Progressive blogger Matthew Yglesias says he is baffled by my previous post here about whether urban sprawl is the result of individual choice or government regulation. Ben Adler, a Newsweek blogger, weighs in as well.

You can read my detailed response to Yglesias on the Antiplanner blog. In a nutshell, Yglesias claims that my argument is a “complicated counterfactual hypothetical about whether or not most people would still prefer to live in large single-family homes even in the absence of regulatory restrictions.” In fact, my argument is that the government regulation that he claims forces people to live in urban sprawl does not even exist.

As near as I can tell, Yglesias has lived his entire life in New York City, Massachusetts, and the DC area, all of which have had highly prescriptive land-use regulation during most of Yglesias’ life. So he might be excused for thinking everywhere else is just like that. In fact, most of the country has never had such regulation. Instead, what regulation exists, in the form of zoning, has been entirely responsive to the market.

As a libertarian, I have repeatedly challenged progressives like Yglesias to join me in supporting the abolition of all zoning codes and other forms of government land-use regulation. Instead of accepting my invitation, Yglesias and Adler would rather pretend I am a hypocrite for supporting such regulation.