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The strange and awful path of productivity in the US construction sector

bfi.uchicago.edu

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Re: The strange and awful path of productivity in the US construction sector

#11

Post by croes »

greenthrow wrote: post #6

This is absurd. Houses are so much more complex than in the 1970s, and so much larger. In 1972 central AC was not common, now it's basically required. Square footage is way higher. Number of electrical outlets and switches per room. Moulding and trim are expected in many houses. Porches, decks, patios are much more ornate. Today's average house ia closer to the house of a millionaire in the 1970s than the average hou…

Would be interesting to compare the regulations for building construction now and then.

Re: The strange and awful path of productivity in the US construction sector

#12

Post by anonreeeeplor »

Corruption was a massive problem in USA industry as well as slowdowns due to legal red tape.

My guess is incompetent government is at the root of the problem.

The more you scale red tape, the harder it is to do anything. Look at the California high speed rail.

Corrupt governments make far more money by slowing down a project and using it as a washing machine to extract rents.

Getting large public projects to misspend their funds on red tape, lawyers and other while delaying building is way more profitable than just letting any construction project simply get the job done fast.

The corruption of the government itself and hybrid with larger construction companies very likely incentivized slow and never complete construction.

Why would you want the work done fast when drawing it out and slowing it down is far more profitable, to milk it forever:

Re: The strange and awful path of productivity in the US construction sector

#14

Post by matwood »

latchkey wrote: post #4
hindsightbias wrote: post #2

> number of houses or total square footage built per employee Average house size has probably doubled in the last 50 years. Nail guns can't make up for building code and higher finish work demands. It's not uncommon to see 6 or 7 layers in sheathing today.

I'm remodeling my place right now. You're totally right, the building codes are a lot more complex and there is more 'work' to do as a result. No more just hiding electrical boxes in the walls. Heh. That said, the products being used have improved a lot. Things like PEX tubing for plumbing (instead of copper) and glue on walls for showers (over doing tile work), make some aspects go a lot faster. Edit: Oh, I forgot t…

PEX is great. I highly recommend keeping some shark bites and spare pieces of PEX around, as it's easy to do repairs on your own if you have an issue.

Re: The strange and awful path of productivity in the US construction sector

#17

Post by markus_zhang »

anonreeeeplor wrote: post #12

Corruption was a massive problem in USA industry as well as slowdowns due to legal red tape. My guess is incompetent government is at the root of the problem. The more you scale red tape, the harder it is to do anything. Look at the California high speed rail. Corrupt governments make far more money by slowing down a project and using it as a washing machine to extract rents. Getting large public projects to misspend…

Red tape in many cases is simply an excuse for more corruption or stronger interest groups IMHO. It puts a legal stamp on a lot of things so that ordinary people cannot argue that.

That also makes me think that SWE should either break all those red tapes or put up their own. Nowadays they are simply being milked by everyone else who is behind a red tape or a stamp or a certification or something similar.

Re: The strange and awful path of productivity in the US construction sector

#19

Post by MontyCarloHall »

hindsightbias wrote: post #2

> number of houses or total square footage built per employee Average house size has probably doubled in the last 50 years. Nail guns can't make up for building code and higher finish work demands. It's not uncommon to see 6 or 7 layers in sheathing today.

Isn’t the real headline then that building construction technology hasn’t improved at the same rate as other manufacturing tech?

For example, cars today are orders of magnitude more complicated than 50 years ago, but due to more efficient manufacturing technology, the auto industry has far higher productivity per employee than it did 50 years ago.

Re: The strange and awful path of productivity in the US construction sector

#20

Post by legitster »

> And second, the authors describe the curious fact that producers located in more-productive areas do not grow at expected rates. Indeed, rather than construction inputs flowing to areas where they are more productive, the activity share of these areas either stagnates or even falls. The authors suggest that this problem with allocative efficiency may accentuate the aggregate productivity problem for the industry.

So... basically high-rises and mobile homes?

It's hard not to see this as a direct result of city councils universally loathing oversized housing blocks.

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