Quality of life reduction as deliberate social policy

A serendipitous conjunction of two different articles this morning which highlight an issue I have been mulling.

Some of our major cities seem to have taken the position that it is acceptable to reduce residential quality of life as long as they pander to the victimhood ethos du jour.  Urban politicians are no longer responding to law-abiding citizens but are focused on the marginalized (whom they can white knight) and the vocal ideological fringe (from whom they seek moral stature).

The first of the two articles was Reasons People are Moving from Los Angeles to Dallas - More Important Than Escaping Higher Taxes by Douglas Newby.  He offers seven reasons people are leaving.

Nonpartisan Elected Officials Draw Angelenos From Los Angeles to Dallas  

 

Dallas Mayor Calls for Lower Taxes and More Employment Attracting People From Los Angeles to Dallas

Dallas Supports Law and Order and Reduction in Bureaucracy

Dallas Health and Prosperity

Big Business and Small Business Connectivity is Magnet For Move From Los Angeles to Dallas

Neighborhoods and Homeownership are the Heart and Soul of Dallas

Moving from Los Angeles to Dallas Makes One Feel That They Can Buy a Home for Free

What leapt out to me was reason six.  All the offered reasons make sense and I suspect can be demonstratively proven true but I think the conceptualization of commitment to residential neighborhoods is paramount.  Newby comments:

Single-family zoned neighborhoods are still revered in Dallas. While high-density developments spring up across Dallas, there is still a desire by Dallas citizens to be able to have homes with a front porch, tree-lined streets and curbs free of parked cars and heavy traffic.

The mayor, growing up in Dallas in an inexpensive neighborhood, advocates home ownership for low-income minorities because he understands homeownership creates wealth, which is far more important than subsidizing expensive apartments for minorities.

During the pandemic, people are fleeing from cities. In contrast, Dallas is thriving because Dallas neighborhoods provide delightful environments to shelter in place. Because of this environment, people are moving from Los Angeles to Dallas.

The big advocates of urban densification are real estate developers (particularly multi-unit), City government itself (increased tax revenue from more occupants), and construction companies (owing to infrastructure upgrades which follow densification).  Real estate developers, City government, and construction companies acting in tandem against the needs and wishes of single-family residents is not a good look, particularly in a coalition already in disregard for perceived corruption.  

Additional advocates for density include bicycle advocates, anti-car advocates, mass transit advocates, AGW devotees, authoritarian socialists, etc.  None of whom are particularly well represented among the law-abiding, aspirational middle class and working blue collar class.  

It is very striking just how large a percentage of politicians, regardless of their ideology, are by their demonstrated behaviors and policies actively reducing the quality of life for the majority in return for little practical gain.

The second article is from Megan McArdle's As cities rebuild, remember that people don’t just fear crime. They fear disorder.  She is harkening back to the original position of James Q. Wilson.  She starts with:

In the spring of 1982, social scientists James Q. Wilson and George L. Kelling published an article about policing in the Atlantic titled “Broken Windows.” Over the years, this article would become famous, and then infamous, as the urtext of a very influential theory of policing.

You’re probably familiar with the folk version of the “broken windows” theory: Tolerating small offenses, such as vandals breaking windows, leads to a general atmosphere of lawlessness in which crime can flourish. By cracking down on small crimes, police may prevent larger ones. This approach has been credited with helping to reduce urban crime from its 1990s peak. But it has also been blamed for aggressive tactics such as “stop and frisk,” and there’s some question about whether the apparent benefits of this approach are merely a statistical mirage.

I share the concerns about overzealous policing and statistical mirages, and yet when I went back and reread the original article, I found it was somewhat different — more nuanced and more relevant — than I’d realized.

Broken Windows, as I have indicated elsewhere, has been quite effective as a strategy, accelerating the decline in crime already seen in the relevant period.  "I share the concerns about overzealous policing and statistical mirages" is just a kowtow to far left critics.  We don't abandon beneficial policies simply because they are occasionally poorly implemented, nor do we dismiss policy successes simply because a  handful of poorly conducted reviews come to a different conclusion from that of the preponderance of the research.  For classical liberal journalists (in the Age of Enlightenment context), such defensive writing is required in such intolerant institutions as the mainstream media and academia.  

It is worth recalling Thomas Sowell's observation - “The most fundamental fact about the ideas of the political left is that they do not work. Therefore we should not be surprised to find the left concentrated in institutions where ideas do not have to work in order to survive.”

McArdle goes on.

I revisited Kelling and Wilson because I was trying to solve a mystery. On a recent reporting trip to New York City to ask bankers, policy analysts and real estate brokers about the city’s economic future, I kept hearing that crime was a major risk, as it had been when I was growing up there, around the time that Kelling and Wilson were writing.

This was surprising. Crime had plummeted to a fraction of its former rate since I’d left for college in 1990, and gradually, it had stopped being a topic of conversation. Now, suddenly I heard that crime might tilt the city toward something like the urban crisis of the 1970s, when crime exacerbated already-severe out-migration.

My interviewees weren’t wrong that violent crime has been rising — but the murder rate is still lower than it was in 2010, when New York was growing and they hadn’t been particularly concerned. None of them had been recently victimized, or knew anyone who had. Why were they so worried?

When I probed, I found that they talked less about violent crime than disorder. Homeless encampments were flourishing, panhandling had become more aggressive, and minor crimes like public urination or open drug use were not just more visible, but making the papers. The summer had brought looting and riots close to home as well. Moreover, many of them saw this as a result of the city’s deliberate decision to ignore the “quality of life” offenses that broken windows had emphasized.

Indeed.  People are concerned about City Government tolerance of increasing disorder for reasons similar to residents being concerned about the disinterest of City Government in cashing in on tax revenues (and corrupt bribes) by focusing on densification over single family residential neighborhoods.  It is evidence of City Government unwillingness to respond to the will of the majority and a death-spiral laser focus on failed policies of the ideological margin.

Again, as a libertarian in a totalitarian and intolerant media company, McArdle is constantly writing defensively.  

Ideally, that would be less about policing than about treating drug use and mental illness, and getting homeless people into shelters, and minor scofflaws into jobs or school. If policing is necessary, it must, as Wilson and Kelling originally emphasized, work with communities, instead of against them.

The first sentence is raw utopianism.  I recently completed a review of City policies regarding urban camping across the US and what I found was the opposite of the mainstream media messaging.

Urban camping is low and declining in the US.

The majority of urban campers elect the lifestyle as demonstrated by the results from cities who do attempt, with quarterly visits to camps, to propagate information about existing programs for shelters, GED programs, mental health and substance abuse programs, etc.  Without the coercion of law enforcement, urban camper acceptance of such free programs is only 5-10%.

Cities which have attempted the Housing First approach have had no success in reducing the homelessness rate but at great financial cost.

Urban camping is unrelated to economic conditions.  In the great recession, homelessness continued its steady decline.  In addition, among states, some of the poorest states also have the lowest rates of homelessness.

Cities which enforce the law (trespassing, public urination, public drug and alcohol consumption, larceny, etc.) have among the lowest rates of homelessness.  In some locales, there are jurisdictions virtually identical to one another in terms of the economy and the demographics of their residents but with different levels of law enforcement.  Conscientious enforcement jurisdictions have at least factors lower homelessness than those with a more cavalier approach to law enforcement.

 Newby and McArdle are both making the point that there seems in some cities a tolerance for politicians eager to pursue policies which are known to reduce the quality of life for the majority of aspirational and family oriented residents.  It is a strange phenomenon, bordering on evil in its consequences.

I look forward to the day when politicians once again focus on the majority will, observe and respect the checks and balances of the Constitution and seek to improve the life conditions and prosperity of all citizens.  Not just pursuing the policies that yield them the most power or financial inducements.