We've been blaming America's 'new housing crisis' on the wrong thing all along

Super low mortgage rates and a healthy jobs market have supported housing demand.
But there aren't enough affordable houses in the US to go around, especially for first-time buyers.
The unresponsiveness of housing supply to demand and price changes is blamed in part on restrictive zoning laws.
Economists measure this responsiveness as elasticity; in markets with higher elasticity, homebuilding responds to higher demand and prices at a relatively faster pace compared with places that are more ine