Newsletters

Newsletter
by Bruce Katz, Ben Preis and Michael Saadine · November 4
Launching a Federal Housing Policy Agenda

The time for housing deliberation is over; the time for housing action has begun.

With that simple mandate, the National Housing Crisis Task Force today released From Crisis to Transformation: A Federal Housing Policy Agenda.

Treating the housing crisis like a crisis means the federal government must fundamentally restructure the way it is organized, substantially boost the production and preservation of housing, and take bold action to provide a housing safety net. Taken together, the Task Force’s recommended actions will reduce regulatory barriers and provide sufficient support and incentives to produce more than 750,000 new housing units per year, protect and preserve our existing housing stock, and create the institutions necessary to fundamentally transform the housing sector for the twenty-first century.

Newsletter
by Bruce Katz, Milena Dovali and Benjamin Weiser · October 31
The Spatial Geography of Defense Manufacturing

As we’ve written before, the U.S. is in the midst of a monumental effort to revive its industrial economy. This transition is resulting in new opportunities and a new industrial geography that is shifting power away from long-dominant “superstar cities” towards cities and metros with a propensity for industrial production. This New Economic Order is being shaped by the need to remilitarize, reshore, and decarbonize the economy, leading to a surge in domestic production across the country.

This month, the US Department of Defense (“DOD”) released two signature documents that remind us of the outsized effect that defense industrial spending has on state and metro economies and the extent to which the defense industrial base is dependent upon smart state and local action.

Newsletter
by Bruce Katz, Ben Preis and Michael Saadine · October 24
Providing a Housing Safety Net

This is the fourth and last in a series of initial policy newsletters being produced alongside the National Housing Crisis Task Force, which will soon release a national policy agenda with recommendations that the federal government can implement to address our housing crisis . The Task Force, an ambitious, two-year project to bring the most promising innovations in housing production, preservation, and finance to communities across the country, was launched in July by the Nowak Metro Finance Lab at Drexel University and Accelerator for America (AFA). If you want to make sure you receive all updates and reports from the Task Force, please register here.

Newsletter
by Bruce Katz, Ben Preis and Michael Saadine · October 10
The US Needs a National Housing Industrial Strategy

This is the third in a series of policy newsletters being produced alongside the National Housing Crisis Task Force, which will release a national policy agenda with recommendations that the federal government can implement to address our housing crisis later this month. The Task Force, an ambitious, two-year project to bring the most promising innovations in housing production, preservation, and finance to communities across the country, was launched in July by the Nowak Metro Finance Lab at Drexel University and Accelerator for America (AFA). If you want to make sure you receive all updates and reports from the Task Force, please register here.

The National Housing Crisis Task Force, in collaboration with the Bipartisan Policy Center will be co-hosting an event in-person and online, on October 24, 2024 at 10:00 a.m. EDT. Please register for the event, Scaling Local Innovations for Achieving Housing Affordability, here.

Newsletter
by Bruce Katz and Joanna Doven · October 3
How Pittsburgh Can Lead the Artificial Intelligence Revolution

Note: This newsletter was initially published by Governing Magazine on September 26, 2024

The 2020s will be remembered as the era when artificial intelligence sparked not only an economic transformation, but a new industrial revolution. As Goldman Sachs put it last year, AI has shifted from an “excitement” phase to a “deployment” reality, permeating critical sectors of the economy including defense, health care and energy with rapid speed.

Newsletter
by Bruce Katz, Ben Preis and Michael Saadine · September 26
Federal housing policy that mobilizes resources and reduces barriers

This is the second in a series of policy newsletters being produced alongside the National Housing Crisis Task Force, which will release a national policy agenda with recommendations that the federal government can implement to address our housing crisis later this fall. The Task Force, an ambitious, two-year project to bring the most promising innovations in housing production, preservation, and finance to communities across the country, was launched in July by the Nowak Metro Finance Lab at Drexel University and Accelerator for America (AFA). If you want to make sure you receive all updates and reports from the Task Force, please register here.

Newsletter
by Bruce Katz, Ben Preis and Michael Saadine · September 12
How does the federal government address the housing crisis?

This is the first in a series of policy newsletters being produced alongside the National Housing Crisis Task Force, which will release a national policy agenda with recommendations that the federal government can implement to address our housing crisis later this fall. If you want to make sure you receive all updates and reports from the Task Force, please register here.

Housing is finally having its moment in the spotlight. Not a day goes by without national and local media elevating housing as one of the most central challenges facing our country.  The housing crisis, largely subjugated to the sidelines for years, has rightfully become a bona fide election issue.[1] During Tuesday’s presidential debate, Vice President Harris mentioned housing no less than five times. And for good reason.

Newsletter
by Bruce Katz · August 8
Downtowns and the New Economic Geography

Versions of this newsletter were initially published earlier this year by Governing Magazine and Context Magazine

For 25 years, the rebound of central business districts has been a driving force in the rebirth of U.S. cities.That positive dynamic is now threatened as the rise of hybrid and remote work drives detrimental, domino-like effects on commercial real estate, small businesses, transit ridership, and municipal tax generation. In certain sectors, working from home, either part time or full time, has become a structural feature of the post-pandemic economy, not a cyclical aberration. The harsh reality is that there will be no bounce back to the pre-COVID era. As a result, cities need to move fast to diversify their downtowns economically, amplify their downtown culturally, and remake their downtowns physically.

Newsletter
by Bruce Katz, Ben Preis and Michael Saadine · July 25
Launching the National Housing Crisis Task Force

Earlier this week, the Nowak Metro Finance Lab at Drexel University and Accelerator for America launched the National Housing Crisis Task Force.

The Task Force, months in the making, held its first meeting in New York City, focusing intensely on the breadth and depth of the housing crisis and the urgent need for all layers of government and the private and civic sectors to rise to the occasion and fully treat the housing crisis like the crisis it is.

Newsletter
by Bruce Katz · July 18
The New Industrial Geography

I’ve been thinking a lot about place lately.

By all accounts, the U.S. economy is undergoing an industrial transformation of monumental proportions. This transformation is gradually shaping a new industrial geography in the country – across and within metropolitan areas and broader regions — which could have profound implications for sub-national growth and development for decades to come.