If I'm single and childless and make $15/hour

[Recursion]

8. My experience was in Vienna where construction is basically fixed

Everything in the city itself is historic so it's a question of how you allocate the existing space. But unless you're fabulously rich you don't get to just "move to Vienna" and rent an apartment; you have to have a job in the area and there's a kind of matchmaking public/private housing authority that determines where you can rent and what your subsidy is. (If you're hella rich you just forego the subsidy, but "normal" people can't afford to do that in Vienna.)