California housing crisis affecting middle class the most: It's 'a broken system'

[Cicada]

39. I dont watch Fox News. My sources include Paul Krugman on this.

Why do the rich get richer and others stagnate. Paul Krugman has argued, as have other liberal economists, that it is not so much because tax laws have been changed to favor them. It is more because we have greater and greater monopolization in our economy. With only a few cell phone companies, prices rise. Our land use rules, and our property tax rules, are just another example.

Krugman points out the word rent can have a broad meaning, beyond real estate, where owners are paid not because they produce anything but because they own something in limited supply. He says that is probably the root of increasing inequality. And we can fix that with laws. Real estate prices, the cost of housing, is just one example. We should not be crucified upon a cross of government restrictions on supply.