What about it? If there's ever a mass exodus to Freeport ME, the people trying to service that need will follow the rules while serving the need. Or they'll get out of that market and someone else will do it. In the "worst" case the local property owners get higher prices which is a win, and the aesthetic rules maintain the (presumed) attractiveness of the town, which is a win. Shrug emoji? The locals hold all the cards, and I'm not even sure that's a bad thing.
> the local property owners get higher prices which is a win
Preventing people from being able to afford a place to live so entrenched interests can accrue hundreds of thousands of dollars of investment appreciation is not a “win”.
Even if you think that the interests of long term “locals” should be privileged (which I disagree with, all men are created equal yada yada), rising property prices don’t benefit all locals, just “local property owners”, as you’ve observed. Local renters and even the kids of local homeowners who eventually want to enter the property market themselves are hurt by constrained supply.
In other words it's a win for the winners, just like capitalism as usual. I can't fix capitalism. The people making these laws are the same ones benefiting, was my point. They win because they hold all the cards. We can talk all day about whether they should win. On the "they shouldn't" side, you can make a "free enterprise" argument like this article seems to, or an "equity" argument like you seem to be doing. They're both sound arguments, and meanwhile contrariwise I also buy the argument that being in a place should afford you some amount of self-determination. There's no clear right answer and no moral high ground, just different groups of people fighting over who gets the resources... again sort of "as usual."
What on earth does gaming the housing market through government regulations have to do with “free enterprise”? Using regulations to distort markets is the very opposite of free enterprise.
Your answer suggested that you consider restrictive land zoning regulations to be consistent with free enterprise and efficient pricing, which of course it is not.
You own an MVNO? That's amazing. I have a few questions regarding setting one up - if you have time, I'd like to ask you over email. My contact info is in my profile.
From the Section
“The Education Premium: Personal versus National”
> “When we move to the national level, these clean results vanish.65 Some prominent economists find that boosting national education slightly impoverishes countries rather than enriching them.66 Others report small positive effects; one typical estimate is that an extra year of national education boosts national income by 1.3%–1.7%.67 Remaining papers find moderate positive effects; the effect of national education on national income roughly equals the effect of personal education on personal income.68 No matter what they find, researchers usually confess their answers are highly uncertain.69”
> “65. For overviews, see Pritchett 2006, Bosworth and Collins 2003, and A. Krueger and Lindahl 2001.
66. See, e.g., Pritchett 2001, pp. 367–91, Islam 1995, and Benhabib and Spiegel 1994.
67. A. Krueger and Lindahl 2001, p. 1125, columns (2), (3), and (5).
68. For a survey, see Lange and Topel 2006, pp. 462–70.
69. One major exception: D. Cohen and Soto 2007 emphasizes the high quality of their data and the low uncertainty of their results. But even their findings dramatically hinge on their sample. When they look at 59 countries over 1960–90, a year of education raises national income by 4.9%. When they look at 81 countries over 1970–90, a year of education raises national income by 9.0% (D. Cohen and Soto 2007, p. 68, columns 5 and 10).”
“Good Omens” is the closest I’ve found.