Luxury Beliefs applied to urbanism
There are transportation and housing ideas that confer status on the upper class while often inflicting costs on the lower class.
For instance…
A survey from YouGov found that Americans in the highest income category were by far the most supportive of defunding the police. They can afford to hold this position, because they already live in safe, often gated communities. And they can afford to hire private security.
…a vulnerable poor person in a crime-ridden neighborhood can’t afford to support defunding the police.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, compared to Americans who earn more than $75,000 a year, the poorest Americans are seven times more likely to be victims of robbery, seven times more likely to be victims of aggravated assault, and twenty times more likely to be victims of sexual assault.
Expressing a luxury belief is a manifestation of cultural capital, a signal of one’s fortunate economic circumstances. The chief purpose of luxury beliefs is to indicate evidence of the believer’s social class and education.
Members of the luxury belief class promote these ideas because it advances their social standing and because they know that the adoption of these policies or beliefs will cost them less than others.
If you aren’t familiar with Henderson, do yourself a favor and subscribe to his Substack. Hear me now and believe me later. He wrote (and spoke) a New York Times op-ed called “I went from foster care to Yale. This is what I learned about luxury beliefs.” Definitely worth watching.
Luxury Beliefs applied to housing and transportation
It’s easy to see luxury beliefs in politically-charged topics, but they also infiltrate boring infrastructure topics like housing and transportation policy.
“Preserve the character of the neighborhood.”
Outlawing small houses and small lots is a proven way for the privileged to keep those people off their street while sounding like they’re serving the greater good. “Single-use zoning isn’t for my benefit, it’s to protect the neighborhood.” Protection from whom? From people who can’t afford large homes on large lots.
Restricting property rights to “preserve neighborhood character” can be a luxury belief.
The established order makes sure to prevent property owners from renting out rooms, building a small cottage home in the backyard, operating a salon out of the garage, and growing/selling produce in the neighborhood.
Housing regulations limit the supply of affordable housing, drive up housing prices, and push lower- and middle-income families out of desirable areas. Of course the wealthy can afford to live in desirable neighborhoods with better schools, amenities, and job opportunities.
San Francisco has the unfortunate history of being the OG NIMBY city in America, which surprises many because the city has long had a reputation for being socially progressive. But like the defund-the-police example, people who have the means to live where and how they want are perfectly willing to impose rules on others. This affordable housing nonprofit gets millions from the government and they put that money to work by blocking any new affordable housing in San Francisco.
“Cars keep the economy moving.”
As a car owner, I know how difficult car dependency can be. Not just the state of being dependent on automobiles to get around for anything and everything, but even talking about it. Zoning is one of the most powerful forces keeping Americans dependent on cars. Local zoning rules of course force different types of housing to be separated from each other, but zoning also sprawls out the land uses in ways that make driving the only viable way to get around.
Of course you drive to CVS just to get a birthday card. Pharmacies are outlawed in your neighborhood.
Of course you drive your kids to Chick-Fil-A on a weeknight. Restaurants are outlawed in your neighborhood.
Of course you drive to get your haircut or nails done. Salons are outlawed in your neighborhood.
Americans have been slaves to personal vehicles for so many decades that it’s hard to visualize a future without them. Worse, we’ve been conditioned to believe that speedily zipping from zone to zone is fundamental for a thriving economy. Sitting at a red light isn’t called waiting your turn, it’s called delay. We’re told the economy suffers from our delay because we need to keep the wheels of productivity spinning.
Without taking a hot second to evaluate the financial ROI of walk-friendly, bike-friendly, bus-friendly mixed-use neighborhoods, local leaders insist that roads must be widened and traffic sped up. For the economy! For the greater good! Who suffers? Americans who are financially strapped but have no choice but to own and operate a personal fleet of vehicles for their family.
Car-oriented infrastructure can be a luxury belief.
The wealthy will always have mobility options. They can opt for large estates and however many vehicles they want, or they can opt to live comfortably in walkable, transit-rich environments.
“It’ll cost you, but it’s worth it.”
Luxury beliefs might be easy to spot in your political opponents, but I think it’s worthwhile to take a closer look at urbanism policies. Using Rob Henderson’s definition, there might be a longer list than we’d like to admit. Each of these is a candidate:
Ban fossil fuels.
Replace ICE with EV.
Preserve green space.
Preserve historical integrity.
Remove blight.
Protect natural habitats.
Abolish police cameras.
Mandate universal design.
Prohibit single staircase buildings.
Increase minimum wage.
Mandate minimum parking.
Please don’t take this as an attack on good intentions. Please do take this as a way to make sure we think through the outcomes of our good intentions. As economist Thomas Sowell said, “There are no solutions, only trade-offs.” Consider whether any specific urbanism belief is like a luxury good (something that serves to demonstrate status) or truly for human flourishing.
Here’s an example happening right now just outside Washington, DC.
Read
. Young as he is, he’s got heartbreaking and inspiring stories to share.
Nice article and extension of these ideas. I really resonate with it when it comes to housing. There’s a fascinating inversion that progressives do there. Housing is expensive because of capitalism! Evil landlords! Slave plantation corporations! All very juicy sounding ideas when not looked at in any detail. But when one does, one can easily see that it’s actually the “luxury beliefs” that drive up prices in the most expensive locales, like SF where I used to live, by restricting supply. I had a neighbor (who owned) who went all out on a NIMBY war against a new single lot building because it was to be 3 stories instead of 2. From what I understand they held up the project for years. This wasn’t an outlier case, of course. And in Portland there was a time where there were yard signs everywhere saying “preserve historic Portland homes” which was code for “don’t change single family zoning”. It’s hard to convey in a short comment just how struck my brain is at the cognitive dissonance. The real and obvious causes in basic supply/demand economics are ignored, while the results of their phalanx of choices (that hugely restrict supply) are projected onto a “bad other”, an abstraction - capitalism. The poor and middle classes get hurt the most, the NIMBYs are the direct and unequivocal cause of that hurt, and yet they entirely disown their agency in the whole process. Psychologically it’s fascinating (and frustrating) to watch. I could give a thousand other urban planning examples in agreement with you, but the point is it’s always the same pattern, it’s only the slogans and details that change.
I was just complaining about a guy who said you cannot live in the USA without a car because “It’s much harder to go car free with kids. Especially as they get older. Ballet, Kumon, soccer, choir, karate etc” I pointed him to Jarrett Walker and his discussion of “elite projection.” I think this is similar! https://humantransit.org/2017/07/the-dangers-of-elite-projection.html