Middle East Cities Should Look Forward—and Back

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The Middle East may well be the birthplace of cities, and maybe capitalism itself, but for the most part, it continues to lag in developing a modern, workable urbanism. Yes, the region has produced high-tech hubs (e.g., Tel Aviv) and postmodern cities (e.g., Dubai), which can be regarded as rising international business centers, but it’s also home to megacities afflicted by mismanagement, poor planning, and some of the world’s highest unemployment rates. In some countries, like Saudi Arabia, and many of the Gulf States, there is also a chronic shortage of homegrown labor willing to work.

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America Keeps Winning Regardless of Who is President

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Ever since the election of Donald Trump, many of our leading academic voices, like Paul Krugman, predicted everything from a stock market crash to a global recession. Slow growth, mainstream economists like Larry Summers, argued, was in the cards no matter who is in charge. That was then. Now the United States stands as by far the most dynamic high-income economy in the world. Read more

Ten years After Lehman Collapsed, We’re Still Screwed

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This article first appeared at The Daily Beast.

The collapse of Lehman Brothers 10 years ago today began the financial crisis that crippled and even killed for some the American dream as we had known it. Donald Trump might be starting to change that, at least for Americans who aren’t determined to remain in our bluest and priciest cities. Read more

America is Moving Toward an Oligarchical Socialism

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Where do we go after Trump? This question becomes more pertinent as the soap opera administration seeks its own dramatic demise. Yet before they can seize power from the president and his now subservient party, the Democrats need to agree on what will replace Trumpism.

Conventional wisdom implies an endless battle between pragmatic, corporate Clintonites on one side, and Democratic socialists of the Bernie brand. Yet this conflict could resolve itself in a new, innovative approach that could be best described as oligarchal socialism.

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The Battle for Houston

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This article first appeared at City Journal.

America’s most opportunity-rich city faces a long-term challenge from “smart-growth” advocates pushing for more regulation.

Over the last half-century, Houston has developed an alternative model of urbanism. As the New Urbanist punditry mounts an assault on both suburban growth and single-family homes, Houston has embraced a light regulatory approach that reflects market forces more than ideology. But last year’s Hurricane Harvey floods severely tested the Houston model. An unprecedented four feet of rain in four days —a year’s worth, the greatest rainfall event in recorded U.S. history—overflowed the banks of every channel in Harris County, flooded nearly 100,000 homes (7 percent of the housing stock), and created an estimated $81.5 billion in damage, the nation’s second-largest natural disaster after Hurricane Katrina. Coupled with a downturn in the energy industry, which saw the loss of some 86,000 jobs last year, Harvey’s aftermath suggested that the region’s growth period had come to an end, with stagnant job growth and domestic migration. Read more

‘Chinafornia’ and Global Trade in Age of Trump

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One of the last regions settled en masse by Europeans, California’s trajectory long has been linked to its partners across the Pacific. Yet these ties could be deeply impacted by President Trump’s immigration and global trade policies, as well as resulting blowback by the authoritarian regime in Beijing.

In recent decades, California has become something of a China junkie. With China on the route to what some predict will be hegemonic power, there’s a set who eagerly wish to promote the idea of “Chinafornia.” The pattern of dependency can be seen in how our industries depend on China for their production. For some companies, like Apple, China provided the capacity to produce products cheaply without suffering heavy GHG impacts in state. China’s coal-based pollution allowed these congenitally “virtue signaling” firms to retain their “green” street cred.

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Cities Are for Rich People Now and Wooing Amazon Only Makes It Worse

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This article first appeared on Vice

Local officials across America are trying to attract the mega-corporation’s new headquarters. That is not going to help your rent.

If there are two facts of life in the modern American city, they are that rent will be too damn high, and that attracting investment from a mega corporation will seem to some local power players like the best way to stave off economic disaster. The rent part is an old, old story. Under-construction of affordable and publicly-funded housing units targeted at the working- and middle-classes is a trend that started around the 1970s. Combine that with spiraling income inequality, the erosion of tenants’ rights, and stagnant real wages, and it makes paying for a roof over your head almost impossible in many metropolises. At the same time, the decline of manufacturing and the federal government’s general unwillingness to invest in major job-creation programs (like infrastructure) means civic leaders have long been tripping over each other to woo companies who might act as job creators for the populace and, not incidentally, help those politicians keep their own jobs. Read more

Blue-collar Blues in the Southern California Job Market

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This piece first appeared in The Orange County Register.

Every year over the past decade, in the Forbes’ annual “Best Places for Jobs” survey, we have been fortunate to assess Southern California’s job market and compare it to other large metropolitan areas. The results point to some strong points but also many long-term problems that regional leaders need to address.

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The Middle East Could Use Less Warfare and More Capitalism

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This article first appeared at The Orange County Register.

Jet fighters, smart bombs, terrorism and ethnic cleansing have not exactly improved the Middle East. Yet the perennial world trouble spot is not without resources — an increasingly educated population, massive energy resources and ample capital — but still suffers economically, with the world’s worst unemployment rates. Read more

Trump’s Opposition to Unrestricted Globalism Might Prove a Historical Necessity

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This article first appeared at The Orange County Register.

Let’s stipulate that Donald Trump is a vulgar, ignorant and often reckless narcissist. Yet he also may well prove a historical necessity, someone who, intentionally or not, has rendered apart a bi-partisan consensus well past its usefulness.

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