Study: U.S. Land Use Regulations More Restrictive Since the Great Recession

New analysis published by the National Bureau of Economic Research reports results of a new survey of local residential land use regulatory regimes for over 2,450 primarily suburban communities across the United States.

The paywalled research, authored by Joseph Gorko, Jonathan Hartey, and Jacob Krimmel, locates the most highly regulated markets on the two coasts, "with the San Francisco and New York City metropolitan areas being the most highly regulated according to our metric," according to the abstract for the paper.

The remainder of the abstract reads as follows:

Comparing our new data to that from a previous survey finds that the housing bust associated with the Great Recession did not lead any major market that previously was highly regulated to reverse course and deregulate to any significant extent. Moreover, regulation in most large coastal markets increased over time.

John Hartley shared more findings from the study, titled " The Local Residential Land Use Regulatory Environment Across U.S. Housing Markets: Evidence from a New Wharton Index," on a Twitter thread.

My latest working paper in @nberpubs w/ @jkrimmel and Joe Gyourko on how zoning/land use regs have changed since the Great Recession: “The Local Residential Land Use Regulatory Environment Across U.S. Housing Markets: Evidence from a New Wharton Index” https://t.co/h1ZHawXp9d pic.twitter.com/k5yRCeisYJ

— Jon Hartley (@Jon_Hartley_) December 23, 2019