This is basically the entire theme of "Abundance" by Klein and Thompson, for those looking for a longer read on this.
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abundance_(Klein_and_Thompson_...
This is basically the entire theme of "Abundance" by Klein and Thompson, for those looking for a longer read on this.
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abundance_(Klein_and_Thompson_...
Another recent book along the same lines would be "Why Nothing Works: Who Killed Progress and How to Get It Back" by Marc Dunkelman:
"When he looked into the history, Dunkelman realized that progressives have long swung back and forth between two opposing impulses. One is what he calls Hamiltonianism: the desire to achieve progress by empowering government and institutions to tackle big problems at the direction of strong leaders (like Robert Moses) and informed experts. The other is what he calls Jeffersonianism: the desire to prevent unaccountable centralized authorities (also like Robert Moses) from abusing ordinary citizens by empowering them to fight back."
-- https://www.niskanencenter.org/why-nothing-works-with-marc-d...
thank you, i'll grab this!
Wow, deregulation and austerity, what a fresh perspective on the economy!
This abundance "movement" has absolutely nothing new to offer, it is simply a rebranding of neoliberalism. It's easy to spot too, just look at who backs the movement: the same old establishment democrats and their wealthy donors. The same people who have entranched the democratic party into this technocratic blob of ineffectiveness and societal erosion. In particular, it is financially backed by, among others, Peter Thiel and Mark Andreessen. This should raise some red flags.
Also, I personally like winning. This abundance movement has exactly zero electoral hype. American voters don't care about it at all. Meanwhile, populist leftists like Mamdani are able to generate momentum for the left for the first time in decades. That Klein, Thompson and the billionaires behind them are so harshly criticizing them should raise additional red flags.
How do you get “austerity” from a movement arguing that far more things should be built?
"How do you get austerity from neoliberalism, a movement that argues that more wealth should trickle down?".
The abundance folks constantly fight the populist left on government spending. Their proposed plan for "having more things built" is to deregulate the housing market and pray that somehow, the massive land owners, who de facto control the political life of this country and have had their way for a century won't fight it.
Absolutely ridiculous claim sorry.
They want SME's running regulations.
Look you can read between whatever lines you want, but Klein specifically calls out the left getting out of their own way. That even when the left tries to do far left top-down socialism, that the regulations and special interests groups prevent them from capitalizing on their own successes.
So even if you come back with something like price controls and government building more housing, you run into the same problems, and you say something like “fuck norms, ignore the neo-libs / conservatives, housing for the people!”
Congratulations, you’ve advocated for deregulation.
Your argument boils down to "people already said some things like this in the past" (ok, and?) and "some people I don't like agree with part of it", which is very weak and doesn't address anything in substance.
You know, you can still want to be able to build housing without having to wait 1 year for permitting or not want to live in a place where making a basic train track is basically impossible because of the number of stakeholders that have to come to a consensus and still vote for Mamdani. You are allowed to have non black and white opinions.
You can even have 1% of the things you think are good in common with Peter Thiel, and that won't immediately turn you into a far right psychopath.
You can even, hear me out, be for less regulation on specific areas where there has been a massive lack of supply but not for "deregulating the economy" in it's entirety!
alas, in southern California 1 year for permitting would be a miracle.
my family has been in construction for 3 generations, and 2 years is now considered normal. plus we have to seal up everything for energy efficiency, then have to remove and add more venting for the next round of inspectors who want to ensure air quality. We stopped building in Sun City because of the $17K tax per unit to fund schools even though it's a 55+ senior community. Currently it's about $115K per house in permitting fees in rural Riverside county. Makes it difficult
Housing can either be an investment vehicle or affordable, but not both at the same time. The abundance crowd remains willfully blind to this obvious reality, and is why they will fail. They promise to make housing affordable while receiving millions from people who became rich off of housing not being affordable. It fundamentally can't deliver on its promise, because it is completely compromised from the start.
I perceive abundance as a big grift to keep the populist left out of the democratic party, which is something they spend a lot of energy doing. How else could you explain this obsession of the abundance crowd for shooting down any populist policy or messaging?
The writer of this article (Dave) publicly dislikes Derek Thompson and keeps criticizing Matt Ygelasis for his austerity fetish, along with praising Mamdani
Mamdani just seems like a typical nepo baby that had some ideas in college he wants to try out because he skipped history class.
Abundance is just https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Way neoliberalism with a new coat of paint. The answer to all questions is 'bust unions and environmental groups'. We've been here before: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cancer_Alley
All the Reaganite conservative institutions (https://www.abundancedc.org/speakers) that are leery of fascism, but love business back this 'program'.
We need a new 'New Deal', that rebuilds what was broken during these last 90 years. We need the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frances_Perkins of this era.
"Frances Perkins was not just the architect of SSA: she also proposed and implemented many of the foundational labor and safety laws1 still relied upon by the American working class. We can also thank her for the 40-hour work week, minimum wage, unemployment compensation, worker’s compensation, workplace safety, abolition of child labor, direct federal aid to the states for unemployment relief, a revitalized federal employment service, and universal health insurance. Well, except the last. We are still working on the last. "
She got everything she wanted done as Labor Sec. Except for universal healthcare. And it was a great loss for everything living American every year since.
Somebody hasn't read the book, just knee jerk reactions to it.
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What do the grass roots want that will result in a higher supply of living spaces?
So basically you ignored the actual text in favor of the conspiracy theorist's "cui bono" about the funding structure behind the authors.
No, there's no conspiracy here. Ezra's probably a true believer, which I think is sadder honestly.
There is no coordination besides shared interest in protecting capital, same as it ever was. Shared 'class interest' and 'class solidarity' if you like. Though some of these folks are probably in weird passive aggressive and catty group chats these days, like Andresson and Thiel.
It is not a conspiracy to look at the super-pacs funding candidates with weird positions either. The transfers of cash are pretty open in our second gilded age.
These 'third way' institutes and movements pop up every decade or so if you are paying attention. The literal 'Third Way' and 'Tea Party' movements were funded directly by some of these 'abundance' groups. But there's no 'shadowy cabal' or secret. They are open about their desires, and rely on marketing to paper over the obvious.
Manufacturing consent for union breaking in Cali (Ezra didn't outright say it, but Josh Barro did) is clearly in their interest. It's also clear from many of them comments here like: 'I don't care who profits as long as there are suddenly houses' that show the 'abundance' gambit is succeeding.
And to be clear, I'm not against the message 'build more housing', but these are not people you should trust. They need to prove they are serious. Their track record tells me they will bait, switch, and act as spoilers.
Don't take just my word for it though! When they don't accomplish or even push for what they originally claimed their core goals are, remember this conversation.
Is this guilt by association? eg The roster of that Abundance Festival?
I've read the book. Ditto the criticisms. Heard the interviews.
My "abundance" take away is a rejection of neoliberalism, austerity, Hayek, etc. That it's akin to Green New Deal, Build Back Better, etc.
Am I wrong?
We need 3.5m (?) new homes, mass transit, upgraded grid, 4Tw (?) of additional renewable energy generation (plus their batteries).
Right?
I don't care how it gets done. I don't care what labels (pejoratives) are used. I don't care who profits.
I just demand it gets done, sooner than later.
You could call it guilt by association, sure! But critically, the funders and speakers and membership that build a movement give life and shape to what that movement becomes. Not caring about 'means' only 'ends' or who profits strikes me as appallingly naive. You tell me, can these people build the houses you so desire?
From this page https://therevolvingdoorproject.org/who-is-behind-the-growin...: compare your words: "take away is a rejection of neoliberalism"
to the following descriptions: "Mercatus Center, but without the libertarian brand that limits that think tank’s outreach to the left." "The group is currently headed by Julius Krein, the founder of pro-Trump publications The Journal Of American Greatness and its successor, American Affairs"
"gone so far as to posit that AI is the only possible solution to climate change and that it should be powered even by fossil fuel sources." "PI is a subsidiary of the The Third Way Foundation, and it proudly proclaims itself as the “intellectual birthplace of the New Democrat and ‘Third Way’ movements.”
"Chamber of Progress also used to be funded by Sam Bankman-Fried’s notorious FTX, Blockchain.com, Zillow, Twitter, and the investment firm behind WeWork, SoftBank. The group has launched a “Abundance & Affordability” project, is listed among Inclusive Abundance’s “Abundance Landscape,” and its employees are vocal in their support of the agenda."
"Manhattan employs conservative provocateur and Ron DeSantis ally Chris Rufo—the progenitor of the debate over “Critical Race Theory”"
"Stand Together’s Chairman and CEO, Brian Hooks, is also the President of the Charles Koch Foundation and previously served as the executive director and COO of the Mercatus Center"
one of the most prominent groups opposing the Obama administration’s two key domestic policy goals: health care reform and cap and trade
The philanthropy has funded “pension reform” work by right wing groups, school privatization efforts, Bari Weiss’ anti-woke university, the Niskanen Center, and sponsored both the 2024 abundance conference and the 2025 conference.
Do I need to go on? These people will decide what "Abundance 'progressiveism'" actually looks like if it continues forward.
They are not hiding the fact they are actually conservatives with new labels. They will republican even more if they are given voting positions.
Do you think these people are on your side? Its all oil and techoncratic billionaires top to bottom.
"Do you think these people are on your side?"
Who is on your side? People who made it all but impossible to renew and improve basic civilizational infrastructure (housing, roads, railways, electric grid, power plants etc.) by introducing so many demands that the system slowly ground to a halt?
Nope. They may say that they are on your side, they may even think that they are on your side, but this is a classical case of the road to hell being paved with good intentions. If someone makes it all but impossible to build new things by elevating chronic naysayers and various special interests into a vetocracy, they are not on your side.
You don't have to trust the abundance movement, but they still have a valid point. In the last 10-15 years, there is a growing awareness all across the West that we have painted ourselves into a corner by heaping too many regulations on further development of cities and land and introducing too many chokepoints where any project can be stalled in courts. This not only makes our living standards worse, but also increasingly leaves us vulnerable to various authoritarian regimes - not just in the sense of raw industrial power, but also propaganda.
If you are a progressive, try to swing your preferred politicians towards more permissiveness, too. This situation badly needs correction and if the progressive part of the spectrum gets stuck on its de facto preference of NIMBYism - for any reasons, be it "everything bagel" demands or the sort of visceral distrust towards other political players that you yourself exhibit quite nicely - they are done for.
Regular people don't want to spend several years fighting a paper war with fifty implacable stakeholders in order to build a block of flats. This is just madness. If someone imposed that system on another country by force, we would consider it an act of war comparable to a naval blockade. Why precisely are we doing this to ourselves?
Unfortunately we need less inclusivity in city planing, that much is clear. Too many people have interest in vetoing everything. It is time to learn this bitter lesson and move on. Maybe you could be the person who makes the change in the progressive circles - try talking to the people you trust about this.
I feel ya.
> Unfortunately we need less inclusivity in city planing, that much is clear.
I don't think we need to go that far. :)
It's been long known the NEPA, CEPA, and other safeguards, were fully captured by bad faith actors and in much need of reform. Like closing legal exploits used to thwart any and all development, as you well know.
It's been kind of amazing how quickly YIMBYism has spun up and matured into a scrappy effective advocacy group(s). And we're starting to see progress, payoff, real results.
The recent CEPA reforms are already yielding positive results. eg By short-circuiting environmental reviews for redeveloping properties that are already in built-up areas. Real common sense "well, duh" type reforms.
There's no shortage of needful common sense reforms. I'm now confident these reform efforts will now accelerate. State-by-state, since federal action is currently closed off.
The biggly "abundance"-esque type challenges I worry about are structural and financial. Reforming public utilities, tackling regulatory capture, investment, green banks, industrial policy, etc.
In a nutshell, I want everything promised in the Green New Deal, times at least 4. (Which does account for inclusion, empowerment, environmental justice, and so forth.)
No, I do not.
I also know that policy and legislation cannot be moved forward without them. Realpolitik.
Further, there may be an opportunity to mix-up the current coalitions. Checkout the "Montana Housing Miracle". NIMBY vs YIMBY is old vs young, not right vs left. With the reactionary nativists crashing the economy (again), the business members of the current ruling coalition are getting grumpy. Let's drive a wedge between the trogs and the merely greedy. Again, Realpolitik.
I also demand some kind of plan or strategy to address lack of housing and climate crisis. From experience, advocacy is easier than opposition. If not Abundance, then what's the plan?
Lastly, we are completely out of time. Land use and housing are the biggest (missing) components of any USA strategy for addressing climate crisis. I, the most left-wing person you're ever likely to meet, no longer have the luxury of partisanship. So I don't care how the things we need get built.
If we survive until 2050 (and beyond), our kids (and grandkids) can carry on the revolution.
I don't think Dave associates himself with the abundance movement