Subscribe
Sign in
Home
Essays
Reading Lists
THE ORIGINS OF EFFICIENCY
Archive
About
Essays
Latest
Top
Discussions
How Will the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act Affect Housing Supply? Part II
This is the second installment of my look under the hood of the recently passed 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act, looking at what each provision…
Aug 14
•
Brian Potter
90
9
4
What Will the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act Do for Housing Supply?
A few weeks ago the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act became law. This is an enormous housing bill that’s been in the works for roughly a year — I first…
Aug 6
•
Brian Potter
99
7
7
Why Is Everyone Trying to Build a Solid-State Battery?
A battery technology that’s getting a lot of attention is solid-state batteries, lithium-ion batteries that replace the liquid electrolyte with a solid…
Jul 30
•
Brian Potter
201
10
11
Can We Lower Construction Costs with Cheaper Labor or Materials?
Last time in our series on the nature of the construction productivity problem, we looked at economies of scale, finding that capturing economies of…
Jul 23
•
Brian Potter
165
28
11
How Predictable Are Laws?
An enormous amount of ink has been spilled (some of it by me) on the trials and tribulations of complying with the National Environmental Policy Act…
Jul 16
•
Brian Potter
162
21
12
The Fall and Rise of Screwworm
Every spring, as sure as the seasons, and for generations unknown, screwworms began their annual march northward from their overwintering sanctuaries in…
Jul 3
•
Brian Potter
356
20
47
US Subways Build Too Many Cross Passages
I wrote the following piece for IFP’s Transit Abundance Playbook, a collection of 15 ideas to improve transit delivery in the US.
Jun 25
•
Brian Potter
181
10
7
Converting Coal Plants to Natural Gas
For the better part of the last several hundred years, coal was the fuel of choice for generating power.
Jun 19
•
Brian Potter
163
6
9
Biological Evolution and Information Acquisition
A few weeks ago we looked at a simulation of technological evolution by economist Brian Arthur, in which he was able to start with simple building…
Jun 11
•
Brian Potter
136
7
5
How Long Does It Take to Plan a Bridge?
Many folks, including me, have observed that it seems to take much longer to build infrastructure in the US than it used to.
Jun 4
•
Brian Potter
170
29
12
Where Are the Economies of Scale in Homebuilding?
Over the last few months we’ve examined the extent of the construction industry’s productivity problem.
May 28
•
Brian Potter
236
56
19
The Rise of Build-to-Rent Housing
A major shift in the housing market in the last several years is the rapidly increasing popularity of “build-to-rent” homes — single-family homes that…
May 21
•
Brian Potter
170
30
14
This site requires JavaScript to run correctly. Please
turn on JavaScript
or unblock scripts
