Failure to build is definitely not the issue, and that's why I posted here because people were talking about how this article was missing the mark, based on their Silicon Valley etc. experiences.

The reality is that western countries are making on the whole fairly terrible macroeconomic decisions for the long run. They are putting primacy on real estate assets for the upper middle class, and undermining their own long run primary industry capacity by making housing for working class people unaffordable. It's all short term decision making made by a minority of moderately wealthy people whose own interests run contrary to the needs of the majority.

>Toronto has a third of all construction cranes in North America

Toronto can have all the cranes in the world and it won't really matter because construction industry cannot keep up.

I think the city(not GTA) has grown 500k in the past 20 years (2.5M -> 3M), condo units only increased 200k (100k -> 300k), other new housing marginal.

The fundamental problem isn't even that there's too much demand, but the west are incapable of building. If we're going to outsource manufacturing abroad, domestic agriculture to migrant farmers, might as well import some Chinese construction who can build a million unit ghost city in a few years.

E: post too fast

@dghlsakjg

The only saving grace in Toronto condo construction is many of them maybe as shoddy as Chinese construction and hopefully will fall into disrepair and replaced before their life spans.

>Chinese building practices assume a certain disposability

That's Japanese residential construction. Chinese construction meme is lack of quality control which implies durability problems. But it's a meme, housing stock too new to really generalize on. My personal experience (worked adjacent industry in both markets) is some of the Toronto new constructs are experiencing much quality issues sooner than Chinese developments. Chinese build so much that they can build well if incentivized too. In terms of cheap, fast, good... Canadian developers simply don't have a fast mode... nor a cheap mode... and frequently not even good. China can at least get you fast & cheap or fast & good.

Chinese building practices assume a certain disposability that we haven't accepted in Canada. Apartment buildings are built with an assumed lifespan of around 30 years.

I have no idea if that is a good thing or a bad thing.

That kind of throwaway mentality for housing might seem crazy, but keep in mind that housing is one of the only goods that we expect to last for a lifetime in the west.

I'm not sure most NA houses are so different. For instance, cheap floor treatments, drywall + stickbuilt, multipane windows that leak after a decade or two.

What are the "cheap floor treatments" and why would drywall or a house made of wood mean that a house won't last more than 30 years? There are plenty of houses built in the 90s with wood that are not just fine, but look practically new and modern.

Questionable proposition considering the suburban GTA has grown an insane amount as well, even with greenbelting in place.

Growth is relative, my friend from Mississauga grew up around farms now surrounded by suburbs, but from 80s-20s , dwellings "only" increased from 120k to 240k. Population 350k to 650k.

Building 120k dwellings in 40 years / 3000 per year is pathetic. Export some Chinese construction over capacity. The residential district I lived in China housed 80,000 (condos). It was built in less than 5 years, every unit was larger and nicer than Toronto new constructions.

Regulations, NIMBYims plays a part, but at western construction also simply isn't competitive enough to address changes in immigration patterns.