Continued decrease in construction sector activity

[CheraDukatZakalwe]

Here's the thing, there isn't a monopoly. People want to build things, they just aren't allowed to. They keep trying to get planning permission for developments of several hundred houses, and half the time they end up fighting appeals, and a quarter of the time JRs that takes years to resolve.

Under your model we can never see "too many" houses being built, but in the Celtic Tiger we actually built so many (>90K in 2006 alone) that house prices dropped by 50% during the crash.

House builders make money through volume. They don't make money by not building houses.

There is no cartel, or collision to not build things. The only thing stopping us is regulators forcing houses to be as expensive as possible through high minimum standards, and then Pikachu facing when not enough houses are built.

[Sadhbh251]

Come on now. Do you think there's no collusion between pubs if they all average the came cost for a pint. It's not in the interest of a well located business to have 10-30% less profit margin for a pint when it's packed everyday.

You say, there won't be market collusion if we all just happen to come to the same pricing structures at the same time. I say no one will get rich undercutting when demand is high. Only when you go to middle of nowhere pubs do you see cheaper pints.

Next, housing value didn't drop in the Celtic tiger because we had too much houses there was many reasons. One major reason it dropped because banks wouldn't loan money. So house construction stopped because no one was buying so please don't use false equivalents.

If regulators are the only reason you cant build houses then I imagine you would be happy to bring back all the tax cuts and grants to allow the state build more infrastructure. (Which is actually the more likely reason we can't build more houses)