California's housing crisis was decades in the making

Support for LAist comes from

Podcasts Take Two

May 5, 2015

California's housing crisis was decades in the making

USC's Richard Green says there's a housing crisis because of a perfect storm of falling wages, desirability and an ethos of NIMBYism that prevents new construction.

A measure of the U.S. economy's future health rose in solidly in April, buoyed by a sharp rise in applications to build new homes and apartments. The Conference Board index is intended to signal economic conditions three to six months out. (Photo: A construction worker installs a window in a new home at the Arbor Rose housing development in San Mateo, California. Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

USC's Richard Green says there's a housing crisis because of a perfect storm of falling wages, desirability and an ethos of NIMBYism that prevents new construction.

Density may be one of the ways out of the state's housing crisis, as controversial as that is.

But there's a complicated history that explains why California has become of the most unaffordable states to call home.

Richard Green, director of the USC Lusk Center for Real Estate, tells Take Two that it's a perfect storm of falling wages, desirability and an ethos of NIMBYism that prevents new homes from being constructed.