Goal of Eliminating Suffering and Death Due to Cancer by
The Mechanics of Modern Innovation
- The decline in cancer mortality rates is often misattributed to medical breakthroughs when lifestyle changes, such as reduced smoking, play a more significant role.
- Innovation is becoming increasingly difficult due to the 'burden of knowledge,' which requires researchers to spend more time learning before they can contribute.
- High-skilled immigrants play an outsized role in American innovation, contributing significantly to patents and Nobel Prizes.
- The H-1B visa program remains a critical but politically contentious mechanism for bringing global talent into the United States economy.
- Scientific progress may be slowing down as the complexity of discovery increases, requiring larger teams and more resources for incremental gains.
This is welcome news, but it is not quite right to associate this entire decline with medical breakthroughs.
2015,â Journal of the National Medical Association 95, no. 7 (July 2003): 637â39,
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2594648/?page=1.
39. The White House, âRemarks of President Barack ObamaâAddress to Joint Session of Congress,â
February 24, 2009, https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/remarks-president-barack-
obama-address-joint-session-congress.
40. The White House, âPresident Biden Reignites Cancer Moonshot to End Cancer as We Know It,â
February 2, 2022, https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2022/02/02/fact-
sheet-president-biden-reignites-cancer-moonshot-to-end-cancer-as-we-know-it/.
41. Some research finds that the age-adjusted cancer mortality rate has declined meaningfully in the last
few decades. This is welcome news, but it is not quite right to associate this entire decline with
medical breakthroughs. For example, despite some advancements in the treatment of late-stage lung
cancers, the rate of lung cancer has declined in the last few decades mostly because of the long-term
decline of smoking in the United States.
42. Derek Thompson, interview with Eric Topol.
43. Benjamin F. Jones, âThe Burden of Knowledge and the âDeath of the Renaissance Manâ: Is
Innovation Getting Harder?,â April 2008, https://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/faculty/jones-
ben/htm/burdenofknowledge.pdf.
44. Periodic Table, Phosphorus, âHistory,â https://www.rsc.org/periodic-table/element/15/phosphorus.
45. Oak Ridge National Laboratory, âBig Science: The Discovery of Tennessine,â January 27, 2017,
https://www.ornl.gov/sites/default/files/Ts_Program%20Final%20sm.pdf; Periodic Table,
Tennessine, Element Summary, 3. History, National Institutes of Health,
https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/element/Tennessine#section=Estimated-Oceanic-Abundance;
Scott Alexander, âIs Science Slowing Down?,â Slate Star Codex (blog), November 26, 2018,
https://slatestarcodex.com/2018/11/26/is-science-slowing-down-2/.
46. Gregor Mendel, âVersuche Ăźber Plflanzenhybriden,â Verhandlungen des Naturforschenden Vereines in
BrĂźnn 5 (1865): 3â47. Presented orally at the February 8 and March 8, 1865, meetings of the BrĂźnn
Natural History Society. Published in 1866, BrĂźnn, Czechoslovakia, by Verlag des Vereines.
Biodiversity Heritage Library, https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/124139#page/5/mode/1up.
Published in English in 1901: âExperiments in Plant Hybridization,â trans. William Bateson,
http://www.esp.org/foundations/genetics/classical/gm-65.pdf.
47. Derek Thompson, interview with Heidi Williams.
48. Derek Thompson, interview with Jeremy Neufeld.
49. Shai Bernstein, Rebecca Diamond, Abhisit Jiranaphawiboon, Timothy McQuade, and Beatriz
Pousada, âThe Contribution of High-Skilled Immigrants to Innovation in the United States,â NBER
Working Paper 30797, December 2022, DOI 10.3386/w30797, summary here:
https://www.nber.org/digest/20233/outsize-role-immigrants-us-innovation; Katia Savchuk, âA New
Look at Immigrantsâ Outsize Contribution to Innovation in the US,â Stanford University, Institute
186for Economic Policy Research, April 14, 2023, https://siepr.stanford.edu/news/new-look-
immigrants-outsize-contribution-innovation-us; Stuart Anderson, âImmigrants Keep Winning Nobel
Prizes,â Forbes, October 7, 2021, updated April 21, 2022,
https://www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2021/10/07/immigrants-keep-winning-nobel-prizes/.
50. Derek Thompson, interview with Jeremy Neufeld.
51. American Immigration Council, âThe H-1B Visa Program and Its Impact on the U.S. Economy,â
October 8, 2024, https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/research/h1b-visa-program-fact-
sheet; US Citizenship and Immigration Services, âUSCIS Reaches Fiscal Year 2024 H-1B Cap,â
December 13, 2023, https://www.uscis.gov/newsroom/alerts/uscis-reaches-fiscal-year-2024-h-1b-cap.
52. The H-1B visa program is politically controversial, even among those who claim to support high-
Innovation and Scientific Infrastructure
- Skilled immigration through H-1B visas is linked to increased patenting and firm growth without significantly harming native-born employment.
- Recent research suggests that scientific papers and patents are becoming less disruptive over time despite increasing volume.
- The historical development of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) was shaped by post-WWII efforts to mobilize scientific personnel.
- Vannevar Bush's 'Science, the Endless Frontier' established the framework for modern American scientific research and federal funding.
- The age of primary investigators and the methods of funding allocation, such as indirect cost rates, significantly impact research output.
The fear may be overstated. Several studies have found that increases in H-1B admissions are associated with more patents and higher growth at firms, while the effect on native-born employment is not significantly negative.
skilled immigration. One common criticism is that these foreign-born workers take jobs from
Americans for less pay. The fear may be overstated. Several studies (see William R. Kerr and William F.
Lincoln, âThe Supply Side of Innovation: H-1B Visa Reforms and US Ethnic Invention,â 2010, and
John Bound, Nicolas Morales, and Gaurav Kahnna, âUnderstanding the Impact of H-1B Visas on the
U.S. Economy,â 2017) have found that increases in H-1B admissions are associated with more patents
and higher growth at firms, while the effect on native-born employment is not significantly negative.
53. Derek Thompson, interview with Jeremy Neufeld.
54. Sally Rockey, âMore Data on Age and the Workforce,â National Institutes of Health Office of
Extramural Research, March 25, 2015, https://nexus.od.nih.gov/all/2015/03/25/age-of-investigator/.
55. Michael Park, Erin Leahey, and Russell J. Funk, âPapers and Patents Are Becoming Less Disruptive
Over Time, Nature 613 (2023): 138â44, https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-022-05543-x.
56. Derek Thompson, interview with James Evans.
57. Derek Thompson, interview with Pierre Azoulay.
58. Gregory A. Petsko, âGoodbye, Columbus,â Genome Biology 13 (2012): Article no. 155,
https://genomebiology.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/gb-2012-13-5-155.
59. Sources differ on the date of the White House meeting. See Robert Reinhold, âDr. Vannevar Bush Is
Dead at 84,â New York Times, June 30, 1974, https://www.nytimes.com/1974/06/30/archives/dr-
vannevar-bush-is-dead-at-84-dr-vannevar-bush-who-marshaled.html; photocopy of June 15, 1940,
letter to Vannevar Bush from Roosevelt, creating the NDRC,
http://www.fdrlibrary.marist.edu/_resources/images/atomic/atomic_02.pdf; Internet Pioneers,
âVannevar Bush,â https://www.ibiblio.org/pioneers/bush.html; âVannevar Bush: The Memex,â
LemelsonâMIT Program, https://lemelson.mit.edu/resources/vannevar-bush; Robert E. Sherwood,
Roosevelt and Hopkins: An Intimate History (New York: Harper, 1948), 153â55; Bush to Seitz,
September 16, 1968 (NAS Archives). Per draft notes for Bushâs âScience, the Endless Frontierâ:
âSummoned by President Roosevelt, in the spring of 1940, the President of the National Academy
and others associated with him recommended the creation of a single central agency within the
executive establishment⌠for the purpose of mobilizing⌠scientific personnel and the facilities of the
nationâ: âFrank Baldwin Jewett (1939â1947),â in The National Academy of Sciences: The First
Hundred Years 1863â1963, National Library of Medicine, National Center for Biotechnology
Information, National Institutes of Health, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK217891/.
60. Vannevar Bush, Science, the Endless Frontier, A Report to the President by Vannevar Bush, Director of
the Office of Scientific Research and Development, July 1945 (Washington, DC: United States
Government Printing Office, 1945), 17, 75th anniversary edition (here and elsewhere, we refer to the
report in its published book form; page numbers are from this searchable edition):
https://www.nsf.gov/about/history/EndlessFrontier_w.pdf.
61. Eva Ă
hrĂŠn, âJoseph Kinyoun, the Hygienic Laboratory, and the Origins of the NIH,â NIH Catalyst
20, no. 6 (NovemberâDecember 2012), National Institutes of Health,
https://irp.nih.gov/catalyst/20/6/nih-in-history.
62. Bhaven N. Sampat, âDoubling Down: Will Large Increases in the NIH Budget Promote More
Meaningful Medical Innovation?,â Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics 51, S2 (2023): 21â23,
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10911986/.
18763. Matt Faherty, âNew Scienceâs Report on the NIH,â New Science, April 2022,
https://newscience.org/nih/#how-are-indirect-cost-rates-calculated.
64. âCassius James Van Slyke, M.D.,â NIH Almanac, National Institutes of Health,
https://www.nih.gov/about-nih/what-we-do/nih-almanac/cassius-james-van-slyke-md.
65. Cassius Van Slyke, âNew Horizons in Medical Research,â Science 104, no. 2711 (December 1946):
The Mechanics of Scientific Funding
- The citations trace the historical evolution of the NIH peer review system and its political economy from the mid-20th century to the present.
- Several sources highlight a growing tension between administrative paperwork and actual research time, suggesting a system burdened by bureaucracy.
- The 'Golden Fleece Awards' and other political critiques illustrate the public and legislative pressure on how scientific grants are allocated.
- Research into 'The Novelty Paradox' suggests that current funding mechanisms may inherently bias against high-risk, innovative 'edge science' in favor of safer, incremental studies.
- The references connect foundational biological discoveries, such as CRISPR sequences and extremophiles, to the specific grant structures that funded them.
The Novelty Paradox & Bias for Normal Science: Evidence from Randomized Medical Grant Proposal Evaluations.
559â67, https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17772322/.
66. âJames A. Shannon, M.D.,â NIH Almanac, National Institutes of Health,
https://www.nih.gov/about-nih/what-we-do/nih-almanac/james-shannon-md.
67. James A. Shannon and Charles V. Kidd, âMedical Research in Perspective,â Science (New Series) 124,
no. 3233 (December 1956): 1185â190, https://www.jstor.org/stable/1752817.
68. Bhaven N. Sampat, âThe History and Political Economy of NIH Peer Review,â Brookings Institution
and the Institute for Progress, May 2023, https://www.brookings.edu/wp-
content/uploads/2023/05/SampatFinal-3.pdf.
69. âProxmire, William. Golden Fleece Awards, 1975â1987,â press release, March 11, 1975, Wisconsin
Historical Society, https://content.wisconsinhistory.org/digital/collection/proxmire/id/84/; Etienne
S. Benson, âAll Thatâs Gold Does Not Glitter,â Association for Psychological Science, June 1, 2006,
https://www.psychologicalscience.org/observer/all-thats-gold-does-not-glitter.
70. Sampat, âThe History and Political Economy of NIH Peer Review,â 16.
71. Sampat, âThe History and Political Economy of NIH Peer Review,â 16; Philip H. Abelson, âMore
Paper Work, Less Research,â Science 139, no. 3556 (February 22, 1963),
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.139.3556.725.
72. The Editors, âDr. No Money: The Broken Science Funding System,â ScientiďŹc American, May 2011,
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/dr-no-money/.
73. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of Health, âTimeline for
Assignment, Review, and Council,â n.d., https://www.niaid.nih.gov/grants-contracts/timelines-
assignment-review.
74. âJohn Doench, Ph.D.,â Broad Institute, October 2023, https://www.broadinstitute.org/bios/john-
doench.
75. Derek Thompson, interview with John Doench.
76. KarikĂł, Breaking Through, Kindle, 183.
77. As Azoulay and Danielle Li note in âScientific Grant Funding,â NBER Working Paper 26889, June
2021, https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w26889/w26889.pdf), the term originated
with Lawrence: Peter A. Lawrence, âReal Lives and White Lies in the Funding of Scientific Research,â
PLoS Biology 7, no. 9 (2009): e1000197, https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.1000197.
78. Derek Thompson, interview with Pierre Azoulay.
79. Derek Thompson, interview with Pierre Azoulay.
80. Kevin J. Boudreau, Eva C. Guinan, Karim R. Lakhani, and Christoph Riedl, âThe Novelty Paradox &
Bias for Normal Science: Evidence from Randomized Medical Grant Proposal Evaluations,â Harvard
Business School Working Paper 13â053, December 2012,
https://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/10001229/13-053.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y.
81. Jay Bhattacharya and Mikko Packalen, âStagnation and Scientific Incentives,â NBER Working Paper
26752, February 2020, https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w26752/w26752.pdf.
82. Mikko Packalen and Jay Bhattacharya, âNIH Funding and the Pursuit of Edge Science,â Proceedings
of the National Academy of Sciences 117, no. 22 (May 2020): 12011â016,
https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1910160117.
83. Derek Thompson, interview with James Evans.
84. Adam M. Deane, Marianne J. Chapman, and Michael Horowitz, âThe Therapeutic Potential of a
Venomous Lizard: The Use of Glucagon-Like Peptide-1 Analogues in the Critically Ill,â Critical Care
14, no. 5 (2010): 1004, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3219279/.
85. Marybeth Shea, âDiscovering Life in Yellowstone Where Nobody Thought It Could Exist,â National
Park Service, n.d., https://www.nps.gov/articles/thermophile-yell.htm.
18886. Yoshizumi Ishino et al., âNucleotide Sequence of the IAP Gene, Responsible for Alkaline Phosphatase
Isoenzyme Conversion in Escherichia coli, and Identification of the Gene Product,â Journal of
Bacteriology 169 (1987): 5429â433, doi: 10.1128/jb.169.12.5429-5433.1987; Francisco J. M. Mojica,
G. Juez, and F. RodrĂguez-Valera, âTranscription at Different Salinities of Haloferax mediterranei
Scientific Innovation and Funding Sources
- The text provides a comprehensive list of citations focusing on the mechanisms of high-risk scientific funding and institutional innovation.
- It highlights the role of DARPA in fostering breakthrough technologies, including early support for Moderna's messenger RNA research.
- The citations reference the 'Pioneer' and 'New Innovator' awards at the NIH, which are designed to support unconventional research paths.
- Metascience is introduced as a field of study aimed at understanding and improving science policy to accelerate progress.
- Historical references to the development of penicillin illustrate the long timeline from initial discovery to deployment.
- The section emphasizes the importance of incentives and creativity in the academic life sciences as evidenced by NBER working papers.
Its mission is to make pivotal investments in breakthrough technologies for national security, and it does not have a dedicated space division.
Sequences Adjacent to Partially Modified PstI Sites,â Molecular Microbiology 9 (1993): 613â21, doi:
10.1111/j.1365-2958.1993.tb01721.x.
87. Derek Thompson, interview with James Evans.
88. Email from Francis Collins to Peter Thiel, January 12, 2017,
https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/7203720/NIH-Thiel-Communications.pdf.
89. âNIH Directorâs Pioneer Awardâ and âNIH Directorâs New Innovator Award,â Office of Strategic
CoordinationâThe Common Fund, National Institutes of Health, 2024,
https://commonfund.nih.gov/pioneer.
90. Derek Thompson, interview with Patricia Labosky.
91. James M. Anderson, âEvaluation of the NIH Directorâs Pioneer Award Program-DP1,â Division of
Program Coordination, Planning, and Strategic Initiatives, National Institutes of Health, May 14,
2013, https://dpcpsi.nih.gov/sites/default/files/CoC-051413-Pioneer-Award-Program-DP1.pdf.
92. Moderna, âDARPA Awards Moderna Therapeutics a Grant for Up to $25 Million to Develop
Messenger RNA Therapeutics,â press release, October 2, 2013,
https://investors.modernatx.com/news/news-details/2013/DARPA-Awards-Moderna-Therapeutics-
a-Grant-for-up-to-25-Million-to-Develop-Messenger-RNA-Therapeutics/default.aspx.
93. In fact, DARPA has inspired several offshoots, including ARPA-E and ARPA-H, for high-risk
research in energy and health, respectively.
94. Office of Space Commerce, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Department of
Commerce, https://www.space.commerce.gov/links/resources-for-space-
entrepreneurs/opportunities-department-of-defense-national-security-
agencies/#:~:text=Defense%20Advanced%20Research%20Projects%20Agency%20(DARPA)&text=It
s%20mission%20is%20to%20make,have%20a%20dedicated%20space%20division.
95. Derek Thompson, interview with Erica R. H. Fuchs. All subsequent Fuchs quotes are from this
interview.
96. Fuchs promised not to reveal the identity of the manager, given the sensitivity of his military work.
97. Don Clark, âIBM Reports Advance in Shrinking Chip Circuitry,â Wall Street Journal, July 9, 2015,
https://www.wsj.com/articles/ibm-reports-advances-in-shrinking-future-chips-1436414814.
98. Derek Thompson, interview with Jon Gertner.
99. Derek Thompson, interview with Jon Gertner.
100. Derek Thompson, interview with Jon Gertner.
101. Derek Thompson, interview with Heidi Williams.
102. âMetascience,â Institute for Progress, https://ifp.org/category/metascience/.
103. Pierre Azoulay, Joshua S. Graff Zivin, and Gustavo Manso, âIncentives and Creativity: Evidence from
the Academic Life Sciences,â NBER Working Paper 15466, October 2009,
https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w15466/w15466.pdf.
104. Matt Clancy et al., âTo Speed Up Scientific Progress, We Need to Understand Science Policy,â
Metascience, September 11, 2023, https://ifp.org/to-speed-up-scientific-progress-we-need-to-
understand-science-policy/.
105. Derek Thompson, interview with Pierre Azoulay.
5. Deploy
1. James Phinney Baxter III, Scientists Against Time (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1968 [and previous
publishers]), Kindle, 517.
2. Alexander Fleming, âOn the Antibacterial Action of Cultures of a Penicillium, with Special Reference
to Their Use in the Isolation of B. influenzĂŚ,â British Journal of Experimental Pathology 10, no. 3
(1929): 226â36, https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2048009/?page=1. Fleming called it
189Penicillium rubrum in his landmark 1929 paper. It was subsequently identified as Penicillium
notatum and Penicillium chrysogenum. Today it is recognized as Penicillium rubens: Jos Houbraken,
Jens C. Frisvad, and Robert A. Samson, âFlemingâs Penicillin Producing Strain Is Not Penicillium
chrysogenum but P. rubens,â IMA Fungus 2, no. 1 (June 2011): 87â95,
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3317369/.
3. Baxter, Scientists Against Time, Kindle, loc. 6605â621. Also see E. Chain and H. W. Florey et al.,
Foundations of Scientific Progress
- The text documents the rigorous experimental evolution of penicillin, moving from a small sample of eight mice to complex multi-group bacterial studies.
- It highlights the historical shift in American innovation, questioning why the era of rapid technological progress and industrial dominance has slowed.
- The citations contrast early breakthroughs in medical science with modern regulatory and economic hurdles in sectors like housing and elevator technology.
- Global competition is a central theme, specifically regarding how China has overtaken the U.S. and Japan in key technologies like semiconductors and battery materials.
- The references emphasize the role of institutional support and industrial policy in fostering or hindering scientific 'miracles' and infrastructure development.
The original sample size was eight mice only. See Eric Lax, The Mold in Dr. Floreyâs Coat: The Story of the Penicillin Miracle.
âPenillin as a Chemotherapeutic Agent,â Lancet, August 24, 1940, 226â28, Experiment 2, 227,
file://C:/Users/User/Downloads/19400824_florey_penicillinasachemotherapeuticagent_lancet.pdf.
The original sample size was eight mice only. See Eric Lax, The Mold in Dr. Floreyâs Coat: The Story of
the Penicillin Miracle (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 2015), Kindle, loc. 1940. Increasingly,
over time, Florey and Chain used more mice, building up to Experiment 2âwith its division into
three groups of mice given three different bacteria,
https://www.sciencedirect.com/sdfe/pdf/download/eid/1-s2.0-S0140673601087281/first-page-pdf.
4. Baxter, Scientists Against Time, Kindle, loc. 704.
5. Derek Thompson, âThomas Edisonâs Greatest Invention,â Atlantic, November 2019,
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/11/edmund-morris-edison/598357/.
6. Derek Thompson, âWhy the Age of American Progress Ended,â Atlantic, December 12, 2022,
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2023/01/science-technology-vaccine-invention-
history/672227/.
7. Brink Lindsey, âEli Dourado on Abundance and Collapse,â a conversation with Dourado, The
Permanent Problem (Substack), July 16, 2024, https://brinklindsey.substack.com/p/eli-dourado-on-
abundance-and-collapse.
8. Robinson Meyer, âWhy America Doesnât Really Make Solar Panels Anymore,â Atlantic, June 15,
2021, https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2021/06/why-the-us-doesnt-really-make-solar-
panels-anymore-industrial-policy/619213/.
9. âOur History: A Story of Innovation and Progress,â Otis, https://www.otis.com/en/us/our-
company/history.
10. Stephen Jacob Smith, âThe American Elevator Explains Why Housing Costs Have Skyrocketed,â New
York Times, July 8, 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/08/opinion/elevator-construction-
regulation-labor-immigration.html.
11. David E. Sanger, âChina Has Leapfrogged the U.S. in Key Technologies. Can a New Law Help?,â
New York Times, July 28, 2022, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/28/us/politics/us-china-
semiconductors.html.
12. Shoya Okinaga, âJapan Battery Material Producers Lose Spark as China Races Ahead,â Nikkei Asia,
April 4, 2022, https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Materials/Japan-battery-material-producers-lose-
spark-as-China-races-ahead2#_blank.
13. Bush, Science, the Endless Frontier. For the Committee on Medical Research, see 58â59 and elsewhere
throughout; for malaria, see 53, https://www.nsf.gov/about/history/EndlessFrontier_w.pdf.
14. Baxter, Scientists Against Time, Kindle, 528, and see 522â27.
15. Baxter, Scientists Against Time, Kindle, 530â32.
16. Christen Rayner, âHow the Discovery of Penicillin Has Influenced Modern Medicine,â Oxford
Scientist, June 1, 2020, https://oxsci.org/how-penicillin-has-influenced-modern-medicine/.
17. Derek Thompson, âWhy the Age of American Progress Ended,â Atlantic, December 12, 2022,
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2023/01/science-technology-vaccine-invention-
history/672227/.
18. âAlessandro Volta,â American Physical Society, n.d.,
https://www.aps.org/archives/publications/apsnews/201012/physicshistory.cfm.
19. âDecember 20, 1900: Nature Reports on William Duddellâs âMusical Arcs,âââ American Physical
Society, n.d., https://www.aps.org/archives/publications/apsnews/201012/physicshistory.cfm.
20. âThe Incandescent Lamp Patent,â (The Consolidated Electric Light Company, Appellant, v. The
McKeesport Light Company), 159 U.S. 465 (1895), Appeal from the Circuit Court of the United
190States for the Western District of Pennsylvania, No. 10, argued October 29, 30, 1894; decided
November 11, 1815, https://tile.loc.gov/storage-
services/service/ll/usrep/usrep159/usrep159465/usrep159465.pdf, 476â477.
21. âVast Power of the Sun Is Tapped by Battery Using Sand Ingredient,â New York Times, April 26,
1954, https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1954/04/26/issue.html.
Foundations of Innovation Policy
- The citations document the historical trajectory of US space exploration and energy policy from the 1950s through the 1980s.
- A significant focus is placed on the evolution of solar energy, tracking its transition from a niche technology to a cheap, low-carbon innovation.
- The references highlight the role of German feed-in tariffs as a critical model for global renewable energy adoption.
- Economic principles like Wrightâs Law and Mooreâs Law are cited to explain the exponential cost reductions in aerospace and computing.
- The data tracks federal R&D budget trends, illustrating how government spending priorities shift across different political administrations.
How Much Did Early Transistors Cost? About a Billion Times More Than They Do Now.
22. âAbout Explorer 1,â NASA, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, n.d.,
https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/spacecraft/display.action?id=1958-002B.
23. âVanguard 1,â NASA, https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/spacecraft/display.action?id=1958-002B.
24. âEvery NASA Budget Request, from 1961 to Now,â The Planetary Society,
https://www.planetary.org/space-policy/every-nasa-budget-request.
25. Alice Buck, US Department of Energy, âA History of the Energy Research and Development
Administration,â March 1982, https://www.energy.gov/management/articles/history-energy-
research-and-development-administration.
26. Robert SanGeorge, âFocus â83: Energy Department Has New Secretary and a Fresh Lease on Life for
1983,â United Press International, December 16, 1982,
https://www.upi.com/Archives/1982/12/16/Focus-83-Energy-Department-has-new-secretary-amd-
a-fresh-lease-on-life-for-1983/8180408862800/.
27. The MacNeil/Lehrer Report, episode 7171, âReaganâs Solar Policy,â July 7, 1981, American Archive of
Public Broadcasting, https://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip_507-8c9r20sj5v; Gregory F.
Nemet, How Solar Energy Became Cheap: A Model for Low-Carbon Innovation (London: Routledge,
2019), Kindle, 71.
28. Email from Gregory Nemet to Derek Thompson.
29. Matt Hourihan and David Parkes, American Association for the Advancement of Science, âFederal
R&D Budget Trends: A Short Summary,â January 2019, p. 6, fig. 8,
https://www.aaas.org/sites/default/files/2019-01/AAAS%20RD%20Primer%202019_2.pdf; Nat
Bullard, @NatBullard, tweet, March 26, 2023, 12:37 p.m.,
https://x.com/NatBullard/status/1640060360181817344.
30. Matthew L. Wald, âU.S. Use of Renewable Energy Took a Big Fall in 2001,â New York Times,
December 8, 2002, https://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/08/us/us-use-of-renewable-energy-took-a-
big-fall-in-2001.html. Also see US Energy Information Administration, âRenewables Share of U.S.
Energy Consumption Highest Since 1930s,â May 28, 2015,
https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=21412.
31. âSunspots: Germany Proves Solar Energy Is No Mirage,â Knowledge at Wharton, May 30, 2012,
https://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/sunspots-germany-proves-solar-energy-is-no-mirage/.
32. Joern Hoppmann, Joern Huenteler, and Bastien Girod, âCompulsive Policy-Makingâthe Evolution
of the German Feed-In Tariff System for Solar Photovoltaic Power,â Research Policy 43 (2014): 1422â
1441, https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/jhuenteler/files/rp_germany_pv.pdf; see p. 1426, table 2.
33. Derek Thompson, email interview with Gregory Nemet.
34. Nemet, How Solar Energy Became Cheap, Kindle, 185.
35. Theodore P. Wright. âFactors Affecting the Cost of Airplanes,â Journal of the Aeronautical Sciences 3
(February 1936): 122â28,
https://pdodds.w3.uvm.edu/research/papers/others/1936/wright1936a.pdf.
36. âTheodore Paul Wright,â Daniel Guggenheim Medal biography, American Institute of Aeronautics
and Astronautics, 1945, https://www.aiaa.org/docs/default-source/uploadedfiles/aiaa-
foundation/medalist-for-1945.pdf?sfvrsn=a86c5fcc_2; âNational Advisory Committee for
Aeronautics, 1943,â December 17, 1943, MIT Museum,
https://mitmuseum.mit.edu/collections/object/GCP-00003754.
37. âMooreâs Law,â Intel, September 18, 2023,
https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/newsroom/resources/moores-law.html#gs.h6ovyc;
Gordon E. Moore, âCramming More Components onto Integrated Circuits,â Electronics 38, no. 8
191(April 19, 1965), https://download.intel.com/newsroom/2023/manufacturing/moores-law-
electronics.pdf.
38. âThe End of Mooreâs Law Will Not Slow the Pace of Change,â Economist, September 16, 2024,
https://www.economist.com/technology-quarterly/2024/09/16/the-end-of-moores-law-will-not-
slow-the-pace-of-change; Rachel Courtland, âHow Much Did Early Transistors Cost? About a
Billion Times More Than They Do Now,â IEEE Spectrum, April 16, 2015,
https://spectrum.ieee.org/how-much-did-early-transistors-cost.
Citations of Industrial Innovation
- The references document the dramatic 93% decline in solar energy costs between 2010 and 2020.
- Citations highlight the role of the 'Entrepreneurial State' in fostering foundational technologies like microchips.
- A significant portion of the sources details the logistical and industrial triumph of Operation Warp Speed during the COVID-19 pandemic.
- The text tracks the evolution of vaccine infrastructure, including the development of specialized glass vials and ultra-cold storage solutions.
- The sources collectively argue for a new model of industrial policy where government and private sectors collaborate on rapid innovation.
Inside the Operation That Beat COVID, the Critics, and the Odds
39. Nemet, How Solar Energy Became Cheap, Kindle, 78, 148.
40. Institute for Energy Research, âChinese Solar Panel Production Issues Are Mounting,â November 18,
2020, https://www.instituteforenergyresearch.org/renewable/solar/chinese-solar-panel-production-
issues-are-mounting/.
41. International Renewable Energy Agency, âSolar Energy,â n.d., https://www.irena.org/Energy-
Transition/Technology/Solar-
energy#:~:text=The%20cost%20of%20manufacturing%20solar,93%25%20between%202010%20and%
202020.
42. Hannah Ritchie, Max Roser, and Pablo Rosado, âRenewable Energy,â December 2020, rev. January
2024, https://ourworldindata.org/renewable-energy.
43. Myra Saefong, âWhy Solar Is the Fastest-Growing Source of U.S. Electricity,â MarketWatch, July 9,
2024, https://www.marketwatch.com/story/why-solar-is-the-fastest-growing-source-of-u-s-electricity-
72e7d489?tesla=y.
44. John Arnold, @JohnArnoldFndtn, tweet, September 27, 2024, 10:40 a.m.,
https://x.com/JohnArnoldFndtn/status/1839706693145415989.
45. âThe Third Industrial Revolution,â Economist, April 21, 2012,
https://www.economist.com/leaders/2012/04/21/the-third-industrial-revolution.
46. Mariana Mazzucato, The Entrepreneurial State: Debunking Public vs. Private Sector Myths, rev. ed.
(New York: Penguin Books, 2023), Kindle, 8.
47. Phil Goldstein, âHow the Government Helped Spur the Microchip Industry,â FedTech, September
11, 2018, https://fedtechmagazine.com/article/2018/09/how-government-helped-spur-microchip-
industry.
48. Mazzucato, The Entrepreneurial State, Kindle, 8.
49. Stuart A. Thompson, âHow Long Will a Vaccine Really Take?,â New York Times, April 30, 2020,
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/04/30/opinion/coronavirus-covid-vaccine.html.
50. Jon Cohen, âUnveiling âWarp Speed,â the White Houseâs America-First Push for a Coronavirus
Vaccine,â Science, May 12, 2020, https://www.science.org/content/article/unveiling-warp-speed-
white-house-s-america-first-push-coronavirus-vaccine.
51. David Adler, âInside Operation Warp Speed: A New Model for Industrial Policy,â American AďŹairs 5,
no. 2 (Summer 2021), https://americanaffairsjournal.org/2021/05/inside-operation-warp-speed-a-
new-model-for-industrial-policy/.
52. Derek Thompson, interview with Paul Mango.
53. Paul Mango, Warp Speed: Inside the Operation That Beat COVID, the Critics, and the Odds (New
York: Republic Book Publishers, 2022), Kindle, loc. 1187.
54. Derek Thompson, interview with Paul Mango.
55. Alice Park, âFDA: Pfizer-BioNTech Vaccine Doesnât Need UltraCold Freezer Storage,â Time,
February 26, 2021, https://time.com/5942452/pfizer-biontech-vaccine-cold-storage-fda/; Deb Balzer,
âInside the Ultracold Freezers That Will House COVID19 Vaccines,â Mayo Clinic, December 10,
2020, https://newsnetwork.mayoclinic.org/discussion/inside-the-ultracold-freezers-that-will-house-
covid-19-vaccines/.
56. âNonex to ValorÂŽ Glass: Corningâs 100-Year History of Life-Saving Innovation for Vaccine
Development,â Corning, n.d., https://www.corning.com/worldwide/en/innovation/materials-
science/glass/vaccine-timeline.html; Jennifer Brant and Mark F. Schultz, âUnprecedented: The Rapid
Innovation Response to COVID19 and the Role of Intellectual Property,â International Federation
192of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Associations, November 2021, https://www.ifpma.org/wp-
content/uploads/2023/01/i2023_Unpacking-IP_2021_Final.pdf.
57. Megan Molteni, âVaccine Makers Turn to Microchip Tech to Beat Glass Shortages,â Wired, June 26,
2020, https://www.wired.com/story/vaccine-makers-turn-to-microchip-tech-to-beat-glass-shortages/;
Bill Bostock, âInside the US Governmentâs $347 Million Plan to Fight the Global Glass Vial Shortage
Ahead of a Coronavirus Vaccine Rollout,â Business Insider, June 22, 2020,
https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-vaccine-glass-shortage-operation-warp-speed-corning-
sio2-2020-6; Brant and Schultz, âUnprecedented.â
58. Derek Thompson, interview with Paul Mango.
Citations of Industrial Policy
- The text provides a comprehensive list of citations focusing on Operation Warp Speed (OWS) as a successful model for modern industrial policy.
- Research highlights the significant public investment in mRNA technology and the resulting global reduction in all-cause mortality.
- The sources suggest that the OWS framework of 'advance market commitments' could be applied to other sectors like carbon removal and diabetes treatment.
- Several citations address systemic bottlenecks in the U.S. medical system, specifically the residency pipeline and the shortage of doctors.
- The references extend to environmental challenges, discussing the decarbonization of heavy industries like cement and the ongoing reliance on fossil fuels.
- The collection includes diverse media types, ranging from NBER working papers and academic journals to tweets and interviews with policy experts.
Advance Market Commitments Worked for Vaccines. They Could Work for Carbon Removal, Too.
59. Derek Thompson, interview with Paul Mango.
60. Mango, Warp Speed, Kindle, loc. 2386 and loc. 2384.
61. Derek Thompson, interview with Caleb Watney.
62. The authors thank David Adler for his analysis of OWS as a model of industrial policy. See Adler,
âInside Operation Warp Speed: A New Model for Industrial Policy,â American AďŹairs V, no. 2
(Summer 2021): 3â32, https://americanaffairsjournal.org/2021/05/inside-operation-warp-speed-a-
new-model-for-industrial-policy/.
63. Hussain S. Lalani et al., âUS Public Investment in Development of mRNA COVID19 Vaccines:
Retrospective Cohort Study,â BMJ Open Science 380, no. 1 (March 2023): e073747,
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9975718/.
64. âLives Saved by COVID19 Vaccines,â Journal of Paediatrics and Child Health 10 (September 2022):
1111/jpc.16213, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9537923/.
65. Virat Agrawal, Neeraj Sood, and Christopher M. Whaley, âThe Impact of the Global COVID19
Vaccination Campaign on All-Cause Mortality,â NBER Working Paper 31812, October 2023,
https://www.nber.org/papers/w31812.
66. Jen Psaki, @jrpsaki, tweet, January 15, 2021, 9:44 a.m.,
https://x.com/jrpsaki/status/1350121790148902912?s=20.
67. Casey B. Mulligan, âWe Need More âWarp Speedâ Operations,â Wall Street Journal, October 6, 2023,
https://www.wsj.com/articles/we-need-more-operation-warp-speed-covid-cancer-diabetes-
bureaucracy-fda-ace77028.
68. Robert Orr, âUnmatched: Repairing the U.S. Medical Residency Pipeline,â Niskanen Center,
September 2021, https://www.niskanencenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Unmatched-
Repairing-the-US-Residency-Pipeline.pdf, 11.
69. Orr, âUnmatched,â p. 12, fig. 4.
70. âPopulation Growth 1980â2005,â U.S. News & World Report, January 9, 2006,
https://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/barone/2006/01/09/population-growth-1980-
2005#:~:text=The%20nationâs%20population%20rose%2031,%2C%20and%20Tennessee%20(30).
71. Derek Thompson, âWhy America Has So Few Doctors,â Atlantic, February 14, 2022,
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/02/why-does-the-us-make-it-so-hard-to-be-a-
doctor/622065/.
72. Arielle DâSouza, Kendall Hoyt, Christopher M. Snyder, and Alec Stapp, âCan Operation Warp Speed
Serve as a Model for Accelerating Innovations Beyond COVID Vaccines?,â NBER Working Paper
32831, August 2024, https://www.nber.org/papers/w32831.
73. Susan Athey, Rachel Glennerster, Nan Ransohoff, and Christopher Snyder, âOpinion: Advance
Market Commitments Worked for Vaccines. They Could Work for Carbon Removal, Too,â Politico,
December 22, 2021, https://www.politico.com/news/agenda/2021/12/22/carbon-removal-advance-
market-commitments-525988.
74. IPCC Sixth Assessment Report, 2022, https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg3/.
75. Nan Ransohoff, âHow to Start an Advance Market Commitment,â Works in Progress (newsletter),
May 31, 2024, https://worksinprogress.co/issue/how-to-start-an-advance-market-commitment/.
76. Derek Thompson, interview with Nan Ransohoff.
19377. Vaclav Smil, âThe Modern World Canât Exist Without These Four Ingredients. They All Require
Fossil Fuels,â Time, May 12, 2022, https://time.com/6175734/reliance-on-fossil-fuels/.
78. Ben Tracy and Analisa Novak, âCement Industry Accounts for About 8% of CO2 Emissions. One
Startup Seeks to Change That,â CBS News, January 16, 2023,
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cement-industry-co2-emissions-climate-change-brimstone/.
79. David WallaceWells, @dwallacewells, tweet, January 6, 2020, 11:04 p.m.,
https://x.com/dwallacewells/status/1221675214259605506.
80. Hannah Ritchie, âHow to Decarbonise the Worldâs Cement,â Sustainability by Numbers (blog), June
30, 2024, https://www.sustainabilitybynumbers.com/p/low-carbon-cement.
81. Derek Thompson, interview with Ned Ransohoff.
82. Derek Thompson, interview with Thomas Kalil.
83. Leopold Aschenbrenner, âSituational Awareness: The Decade Ahead,â June 2024, 87,
Citations Toward Abundance
- The text provides a comprehensive bibliography focusing on the intersection of technological progress, infrastructure, and political history.
- References to Israel's desalination efforts and Sam Altman's 'The Intelligence Age' highlight the role of modern technology in overcoming resource scarcity.
- Historical citations explore the public perception of the Apollo moon landing and the dedication required for massive national leaps in capability.
- The 'Toward Abundance' section draws on the rise and fall of the neoliberal order, examining how market eras and tax policies shape societal growth.
- Political transcripts and policy documents from figures like Eisenhower, Trump, and Vance illustrate the shifting rhetoric around economic deregulation and trade.
- The collection suggests a thematic transition from Malthusian constraints toward a future defined by technological and economic abundance.
The Dreams and Dedication Behind Our Leap to the Moon
https://situationalawareness.ai/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/situationalawareness.pdf.
84. Iphigenie Bera, Destiny Lara, and Damien Koh Tze-In, âGET Israel: Topic 9âSorek and Overall
Desalination Water Supply in Israel,â Northwestern University, September 21, 2022,
https://water.northwestern.edu/2022/09/21/get-israel-topic-9-sorek-and-overall-desalination-water-
supply-in-israel/.
85. Sam Altman, âThe Intelligence Age.â
86. Derek Thompson, interview with Paul Mango.
87. Frank Newport, âLanding a Man on the Moon: The Publicâs View,â Gallup, July 20, 1999,
https://news.gallup.com/poll/3712/landing-man-moon-publics-view.aspx.
88. Roger D. Launius, âPublic Opinion Polls and Perceptions of US Human Spaceflight,â Space Policy 19,
no. 3 (August 2003): 163â75,
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0265964603000390.
89. Mark Whitaker, âThe Dreams and Dedication Behind Our Leap to the Moon,â Washington Post,
review of Charles Fishman, One Giant Leap (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2019), July 11, 2019,
https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/the-dreams-and-dedication-behind-our-leap-to-the-
moon/2019/07/11/6ae625f4-9456-11e9-b570-6416efdc0803_story.html.
Conclusion: T oward Abundance
1. Gary Gerstle, The Rise and Fall of the Neoliberal Order: America and the World in the Free Market
Era (New York: Oxford University Press, 2022), Kindle, 153â160.
2. Dwight D. Eisenhower, âRadio and Television Address to the American People on the Tax Program,â
March 15, 1954, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/radio-and-television-address-the-
american-people-the-tax-program.
3. Gerstle, The Rise and Fall of the Neoliberal Order, Kindle, 615.
4. Tom Hayden, The Port Huron Statement, written for the Students for a Democratic Society, June 15,
1962. Courtesy Office of Sen. Tom Hayden,
https://images2.americanprogress.org/campus/email/PortHuronStatement.pdf.
5. Motor Carrier Act, 94 Statute 793, Public Law 96-296, 96th Congress (1980) (enacted),
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-94/pdf/STATUTE-94-Pg793.pdf#page=1;
Airline Deregulation Act, 92 Statute 1705, Public Law 95-504, 95th Congress (1978) (enacted),
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-92/pdf/STATUTE-92-Pg1705.pdf.
6. Tax Foundation, âHistorical US Federal Individual Income Tax Rates & Brackets, 1862â2021,â
August 24, 2021, https://taxfoundation.org/data/all/federal/historical-income-tax-rates-brackets/;
Adam Carasso and Gene Steuerle, âA Brief History of the Top Tax Rate,â Tax Policy Center,
November 25, 2002, https://www.urban.org/sites/default/files/publication/59856/1000459-A-Brief-
History-of-the-Top-Tax-Rate.PDF; Josephine Nesbit, â5 Presidents Who Raised Taxes the Most, and
5 Who Lowered Them: Is Trump One of Them?,â Yahoo! Finance, November 5, 2024,
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/5-presidents-raised-taxes-most-
194140035413.html#:~:text=Harry%20Truman%2C%201945%2D1953&text=The%20Revenue%20Act
%20of%201950,pay%20for%20the%20Korean%20War.
7. Gary Gerstle, interview with Derek Thompson.
8. Stefan Becket, âRead the Full VP Debate Transcript from the Walz-Vance Showdown,â October 2,
2024, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/full-vp-debate-transcript-walz-vance-2024/.
9. Donald Trump, The Economic Club of New York, September 5, 2024, transcript of speech, p. 27,
https://www.econclubny.org/documents/10184/109144/20240905_Trump_Transcript.pdf.
10. Jerusalem Demsas, âBlue States Gave Trump and Vance an Opening,â Atlantic, October 26, 2024,
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2024/10/trump-vance-malthusian-housing-
views/680384/.
11. George Packer, âThe Empty Chamber,â New Yorker, August 2, 2010,
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/08/09/the-empty-chamber.
12. âRead Donald Trumpâs Speech on Trade,â Time, June 28, 2016, https://time.com/4386335/donald-
trump-trade-speech-transcript/.
13. Donald Trump rallies in Phoenix, Arizona (June 23, 2020), and elsewhere,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQjTCatM0Ww.
Economic Policy and Historical Citations
- The text documents the continuity and expansion of trade tariffs across the Trump and Biden administrations.
- Significant legislative milestones are cited, including the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, the CHIPS and Science Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act.
- Export controls and technology restrictions highlight an escalating strategic battle between the United States and China over semiconductor and AI technology.
- The citations contrast modern industrial policy with historical and literary perspectives, ranging from Marx's Communist Manifesto to Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby.
- Recent political agendas focus on middle-class economic relief, specifically targeting housing supply and inflation reduction.
The productive forces at the disposal of society no longer tend to further the development of the conditions of bourgeois property; on the contrary, they have become too powerful for these conditions, by which they are fettered.
14. Erica York, âTariff Tracker: Tracking the Economic Impact of the Trump-Biden Tariffs,â Tax
Foundation, June 26, 2024, https://taxfoundation.org/research/all/federal/trump-tariffs-biden-
tariffs/.
15. Ana Swanson, âBiden Administration Clamps Down on Chinaâs Access to Chip Technology,â New
York Times, October 7, 2022, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/07/business/economy/biden-chip-
technology.html; Michelle Toh and Kayla Tausche, âUS Escalates Tech Battle by Cutting China Off
from AI Chips,â CNN, October 18, 2023, https://www.cnn.com/2023/10/18/tech/us-china-chip-
export-curbs-intl-hnk/index.html; Department of Commerce, Bureau of Industry and Security, 15
CFR Parts 736, 738, 740, 742, 743, 772, and 774 [Docket No. 240813-0217] RIN 0694-AJ60,
âCommerce Control List Additions and Revisions; Implementation of Controls on Advanced
Technologies Consistent with Controls Implemented by International Partners,â September 6, 2024,
https://public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2024-19633.pdf.
16. Ana Swanson, âBiden Administration Announces Indo-Pacific Deal, Clashing with Industry
Groups,â New York Times, May 27, 2023,
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/27/business/economy/biden-indo-pacific-trade-deal.html.
17. Joe Biden, âRemarks on Signing the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act,â November 6, 2021,
transcript by Smith Dawson & Andrews, https://www.sda-inc.com/news/remarks-by-president-
biden-on-passage-of-the-bipartisan-infrastructure-deal/.
18. Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, H.R. 3684, 117th Congress (2021â2022) (enacted),
https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/3684/text; The White House, âFact Sheet:
The Bipartisan Infrastructure Deal,â November 6, 2021, https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-
room/statements-releases/2021/11/06/fact-sheet-the-bipartisan-infrastructure-deal/.
19. CHIPS and Science Act, H.R. 434, 117th Congress (2021â2022) (enacted),
https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/4346.
20. Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, H.R. 5376, 117th Congress (2021â2022) (enacted),
https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/5376/text.
21. Harris-Walz campaign, âA New Way Forward for the Middle Class,â 2024,
https://kamalaharris.com/issues/; Harris-Walz campaign, âVice President Harris Lays Out Agenda to
Lower Costs for American Families,â press release, August 16, 2024,
https://mailchi.mp/press.kamalaharris.com/vice-president-harris-lays-out-agenda-to-lower-costs-for-
american-families; Josh Boak, âHarris Campaign Releases New Ad to Highlight Plans to Build 3
Million Homes and Reduce Inflation,â AP, August 27, 2024, https://apnews.com/article/harris-
trump-housing-home-inflation-build-construction-00ae665790649d3b25d77a6cc0d111d0.
22. Shannon Osaka, âBidenâs $7.5 Billion Investment in EV Charging Has Only Produced 7 Stations in
Two Years,â Washington Post, March 28, 2024, https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-
195solutions/2024/03/28/ev-charging-stations-slow-rollout/.
23. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The Communist Manifesto, edited and annotated by [Frederick]
Engels (1848; Chicago: Charles H. Kerr & Company, 1888), available at
https://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/manifesto-of-the-communist-party.
24. âThe productive forces at the disposal of society no longer tend to further the development of the
conditions of bourgeois property; on the contrary, they have become too powerful for these
conditions, by which they are fetteredâ: Marx and Engels, The Communist Manifesto.
25. F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby (New York: Charles Scribnerâs Sons, 1925; critical edition
published by Cambridge University Press, 1991), 21, 54.
26. Bell Telephone Magazine, Spring 1964, https://www.worldsfairphotos.com/nywf64/articles/bell-
telephone-magazine-spring-64.pdf; Damon Darlin, âHow the Future Looked in 1964: The
Picturephone,â New York Times, June 26, 2014; Bell System Pavilion (photographs), The 1964â1965
Index of Abundance and Innovation
- The text provides a detailed index and bibliography focusing on the 1964 New York Worldâs Fair and its technological optimism.
- It explores the concept of 'abundance' as a lens for political and economic theory, contrasting it with traditional scarcity-based models.
- Key historical and modern figures are cited, ranging from Lyndon B. Johnson and Thomas Mann to contemporary tech leaders like Sam Altman.
- The index highlights critical infrastructure and policy themes, including energy superabundance, adversarial legalism, and construction productivity.
- Significant focus is placed on the role of institutional research, citing Bell Labs, ARPANET, and the Apollo space program as models for progress.
The pages referenced in this index refer to the page numbers in the print edition.
New York Worldâs Fair, worldsfairphotos.com, Bill Cotter, updated December 27, 2022,
https://www.worldsfairphotos.com/nywf64/bell-system.htm.
27. âWestinghouse Time Capsule,â Westland, Jeffrey Stanton, 1997,
https://www.westland.net/ny64fair/map-
docs/westinghouse.htm#:~:text=A%20window%20along%20one%20side,Robert%20Millikan%20an
d%20Thomas%20Mann; Westinghouse (photographs), The 1964â1965 New York Worldâs Fair,
worldsfairphotos.com, Bill Cotter, updated December 27, 2022,
https://www.worldsfairphotos.com/nywf64/bell-system.htm.
28. Futurama II (photographs and audio recording), phrenicea.com, John Herman, 2000â2011,
https://www.phrenicea.com/futurama_chip.htm.
29. Lyndon B. Johnson, âRemarks at the Opening of the New York Worldâs Fair,â April 22, 1964,
https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/remarks-the-opening-the-newyork-worldsfair.
30. Gerstle, The Rise and Fall of the Neoliberal Order, Kindle, 167.
31. David M. Potter, People of Plenty: Economic Abundance and the American Character (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1954), 78, 210. And see George Bancroft, History of the Colonization of
the United States, Vol. 1, 17th ed. (Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, 1859â75),
https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?
doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2001.05.0326%3Achapter%3D8#note-link69.
196Index
A note about the index: The pages referenced in this index refer to the page numbers in the print edition.
Clicking on a page number will take you to the ebook location that corresponds to the beginning of that
page in the print edition. For a comprehensive list of locations of any word or phrase, use your reading
systemâs search function.
AARP, 82
Abbonizio Contractors, 125, 126
abundance, 1â20, 203â22; see also deployment and implementation; economic theory; energy; housing;
invention; liberalism; political issues
defined, 19â20
economy-as-pie metaphor, 11â15
energy superabundance, 67
as lens vs. list, 215â17
liberalism and potential for, 1â4, 16â19, 211â15
political order concept and, 203â7, 220â21
potential for, 1â4, 211â15, 222
scarcity vs., 4â5, 207â11, 217â22
supply-side economics as mistake, 5â11
values and, 15, 49, 83, 205, 207â11, 216
academic and scientific research funding, see invention
Administrative Procedure Act (1946), 91
advance market commitment (AMC) policy, 192â95
adversarial legalism, 91â94
The AďŹuent Society (Galbraith), 49
Affordable Care Act (2010), 7
agriculture, energy used for, 59â61
air pollution, 50, 63â64, 88â89, 96
Alaska, construction productivity in, 80
Aldern, Clayton Page, 39â41
Alphabet, 26, 27, 29â30, 142, 196
Alstom, 118
Altman, Sam, 198
Amazon, 29â30, 196
American Medical Association, 175
American Orthopaedic Association, 190
The American Prospect publication, 106
American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (2009), 72â73, 116â17
American Rescue Plan Act (2021), 10
American Society of Planning Officials, 42
Americans with Disabilities Act (1990), 104
197Anbinder, Jacob, 37, 47, 49, 53â55
Anthropic, 28
Apollo space program, 145, 188, 189, 199, 200â201
Apple, 26, 27, 183
Arcadis, 118
âAre Ideas Getting Harder to Find?â (Stanford and MIT), 142
Armstrong, Neil, 201
Army Materiel Command (US Department of Defense), 186
Arnold, John, 182
Arnold Ventures, 182
ARPANET, 162
artificial intelligence (AI), 28, 142, 196â99
Arup, 118
Aschenbrenner, Leopold, 197
Atlantic magazine, 46, 208
AT&T, 163â65, 168
Australia, carbon emissions per person, 66
Azoulay, Pierre, 141, 148, 155, 156, 167, 168
Bagley, Nicholas, 89â91, 93â94, 112
Bastani, Aaron, 13â14
Baxter, James Phinney, III, 174, 202
Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART), 118â19
Beijing, air pollution in, 63
Bell, Alexander Graham, 171
Bell Labs (Bell Telephone Laboratories, AT&T), 163â65, 168, 177, 218
Bennet, Michael, 209
Bhattacharya, Jay, 157
Biden, Joe
on COVID pandemic, 188
on economic policy, 10
on energy, 61, 212
on I-95 bridge repair, 127
on Inflation Reduction Act, 77
The Bureaucracy of Progress
- The text highlights how modern bureaucracy and complex zoning rules have significantly hindered housing development and construction productivity in American cities.
- Environmental legislation from the 1970s, such as CEQA and the Clean Air Act, has evolved into a primary tool for litigation that delays major infrastructure projects.
- The 'burden of knowledge' and institutional bureaucracy within the NIH and other scientific bodies are identified as growing obstacles to rapid innovation and invention.
- California serves as a primary case study for the friction between liberal policy goals and the practical inability to build high-speed rail or affordable housing.
- A historical shift is noted from the mid-20th century 'frontier' mentality of city-building toward a modern era defined by 'vetocracy' and administrative bloat.
The 'Californication' of the American economy has meant that even the most essential infrastructure projects are now strangled by a thicket of procedural delays and environmental litigation.
on infrastructure, 210â11
on scientific research, 142
on semiconductor industry, 98, 114â16 (see also CHIPS and Science Act)
on trade, 210
big governmentâsmall government divide, 105â12, 205
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, 139, 192
BioNTech, 132, 139
Bloom, Nicholas, 142
Bloomberg, Michael, 24
Bloomberg L.P., 27, 196
BloombergNEF, 64
boardinghouses, building codes against, 41â43
Boston, housing and zoning in, 106
Breaking Through (KarikĂł), 155
Britain, see United Kingdom
Broad Institute, 144, 154, 163
Brooks, Leah, 97
198Brown, Jerry, 71, 72, 74
Buckley, Rob, 125â26
Buckley & Company, 125
building codes, housing and, 42â43; see also zoning rules
building of clean economy, see energy
building of housing, see housing
building of infrastructure, see infrastructure
burden of knowledge, 143â44
bureaucracy
affluence and, 81â86
construction productivity and, 78â81
Golden Fleece Award and, 153
housing development and zoning rules, 33â38, 44â47, 106â7, 208
litigation and, 86â94, 205
of NIH, 152â59 (see also invention)
Bureau of Consular Affairs (US State Department), 121â22
Bush, George H. W., 6
Bush, Vannevar, 150, 151, 153, 174
C. Abbonizio Contractors, 125, 126
California; see also Los Angeles; San Francisco; Silicon Valley
California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA, 1970), 53
Democratic Party and, 16â17, 38
Employment Development Department (EDD), 119â24
environmental legislation of, 14, 52â53
Friends of Mammoth (1972), 53â54
High-Speed Rail Authority/high-speed rail plans of, 71â78, 86, 94, 116â18
housing in, 33â39, 52â54, 55â56
Lakewood planned community, 36
Legislative Analystâs Office, 38
liberalism and, 16â17
Petaluma Plan, 36â37
presidential election (2024) and, 18
solar power in, 64
Venice Dell Community project, 110
âCalifornicationâ term, 55
Calisch, Sam, 68
Cambridge Systematics, 118
Cambridge University, 203
Canada
carbon emissions per person, 66
rail system cost of, 77
cancer research, 142, 148
capitalism, Marx and Engels on, 214â15
CARES Act (2020), 10
Carnegie Mellon (formerly Carnegie Institute of Technology), 162
Caro, Robert, 55
Carroll, Mike, 125â27
cars, see transportation
Carson, Rachel, 50â51
Carter, Jimmy, 7, 179, 205
199Census Bureau, US, 23
Center for Building in North America, 173
Center on Global Energy Policy (Columbia University), 67
Central Pacific Railroad Company, 74
CEQA (California Environmental Quality Act, 1970), 53
Chain, Ernst, 170, 171, 174
Chamber of Commerce, 81
Chase, Jenny, 64
Chat-GPT, 142
Chetty, Raj, 31
child care cost, 9
childhood leukemia research, 148
childhood population, under age five, 18
China
Beijing, air pollution in, 63
as economic competitor to US, 209
federal civilian workforce size in, 117
high-speed rail system of, 75, 82
manufacturing in, 26â27
solar technology of, 179â80, 181
CHIPS and Science Act (2022), 11, 71, 98, 114, 116, 211
Chokecherry and Sierra Madre Wind Energy Project, 97
Christian Science Monitor, 87
Chung, Payton, 41
cities; see also housing; individual names of cities
air pollution in, 50, 63â64
as American frontier, 21â25
habitable land of, 59
income inequality and housing in, 30â32
innovation found in, 25â30
âCities of Amberâ (Anbinder), 37, 47, 49, 53â55
Clean Air Act (1970), 51, 52, 88
clean economy, building, see energy
Clean Water Act (1972), 51, 87, 96
Cleveland, Ohio, water pollution in, 50
climate change
abundance potential and, 212
energy policy and, 57â62 (see also energy)
political divide on, 15
politics of invention and, 134
sustainable technologies and, 62â67
Clinton, Bill, 7, 206
Coastal Zone Management Act (1972), 96
Cobbett, William, 221
COBOL programming language, 120â21
Code for America, 119
Cohen, Lizabeth, 19
Colburn, Gregg, 39â41
Collins, Francis, 159
Collison, Patrick, 86
Colorado, construction productivity in, 80
200Columbia University, 67, 113, 184
Columbus, Christopher, 148
Index of Progress and Policy
- The text highlights the tension between demand-side and supply-side economics, particularly how the Democratic Party has historically aligned with demand-side theories.
- It examines the 'eureka myth' of innovation, arguing that deployment and implementation are as critical to progress as the initial discovery.
- The COVID-19 pandemic serves as a case study for rapid institutional response, specifically through Operation Warp Speed and mRNA research.
- Bureaucratic bottlenecks and litigation are identified as primary obstacles to construction productivity and infrastructure development.
- The concept of 'degrowth' is contrasted with the potential for abundance through energy policy and technological advancement.
The eureka myth of deployment and implementation suggests that the pace of progress is a choice made in times of crisis.
Committee on Medical Research (CMR), 174â75
The Communist Manifesto (Marx and Engels), 214â15
Congress, US; see also individual names of legislation
bureaucracy created by (1960s and 1970s), 92
military base closings by, 98
Conservation Fund, 96
The Conservative Futurist (Pethokoukis), 16
Construction Analytics, 80
construction productivity measure, 78â81
Copernicus, 58
Corning, 186
COVID pandemic
economic policy and, 10
masking and, 132
Operation Warp Speed (OWS), 184â89, 211
PCR tests and, 158
remote work and, 29â30
vaccine development and mRNA research, 130â32, 135, 137â40, 146, 156, 161, 184
Cowen, Tyler, 16
crisis, focus in times of, 199â202
CRISPR, 158â59
Cruz, Ted, 116
CTY Housing, 108â9
Curie, Marie, 171
Cuyahoga River, water pollution in, 50
CVS, 187
dairy industry, 59â61
Dale, Thomas, 221
Dartmouth College, 137, 166
Darwin, Charles, 58
Davy, Humphry, 176
The Day the Earth Stood Still (film), 41
DeepMind, 28, 142
Deese, Brian, 77
Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), 161â65, 167â68, 199
degrowth
abundance potential and, 213â14
defined, 58â59
energy policy and, 58â62
Delaware, construction productivity in, 80
Delhi, air pollution in, 63â64
Deloitte, 121, 122
demand-side economics
defined, 5â6
Democratic Party as associated with, 6â10
The End of Laissez-Faire (Keynes), 183
for housing, 23 (see also housing)
supply-side economics as mistake, 5â11
201Democratic Party; see also liberalism
California politics and, 16â17, 38
demand-side economics and, 7
on government delays, 77, 90, 127, 153 (see also bureaucracy)
on health care, 135â36
lawyers as politicians in, 93
litigation and legal bureaucracy, 89â94
on Operation Warp Speed, 188
political order concept and, 203â7, 220â21
presidential election (2024) and, 17â18, 213
Demsas, Jerusalem, 46, 208
Denmark, social welfare system of, 70â71
Department of Defense, US, 98, 161â63, 178, 183, 186
Department of Health and Human Services, US, 40, 185, 188, 190
Department of Housing and Urban Development, US (HUD), 111â12
Department of Transportation, US, 126
Department of Transportation Act (1966), 51
deployment and implementation, 169â202
of artificial intelligence, 196â99
bottleneck detection for, 163, 189â91, 195, 197, 198
eureka myth of, 171â75, 177, 180, 182, 202
focus as choice in, 199â202
of Operation Warp Speed, 184â89
pace of progress in, 176â84
of penicillin, 169â71, 174â75, 176, 180, 183â85, 202
pull funding and advance market commitment policy for, 192â95
Wrightâs law, 180
Doench, John, 154â55, 163
Donora, Pennsylvania, air pollution in, 50
Dourado, Eli, 67
Duchovny, David, 55
Dupont Experimental Station, 149
economic events, see COVID pandemic; Great Recession; New Deal
economic theory; see also scarcity
The Communist Manifesto (Marx and Engels), 214â15
demand-side economics, 5â11
The End of Laissez-Faire (Keynes), 183
inflation and, 9â10, 43â45
pie metaphor of, 11â15
scarcity as choice, 4â5
scientific research/invention and economic growth, 137 (see also invention)
supply and demand, defined, 5â6
supply and demand of housing, 23 (see also housing)
supply-side economics, 5â11, 38â43, 212
Economist magazine, 182
Edison, Thomas, 149, 171, 176â77
Edwards, James, 179
Einstein, Albert, 147
Eisenhower, Dwight, 204â5
Electoral College, 18
202elevators, 173
Emanuel, Rahm, 73
eminent domain, 75
Empire State Building, 77
âEmpirically Grounded Technology Forecasts and the Energy Transitionâ (Way, Ives, Mealy, and Farmer), 65
employment
Californiaâs unemployment insurance system, 119â24
construction productivity measure and, 81
federal civilian workforce size, 117
homelessness and, 40
in housing construction, 85
housing cost and wages, 43, 44
invention and skilled workers, 115, 116, 145â46, 166
outsourced work by government agencies, 117â24
in service jobs, 30â32
Employment Development Department (EDD, California), 119â24
Index of Abundance and Obstruction
- The index highlights the tension between the potential for energy superabundance and the bureaucratic hurdles of legal intervention and construction productivity.
- California's high-speed rail and green infrastructure projects serve as primary case studies for the difficulties of modern implementation.
- Environmental legislation like NEPA and the Endangered Species Act are indexed as both protective measures and significant sources of project delay.
- The text explores 'everything-bagel liberalism,' where social and regulatory goals are layered onto infrastructure projects, often slowing their progress.
- Historical and modern scientific breakthroughs, from mRNA research to the 'eureka myth,' are contrasted against the administrative realities of the entrepreneurial state.
The index points toward 'everything-bagel liberalism,' a state where the accumulation of well-intentioned regulations becomes a barrier to the very progress they seek to guide.
Endangered Species Act (1973), 51, 52, 96
The End of Laissez-Faire (Keynes), 183
energy, 57â99
abundance potential and, 1â4, 212
bureaucracy and affluence, 81â86
bureaucracy and legal intervention, 86â94, 205
Californiaâs high-speed rail difficulty and, 71â78, 86, 94, 116â18
climate change and energy policy, 57â62
construction productivity and, 78â81
electricity infrastructure need and, 68â71
energy superabundance concept, 67
fossil fuels for, 61â66, 69, 70, 178, 179
green infrastructure and, 94â99, 109â10
implementation of technologies for, 173, 176â80, 181, 183
nuclear power, 1â4, 14, 15, 60, 65, 67
sustainability of, 62â67 (see also solar energy; wind energy)
Energy Information Administration, US, 65
Energy Research and Development Administration (US Department of Energy), 178
Engels, Friedrich, 214â15
The Entrepreneurial State (Mazzucato), 182â83
Environmental Defense Fund, 88
environmentalism; see also climate change
abundance and future potential for, 216â17
California on, 14, 52â53
energy policy and, 76
green infrastructure, 94â99, 109â10
housing and effect of, 48â54
legal challenges and action in, 88â89
National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA, 1970), 51, 52, 54, 96, 114â16
Republican Party on, 51â53
Environmental Protection Agency, 52
Estonia, productivity measure, 79
eureka myth, 171â75, 177, 180, 182, 202
Evans, James, 147â48, 157, 159
Evarts, Charles, 190
203âeverything-bagel liberalism,â 113â17
Explorer 1 satellite, 178
factory farms, 59â61
Federal-Aid Highway Act (1968, 1973), 51
Federal Highway Administration, 125
Federal Land Policy and Management Act, 96
Federal Reserve, 199
FedEx, 187
financing, private vs. public, 101â4, 106
âfirefighter test,â 30
Fischel, William, 34â35, 44â47
Fitzgerald, F. Scott, 217
Fleming, Alexander, 169â71, 202
Florey, Howard, 170â71, 174
Florida, energy sources of, 69
focus, implementation and, 199â202
Food and Drug Administration, US, 132, 185
Ford, 176, 180
fossil fuels, 61â66, 69, 70, 178, 179; see also energy
Foster, Rebecca, 102, 104
Fountain, Lawrence, 153
14B (Local Business Enterprise and Non-Discrimination in Contracting Ordinance), 102â3
Foxconn, 26
France
carbon emissions per person, 66
energy cost in, 61
health care cost in, 105
high-speed rail system of, 72
housing supply in, 23
Palace of Versailles, 62
Franklin, Benjamin, 171
fraud, in government programs, 123â24
Friends of Mammoth v. Board of Supervisors of Mono County (Cal. 1972), 53â54
Frontier, 193
Fuchs, Erica R. H., 161â63
Fully Automated Luxury Communism (Bastani), 13â14
âFuturama IIâ exhibit (General Motors), 218
Galbraith, John Kenneth, 49
Gallup survey (1965), 200
Galperin, Ron, 109
Ganong, Peter, 32
Garcetti, Eric, 108
General Motors, 218
genetics
CRISPR, 158â59
Genome Biology journal, satirical article, 148
Mendel and, 144
mRNA research, 130â32, 135, 137â40, 146, 156, 161, 184
Georgia, construction productivity in, 80
204geothermal energy, 65
Germany
carbon emissions per person, 66
housing supply in, 23
postâWorld War II economy, West Germany, 81
rail system cost of, 77
solar technology of, 179, 181
Gerrard, Michael, 113
Gerstle, Gary, 203â4, 207, 220â21
Gertner, Jon, 164â65
âGetting Infrastructure Built: The Law and Economics of Permittingâ (Liscow), 97â98
Gilliam, Harold, 56
Glaeser, Ed, 24, 25, 27, 30, 84â85
GLP-1 drugs, 157â58
Golden Fleece Award, 153
Goldman Sachs, 27
Google, 28, 142
Goolsbee, Austan, 78â80
government and public opinion, 14â15, 89â94, 182â83; see also political issues
Grant, Ulysses S., 21
grant writing, see invention
Great Depression, see New Deal
The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald), 217
Great Recession
American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (2009), 72â74
housing market and, 23
political order concept and, 206
Greeley, Horace, 21, 22â23
green infrastructure, 94â99, 109â10; see also energy
âThe Greensâ Dilemmaâ (Ruhl and Salzman), 69â70, 95â97
Griffith, Saul, 68
Index of American Abundance
- The index highlights the critical intersection of housing scarcity and homelessness, identifying zoning and building codes as primary barriers to affordability.
- It traces the history of American infrastructure, from the success of the Interstate Highway System to modern challenges in high-speed rail and bridge repair.
- The text examines the 'politics of invention,' contrasting the discovery of penicillin and the internet with modern bureaucratic hurdles in NIH funding.
- A significant focus is placed on the 'KarikĂł Problem,' illustrating how institutional risk-aversion can stall essential scientific progress and breakthrough research.
- The relationship between immigration policy and innovation is explored, specifically how H-1B visas and skilled labor are vital to maintaining 'idea factories.'
- Supply-side economics is framed as a solution to rising costs in healthcare, education, and housing through the lens of abundance rather than scarcity.
Homelessness as scarcity problem of, 38â43; cities as American frontier, 21â25; eureka myth and, 171â75.
growth, see housing
Hansen, Alvin, 22
Harris, Kamala, 18, 61, 93, 212, 213
Harris & Associates, 118
Harvard University, 156â57, 163
Hawaii, homelessness in, 40
Hayes, Denis, 51
H-1B visa, 146; see also immigration policy
health care; see also COVID pandemic
abundance potential for, 1â4
Affordable Care Act (2010), 7
big governmentâsmall government divide on, 105â6
NIH funding for research (see National Institutes of Health)
penicillin discovery, 169â71, 174â75, 176, 180, 183â85, 202
politics of invention and, 134â36
scarcity of primary-care physicians, 190â91
supply-side economics and insurance cost, 8â9
Heisenberg, Werner, 147
Hewlett-Packard, 163
205Hickel, Jason, 58, 60, 61
higher education cost, 9
High-Risk, High-Reward Research program (NIH), 159, 160
High-Speed Rail Authority (California), 74â76, 94, 118
highways; see also transportation
Federal-Aid Highway Act (1968, 1973), 51
Federal Highway Administration, 125
Highway Safety Act (1966), 86
Interstate Highway System, 46â47, 50, 51, 54â56, 96, 97, 204
HIV research, 137â39, 148
HNTB, 118
Homelessness Is a Housing Problem (Colburn and Aldern), 39â41
housing, 21â56
abundance potential for, 1â4, 212â13, 215â16
big governmentâsmall government divide on, 105â12
building codes and, 42â43
cities and innovation, 25â30
cities as American frontier, 21â25
construction productivity measure, 79
elevators in, 173
environmentalism and effect on, 48â54
financing of, private vs. public, 101â4, 106
homelessness as scarcity problem of, 38â43
immigration policy and, 208
income inequality and, 23â25, 30â32
price rise of 1970s to present, 23, 43â47
social (public) housing availability, 111â12
supply-side economics and price rise of, 8
thirty-year fixed-rate mortgage, 44â45
transportation infrastructure and, 35â38, 48â56
Yes In My Back Yard (or YIMBY), 212
zoning rules and, 33â38, 44â47, 106â7, 208
Housing Accelerator Fund, 102
Houston, housing and zoning in, 106â7
Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI), 167
Howell, William, 17
How Solar Energy Became Cheap (Nemet), 178â80
Huffman, Jim, 36
Human Genome Project, 148, 158
Hygienic Laboratory, 151
IBM, 120â21, 163
I-95 bridge repair (Pennsylvania), 125â28
Idaho, construction productivity in, 80
idea factories, 160â66; see also invention
The Idea Factory (Gertner), 164â65
Illinois, presidential election (2024) and, 18
immigration policy
border wall and, 98
housing and, 208
immigrants as others, 208
206invention and skilled workers, 115, 116, 145â46, 166
Immunity journal, 138
Imperial College London, 133
implementation, see deployment and implementation
income inequality
energy inequality and, 63â64
housing and, 23â25, 30â32
India, air pollution in, 63â64
individualism, 205â6
inflation
housing cost since 1970s, 43â45
supply-side economics and, 9â10
Inflation Reduction Act (2022), 11, 71, 77, 181â82, 211
infrastructure; see also transportation
Biden on, 210â11, 213
energy and infrastructure need, 68â71
housing and, 48â56
Trump on, 210
Infrastructure and Investment Jobs Act (2021), 71
Institute for Progress, 145, 187
Intel, 26, 180
Internal Revenue Service (IRS), 122
internet, DARPA and, 161, 162
Interstate Highway System, 46â47, 50, 51, 54â56, 96, 97, 204
invention, 129â68
burden of knowledge and, 143â44
eureka myth and, 171â75, 177, 180, 182, 202 (see also deployment and implementation)
idea factories of, 160â66
immigration policy and, 115, 145â46, 166
innovating scientific research for, 166â68
KarikĂł Problem and pace of scientific progress, 141â49, 156
KarikĂłâs research and NIH lack of funding, 129â33, 137â41, 146, 155, 168
NIH bureaucracy and effect on, 152â59
NIH incentives for, 159â60
NIH inception and, 149â52
politics of, 133â37
Worldâs Fair (1964), 217â19
iPhone (Apple), 26, 183
Israel, water desalination by, 67, 198
Italy, housing supply in, 23
Japan
carbon emissions per person, 66
high-speed rail system of, 72
housing supply in, 23
Index of Abundance and Liberalism
- The index highlights the 'KarikĂł Problem' and the challenges of mRNA research funding, illustrating the friction between scientific innovation and institutional bureaucracy.
- It contrasts 'everything-bagel liberalism' with procedural governance, noting how litigation and regulatory processes often hinder efficient public outcomes.
- The text tracks the evolution of environmental and social legislation, such as NEPA and the National Cancer Act, and their long-term impact on infrastructure and development.
- Economic concepts like labor productivity, Wrightâs law, and the 'big governmentâsmall government' divide are explored through various historical and modern lenses.
- The role of major institutions and figuresâfrom NASA and the NIH to Elon Musk and Ralph Naderâis documented in the context of technological deployment and state capacity.
âeverything-bagel liberalism,â 113â17; litigation and bureaucracy problem, 89â94, 205
postâWorld War II economy, 81, 82
rail system cost of, 77
Jefferson, Thomas, 62
Jenkins, Jesse, 69
Johnson, Lyndon B., 48, 86, 218â19
Jones, Benjamin, 143, 145
207JPMorgan Chase, 27, 29â30
Kagan, Robert, 91â92
Kalil, Thomas, 195
KarikĂł, Katalin, 129â33, 137â41, 146, 155, 168
KarikĂł Problem, 141â49, 156
Kelly, Brian, 76, 118
Kelly, Mark, 116
Kennedy, John F., 201
Kennedy, Robert F., Jr., 188
Keynes, John Maynard, 183
Klein, Ezra, 75
Kuttner, Bob, 106, 111
labor productivity measure, 78
labor unions, 82, 126, 127
Labosky, Patricia, 159â60
Laffer, Arthur, 6
Lakewood, California, housing and, 36
land
agriculture and energy use, 59â61
land use for sustainable energy, 70
lot size and housing, 45, 47
Latvia, productivity measure, 79
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, 70
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, 66â67
Legislative Analystâs Office (California), 38
Lehrer, Jim, 89
Leonardo da Vinci, 131
Less Is More: How Degrowth Will Save the World (Hickel), 58, 60, 61
liberalism, 101â28
abundance as potential for, 1â4, 16â19, 211â15 (see also abundance)
big governmentâsmall government divide and, 105â12, 205
âeverything-bagel liberalism,â 113â17
litigation and bureaucracy problem, 89â94, 205 (see also bureaucracy)
neoliberalism as political order, 204
New Deal and effect on, 49
outsourced work by government agencies, 117â24
private vs. public financing and, 101â4, 106
as procedural vs. outcome-based, 89â94, 112, 125â28
regulatory processes vs. efficient choices of government, 125â28
on social welfare system, 70â71
Licklider, J. C. R., 162
Lindsey, Brink, 127â28
Liscow, Zachary, 97â98, 119
lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries, 173
Lithuania, productivity measure, 79
litigation, bureaucracy and, 86â94, 205
Local Business Enterprise and Non-Discrimination in Contracting Ordinance (14B), 102â3
London, air pollution in, 63â64
Los Angeles
208air pollution in, 50, 63, 89
Homeless Services Authority, 111
housing and Proposition HHH in, 107â10
Los Angeles Times, 118
Lott, Melissa, 67
Mac Donald, Heather, 39
Mango, Paul, 185, 186, 199
Manhattan Project, 145, 150, 189, 197
Mann, Charles, 62
manufacturing; see also deployment and implementation; invention
emissions, 66
productivity measure of, 78
Trump on, 209â10
Wrightâs law, 180
Marine Mammal Protection Act (1972), 96
Marston, Heidi, 111, 112
Marx, Karl, 214â15
masking, COVID and, 132
Mazzucato, Mariana, 182â83
McKesson, 187
McKibben, Bill, 65
meat industry, 59â61
Medicare, 33
Mendel, Gregor, 144
mental illness, homelessness and, 40
Merrimack River, water pollution in, 50
messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) research, 130â32, 135, 137â40, 146, 156, 161, 184
Meta, 28, 29â30
metascience, 166
Metzenbaum, James, 35
Michigan, construction productivity in, 80
Michigan Law Review, 90
microinventions, 176â77
Microsoft, 26, 196
Migratory Bird Treaty Act, 96
military base closings, 98
MIT, 142, 148, 150, 162, 163
Model S (Tesla), 136
Model T (Ford), 176, 180
Moderna, 132, 139â40, 161, 188
Moe, Terry, 17
Mokyr, Joel, 176
Moleyns, Frederick de, 177
Mondale, Walter, 93
Moore, Gordon, 180
Mooreâs Law, 163
Moretti, Enrico, 25, 28
Moses, Robert, 55
mRNA (messenger ribonucleic acid) research, 130â32, 135, 137â40, 146, 156, 161, 184
MSNBC, 184
209âmuckers,â 149
Mulligan, Casey B, 189
Mumford, Lewis, 55
Musk, Elon, 136, 211â12
Nader, Ralph, 86â90
Naderâs Raiders, 87â88
NASA, 136, 145, 150, 162, 183, 199, 201
National Academy of Sciences, 148
National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, 150, 180
National Cancer Act (1971), 142
National Cancer Institute, 142
National Economic Council, 77
National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA, 1970), 51, 52, 54, 96, 114â16
National Forest Management Act (1976), 96
National Heart Institute, 152
National Historic Preservation Act (1966), 51
National Institute of Mental Health, 152
National Institutes of Health (NIH)
budget of, 161
Index of American Progress
- The text highlights the 'KarikĂł Problem,' where institutional bias and NIH funding models failed to support the research that eventually led to mRNA vaccines.
- It traces the evolution of American political orders from the New Deal to neoliberalism, examining how these frameworks shaped government capacity.
- The index contrasts the efficiency of rapid infrastructure projects, like the I-95 bridge repair, with the bureaucratic hurdles of modern federal procurement and outsourcing.
- It explores the 'politics of abundance,' suggesting that economic growth and supply-side policies are essential for maintaining democratic values and social stability.
- The section documents the history of transformative scientific breakthroughs, such as penicillin and Operation Warp Speed, as models for state-led innovation.
The KarikĂł Problem and pace of scientific progress, 141â49, 156
bureaucracy of, and effect on research, 152â59
funding model of, 167
incentives for research by, 159â60
inception of, 149â52
institutional bias and, 165
KarikĂł Problem and pace of scientific progress, 141â49, 156
KarikĂłâs research and lack of funding by, 129â33, 137â41, 146, 155, 168
successful scientific discoveries and, 148â49, 183
National Science Foundation (NSF), 151, 152, 183
National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act (1966), 86
Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), 88
Nature journal, 138
Navy, US, 178
negative energy prices, 64
Nelson, Gaylord, 51
Nemet, Gregory, 178â80
neoliberalism, as political order, 204
Neufeld, Jeremy, 145, 146
Nevada, energy sources of, 69
New Deal
as Great Depression response, 22, 48â49, 199
as political order, 204â5
The New Geography of Jobs (Moretti), 25, 28
New Hampshire, water pollution in, 50
New Innovator Award (NIH), 159, 160
New Jersey, housing in, 37, 106
Newsom, Gavin, 74, 75â76
Newton, Isaac, 159
New York City
air pollution in, 63
finance sector and, 27
210housing in, 24, 34â35, 37, 106
Worldâs Fair (1964), 217â19
New York (state), presidential election (2024) and, 18
New York Times, 64, 177â78, 181, 184, 193
New-York Tribune, 21
NIH, see National Institutes of Health (NIH)
Niskanen Center, 16, 90, 191
Nixon, Richard, 51â52, 142
Nobel Prizes, 140, 145, 171, 172
Noise Control Act (1972), 51
North Carolina, construction productivity in, 80
Northwestern University, 143
Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO), on semiconductors, 114â16
Not the End of the World (Ritchie), 64, 66
nuclear power, 1â4, 14, 15, 60, 65, 67
Obama, Barack
American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (2009), 72â74, 116â17
digitizing government project of, 119
on energy, 136
on inflation, 9â10
scientific research policy of, 136, 142
on trade, 210
Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD)
inception of, 150, 199
NIH inception and, 151
penicillin and, 174â75, 183, 189
Ohio, water pollution in, 50
oil crisis (1973), 178
Olson, Mancur, 81â83, 85, 93
OpenAI, 28, 142, 198
Operation Warp Speed (OWS), 184â89, 192, 195, 199, 211
Oppenheimer, J. Robert, 150
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), 23, 79, 97
Orr, Robert, 191
others, immigrants as, 208
Otis, Elisha, 173
outsourced work, 117â24
Oxford University, 170
Ozempic, 157â58
Packalen, Mikko, 157
Pahlka, Jen, 119â24
Palace of Versailles, 62
âPapers and Patents Are Becoming Less Disruptive Over Timeâ (Park, Leahey, and Funk), 147
parking, housing and, 42, 45â46
Parsons Corporation, 118
PCR (polymerase chain reaction) tests, 158
peer review system, invention and, 156â57, 162
Pell Grants, 7
penicillin, 169â71, 174â75, 176, 180, 183â85, 202
211Pennsylvania
air pollution in, 50
I-95 bridge repair, 125â28
People of Plenty (Potter), 19, 22, 221
Petaluma (California) Plan, 36â37, 38
Pethokoukis, James, 16
Petsko, Gregory, 148
Pew Research Center, 94
Pfizer, 29â30, 132, 186, 188
PGH Wong Engineering, 118
phosphorous, 143
pie metaphor of economy, 11â15
Pioneer Award (NIH), 159, 160
Podesta, John, 77
political issues; see also Democratic Party; liberalism; Republican Party
big governmentâsmall government divide, 105â12, 205
federal civilian workforce size, 117
politics of invention, 133â37 (see also invention)
public opinion of government responsibility, 14â15, 89â94, 182â83
red-state/blue-state construction productivity measure, 80
red-state/blue-state housing policy, 33â38, 106â7
of right-wing populism, 17, 207â8
state capacity concept, 105
of supply-side economics, 5â11
values and abundance, 15, 49, 83, 205, 207â11, 216
political order concept, 203â7, 220â21
pollution, see environmentalism
polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests, 158
Port Huron Statement (1962), 205
Portugal, rail system cost of, 77
Postman, Neil, 15
Potter, David M., 19, 22, 221
poverty, homelessness and, 40
The Power Broker (Caro), 55
Index of Abundance and Scarcity
- The text examines the systemic 'KarikĂł Problem' and the pace of progress, highlighting how institutional friction delays the implementation of life-saving inventions.
- It contrasts the politics of scarcity with a proposed 'politics of abundance,' suggesting that current housing and energy shortages are often the result of deliberate policy choices.
- The role of legal and procedural hurdles is explored through 'The Procedure Fetish,' which details how litigation and bureaucracy stall infrastructure and environmental projects.
- Historical shifts in political orders are traced from the New Deal and neoliberalism to the current era, focusing on how parties approach government size and regulatory power.
- Case studies in productivity and implementation range from the rapid development of COVID-19 vaccines to the chronic delays in San Francisco's housing and transit systems.
Scarcity as choice, 4â5; homelessness as housing scarcity problem, 38â43; politics of abundance vs., 207â11, 217â22.
Presidents, Populism, and the Crisis of Democracy (Howell and Moe), 17
primary-care physicians, scarcity of, 190â91
âThe Procedure Fetishâ (Bagley), 90â91, 93â94
progress, pace of; see also deployment and implementation; invention
implementation and, 176â84 (see also deployment and implementation)
KarikĂł Problem and, 141â49, 156
progressivism, see liberalism
Project Finance Advisory, 118
Proposition 209 (California), 103
Proposition HHH (Los Angeles), 107â10
Proxmire, William, 153
Public Citizens (Sabin), 87â89
public opinion of government, 14â15, 89â94, 182â83; see also political issues
public (social) housing, availability of, 111â12
pull funding, 192â95
race, housing and, 35â38, 46â47
212Raimondo, Gina, 114, 115â16
RAND Corporation, 162
Ransohoff, Nan, 193, 195
Reagan, Ronald, 7, 52â53, 179, 205, 206, 221
Recoding America (Pahlka), 119â24
Redlener, Irwin, 184
Regulatory Accountability Act (2017), 90
Republican Party
on COVID vaccines, 188
on environment, 51â53
on government size, 117
on health care, 135â36
litigation and legal bureaucracy, 89â94
political order concept and, 203â7, 220â21
presidential election (2024) and, 17â18, 213
supply-side economics as right-wing, 6
Tea Party movement, 33
Reynolds, Malvina, 55
The Rise and Decline of Nations (Olson), 81â83, 93
The Rise and Fall of the Neoliberal Order (Gerstle), 203â4, 220â21
Ritchie, Hannah, 64, 66, 194
Rockefeller Foundation, 149
rooming houses, building codes against, 41â43
Roosevelt, Franklin D., 150, 174, 204, 205, 206, 221
Rosling, Hans, 63
Rothman, James, 140â41
Ruhl, J. B., 69â70, 94â97, 98
Russia
Biden administration on, 61
Sputnik (Soviet Union), 160â61, 199
Sabin, Paul, 87â89
Sacramento Bee, 54
safety, construction productivity measure and, 80â81
Sahin, Ugur, 139
Salzman, James, 69â70, 94â97, 98
Sanders, Bernie, 207
San Francisco
Arts Commission, 103
Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART), 118â19
Board of Supervisors, 104
on 14B ordinance and contracting requirements, 103
housing in, 27â29, 106â7
Mayorâs Office on Disability, 103
San Francisco Chronicle, 56
SARS-CoV-2, see COVID pandemic
Saudi Arabia, oil production by, 61, 179
scarcity
as choice, 4â5
homelessness as housing scarcity problem, 38â43 (see also housing)
politics of abundance vs., 207â11, 217â22
213of primary-care physicians, 190â91
schizophrenia research, 135, 144â45
Schmidt, Eric, 136
SchrĂśdinger, Erwin, 147
Schwab, Charles and Helen, 104
Schwellenbach, Lewis, 22
âScience, the Endless Frontierâ (Bush), 151
Science journal, 152, 153
scientific research funding, see invention
Scripps Research Translational Institute, 143
Seeger, Pete, 55
Selzer, Larry, 96
semiconductor chips
CHIPS and Science Act (2022), 11, 71, 98, 114, 116, 211
manufacturing of, 26, 98, 116
Semiconductor Industry Association, 114
Sener, 118
service jobs, housing and, 30â32
Shannon, James, 152â53
Shapiro, Josh, 125â27
Shoag, Daniel, 32
Sierra Club, 54, 81, 88
Silent Spring (Carson), 50â51
silicon-based solar cell implementation, 177
silicon transistor invention, 165
Silicon Valley
high-speed rail plans and, 86
semiconductor industry of, 114 (see also semiconductor chips)
technology sector and housing, 27â29
Singapore
federal civilian workforce size in, 117
public (social) housing in, 111
water desalination and, 67
âSituational Awarenessâ (Aschenbrenner), 197
Slaoui, Moncef, 186
Slovak Republic, productivity measure, 79
Smith, Stephen Jacob, 173
social (public) housing, availability of, 111â12
Social Security, 7
solar energy
abundance potential for, 1â4, 14, 15
energy policy and, 62â65, 69â70
implementation of technologies for, 177â80, 181, 183
Solar Energy Research Institute, 178
South Carolina, construction productivity in, 80
South Dakota, energy sources of, 69
SpaceX, 136
Sputnik, 160â61, 199, 200
St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 42
Stanford University, 142, 162
Index of Abundance and Infrastructure
- The text explores the decline of state capacity and the specific challenges facing U.S. infrastructure, such as the high-speed rail difficulties in California.
- It examines the 'productivity paradox' in the construction sector, noting how efficiency has stagnated or declined compared to other industries.
- The role of technology and innovation is highlighted through the history of the silicon transistor, semiconductor manufacturing in Taiwan, and the development of COVID-19 vaccines.
- Economic and political shifts are traced through the evolution of supply-side economics, the impact of the 'Homeownership Society,' and the rise of populist movements.
- Environmental sustainability is addressed by comparing carbon emissions per person and the potential for solar power expansion in states like Texas.
The Strange and Awful Path of Productivity in the U.S. Construction Sector
âState Capacity: What Is It, How We Lost It, and How to Get It Backâ (Lindsey), 127â28
214state capacity concept, 105
State Department, US, 121â22
âThe Strange and Awful Path of Productivity in the U.S. Construction Sectorâ (Goolsbee and Syverson),
78â80
Stripe, 86, 193
STV, 118
Sunak, Rishi, 61
Sun Microsystems, 163
supply-side economics
housing shortage and, 38â43, 212 (see also housing)
as mistake, 5â11
Republican Party associated with, 6
supply and demand, defined, 5â6
sustainability of energy, 62â67; see also energy
Syverson, Chad, 78â80, 84
Tahanan, 101â4, 106
Taiwan, semiconductor chips manufacturing in, 26, 116
Tanenbaum, Morris, 165
taxes
child tax-credit payments, 122
degrowth proposals, 60
housing and, 44â47, 107â10
Taylor, Bob, 162
Tea Party, 33
technology; see also energy
cities and innovation of, 25â30
politics of invention and, 133â37 (see also invention)
progress and importance of, 222
railroad history of United States, 74
silicon transistor invention, 165 (see also semiconductor chips)
tennessine, 144
Terner Center for Housing Innovation (University of California, Berkeley), 101â2
Tesla, Nikola, 171
Tesla (automotive company), 26, 27, 29â30, 136
Texas
housing in, 33, 39
solar power in, 64
âThe Homeownership Society Was a Mistakeâ (Demsas), 46
Thiel, Peter, 136, 159
thirty-year fixed-rate mortgage, 44â45
âThis Landâ (San Francisco Chronicle column, Gilliam), 56
Thompson, Stuart A., 184
âticky-tackyâ term, 55
âA Time for Triageâ (Gerrard), 113
Time magazine, 55
Tocqueville, Alexis de, 92
Tong, Yasmin, 108â9
Topol, Eric, 143
trade; see also semiconductor chips
China and, 206
215Trump on, 209â10
Transcontinental Railroad, 74
Transit Costs Project, 77
Trans-Pacific Partnership, 210
transportation
abundance potential for, 1â4
California on gas-powered vehicles, 14
Californiaâs high-speed rail difficulty and, 71â78, 86, 94, 116â18
cars, construction productivity measure, 85
Federal-Aid Highway Act (1968, 1973), 51
Federal Highway Administration, 125
Highway Safety Act (1966), 86
housing and, 35â38, 48â56
implementation of inventions for, 176, 180
Interstate Highway System, 46â47, 50, 51, 54â56, 96, 97, 204
Unsafe at Any Speed (Nader), 86â90
Triumph of the City (Glaeser), 24, 25, 27, 30
Truman, Harry, 22, 205
Trump, Donald
on COVID pandemic, 188, 189
on economic policy, 10
election of (2024), 17â18, 211
on immigration, 98, 208
on infrastructure, 209â10
populist movement and, 207
second term and abundance potential of, 213
on trade, 209
TĂźreci, Ăzlem, 139
TYLin, 118
Uniform Relocation Assistance and Real Property Acquisition Policies Act (1970), 51
unions, 82, 126, 127
United Kingdom
carbon emissions per person, 66
health care cost in, 105
postâWorld War II economy, 81
United States; see also Democratic Party; political issues; Republican Party; individual names of government
agencies; individual names of politicians
carbon emissions per person, 66
federal civilian workforce size in, 117
health care cost in, 105 (see also health care)
housing supply in, vs. other developed countries, 23 (see also housing)
University of California, Berkeley, 102
University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), 69, 162, 163
University of Chicago, 147, 157, 189
University of Pennsylvania, 130, 137
University of Texas, 173
University of Wisconsin, 178
Unsafe at Any Speed (Nader), 86â90
UPS, 187
216vaccine, COVID, 130â32, 135, 137â40, 146, 156, 161
values, abundance and, 15, 49, 83, 205, 207â11, 216
Vance, JD, 208
Vanderbilt University, 69
Vanguard 1 satellite, 178
Van Slyke, Cassius, 152
Vartabedian, Ralph, 118
Venice (California) Dell Community project, 110
Vernon, Austin, 67
Veterans Administration, US, 186
Virginia, construction productivity in, 80
Voeten, Erik, 61
Volta, Alessandro, 176
Von Eschenbach, Andrew, 142
Walgreens, 187
Wallace-Wells, David, 193
Wall Street Journal, 163, 189
Walmart, 29
Walz, Tim, 93
Index and Publication Details
- The index highlights a focus on energy policy, specifically the potential and regulatory hurdles of wind energy and water desalination.
- Historical comparisons are drawn between post-World War II infrastructure booms and modern construction productivity challenges.
- The text references the tension between environmental goals and existing legal frameworks, such as the Clean Water Act and 'Green Laws.'
- Key economic and social concepts like Wrightâs law, YIMBY movements, and zoning rules are identified as central themes of the work.
- The publication information confirms the book is a 2025 release by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson under Avid Reader Press.
What Happens When the New Green Deal Meets the Old Green Laws?
âWar on Cancer,â 142
War Production Board, 175
Warp Speed (Mango), 185, 186â87
Warren, Earl, 92
Washington Post, 127
Washington (state), energy sources of, 69
water desalination, 67, 198
water pollution
Clean Water Act (1972), 51, 87, 96
examples of, 50, 96
Watney, Caleb, 187
Webb, James, 201
Weissman, Drew, 137â40
Western Electric, 163
Westinghouse, 218
Wharton School, 79â80
âWhat Happens When the New Green Deal Meets the Old Green Laws?â (Ruhl and Salzman), 94â95
White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, 195
Whitmer, Gretchen, 89
Wiener, Scott, 102
Williams, Brian, 184
Williams, Heidi, 136, 145, 166
wind energy
abundance potential for, 1â4, 14
energy policy and, 64â65, 69â70
The Wizard and the Prophet (Mann), 62
Worldâs Fair (1964), 217â19
World War II
housing/infrastructure construction following, 5, 36
invention and, 137, 164
New Deal as political order, 204â5
217Office of Scientific Research and Development inception and, 199
postâWorld War II economy, 81
Wright, Theodore, 180
Wright brothers, 171
Wrightâs law, 180, 181
WSP, 118
WTF Happened in 1971? (website), 43
Wyoming
Chokecherry and Sierra Madre Wind Energy Project, 97
construction productivity in, 80
energy sources of, 69
Yes In My Back Yard (or YIMBY), 212
Yglesias, Matthew, 41, 42â43
Yuan, Eric, 29
Zarenski, Ed, 80â81, 83â84
zoning rules, 33â38, 44â47, 106â7, 208
Zoning Rules! (Fischel), 34â35, 44â47
Zoom, 29
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