My Amazon Review of Edward Glaeser's and David Cutler's "Survival of the City: Living and Thriving in an Age of Isolation"

 

Sickness and the City

 

Harvard urban economics professor Edward Glaeser and Harvard health economics professor David Cutler have teamed up to write a book about the post-Covid environment for cities. They rightfully note that isolation and social distancing caused by the pandemic are city destroyers in that they break the bonds of agglomeration economies that are so necessary for cities to succeed. In a word they represent an “existential threat” to a city’s viability.

 

There is quite a bit of history here in that they discuss role of cholera, typhus, bubonic plague, and influenza in determining the development or nondevelopment of cities. Early on city leaders understood the need to quarantine sick individuals and travelers from lands where sickness was evident.

 

To deal with future pandemics the authors call for strengthening the public health infrastructure to deal with stockpiling protective equipment and the delivery of healthcare services. They propose a global public health NATO to supplement the World Health Organization which would intervene in health emergencies. This NATO would also help fund vitally needed sanitation infrastructure in less developed countries. Given NATO’s defeat in Afghanistan, it has become far less of a role model.

 

They view urban America largely through the narrow prism of New York and Los Angeles where the struggle is between the insiders and the outsiders. Homeowner insiders control local zoning which restricts housing supply that makes housing unaffordable for all but the wealthy, and the police and teachers’ unions insiders make reform of policing and education difficult. It is these insiders who prevent cities from achieving their natural function of being the engine for intergenerational mobility.

 

Going forward the competitive environment for the so-called super star cites is going to get tougher. The authors believe they will continue to thrive, but the breakthrough of remote work is going to make it more difficult. Simply put, there is too much office space and the businesses that live off dense concentrations of office buildings will suffer.

 

My main criticism of the book is that it is way to New York and Los Angeles focused. It ignores the very exciting urban environments of Houston, Nashville, Austin, and Denver, for example. Those cities are thriving amidst the pandemic and will do far better once it ends.     

For the full Amazon URL see: Sickness and the City (amazon.com)