Forums: Deadweight Loss

The 1980s and 1990s were the Belle Époque - the beautiful age - of commercial development, a time when getting project approval could be as simple as shaking the right hand or making the right campaign donation. And Americans were all for it, ready to embrace the next mall or Home Depot or Starbucks Coffee outlet that gave them easy access to consumer products. Mike Saint was there for it and remembers when making proposed developments reality was simple. No more. "At a conference in 2004, I heard a developer say 'Up until 1999, anything I wanted to do was...