Unaffordable Housing
“Home Unaffordable Home,” by Jonathan Shaw (November-December 2024, page 21) is half good. In focusing on only one of the causes of high prices, regulation, it is an advocacy piece that will please private developers. There are other causes of high housing costs, including absence of profit and rent controls, demolition and disposal, and material and labor costs. Labor costs are complex. Many construction workers in the Boston area are nonunion, without benefits, and are not paid enough to themselves afford good housing. Many are recent arrivals who are not citizens. Some live in groups in buildings soon to be razed and knowing they will soon have to move to another unhealthy and temporary home. The article does mention the impact of high costs on low-income workers. Finally, when new housing is built, private developers ask as much as the market will bear. To me, the biggest cause of high costs is not over-regulation. It’s greed.
John Bassett ’60
Brookline, Mass.
The article placed a strong emphasis on restrictive zoning laws as the reason for high housing prices and low supply. While zoning undoubtedly plays a role, I was surprised by the omission of one of the most significant contributors to our current housing shortage: the financial crisis of 2008.
The precipitous decline in housing construction began in 2006, reached a low in 2009, and only began a slow recovery after that, reaching levels approaching those in 2000 only in 2019. We have not recovered from that 14-year dip in construction, and this supply gap, triggered by the financial collapse, is a major factor in today’s housing crisis.
While modifying zoning laws to encourage higher-density housing may help to alleviate the crisis, we should not forget that the boom-and-bust cycles of our economy cause far greater havoc than restrictive zoning laws.
Gerald Feigin, Ph.D. ’90
Croton on Hudson, N.Y.
I’ve been involved in local politics for around 40 years, including 10 years on the city council. Much of my time has been spent on growth and housing issues.
Ever since I moved here, Boulder’s housing has been more expensive than in surrounding areas. We’ve had to face the difficulties of providing affordable housing in a situation (like much of the country is in) where demand so far exceeds supply that prices cannot be reduced significantly by adding more market-rate units, at least at levels that would not destroy our community. Here’s what we’ve done:
We require new residential development to provide 25 percent of units as permanently affordable, or to pay a fee-in-lieu to provide these “inclusionary housing” units off site. New job development is required to pay for affordable housing for a portion of its workers; currently this “job/housing linkage fee” for office space development is $30 per square foot. We also have a “buy down” program: in exchange for cash from the city (paid for by general revenues), the property owner or purchaser agrees to limit the price appreciation indefinitely—so as prices inflate, the unit becomes relatively more affordable.
To truly maintain our community’s economic diversity, these requirements would need to be doubled (or more), and the programs expanded. But even at current levels, they create a significant number of housing units that stay permanently affordable.
On the other side, our comprehensive plan limits city expansion into surrounding rural areas, much of which are now protected as city-owned open space. The plan, which is an agreement with Boulder County, also limits significant densification of single-family neighborhoods. Again, not perfect, but at least our quality of life is somewhat preserved.
Steve Pomerance ’63
Boulder, Colo.
I was dismayed by “Home Unaffordable Home.” It suggests that the crisis in home affordability is more or less exclusively the consequence of zoning restrictions and NIMBYism. But purchases by large investors are clearly a major part of this picture, accounting for 26 percent of purchases of the most affordable homes in the last quarter of 2023. That such a major part of the affordability crisis is simply ignored makes it impossible for me to take either the article or those scholars’ work seriously.
Richard Smoley ’78
Winfield, Ill.
Jonathan Shaw describes NIMBY politics as actions by residents to protect the status quo of their neighborhoods. The answer to this problem, his sources suggest, is the relaxation of land-use regulations and zoning laws. What’s missing is a more complex understanding of NIMBYism, which shows up later in the article. As Rebecca Diamond points out, “The downsides of building more housing—in terms of congestion, too many kids in your schools, too many cars on your streets, and expanded infrastructure—are borne at the local level. But the benefits are diffuse.” In other words, the costs are borne by neighbors and the benefits distributed to the community.
The answer is not to relax land-use regulations and zoning laws but to empower citizens to invent ways to absorb new housing—on their terms. I’m talking about engaging a diverse and representative group of citizens in tackling the problem themselves through organized and facilitated collaboration. Public participation does not create a sense of shared ownership of the problem, nor an investment in a solution. Meaningful collaboration does. NIMBYism is a valid concern and the way to address it is through citizen empowerment and social responsibility. We’re all capable of NIMBYism. We’re also capable of compromise, if given the chance.
Todd Bryan, M.P.A. ’85
Boulder, Colo.
Your excellent article does not mention an underlying driver of the affordability crisis: growing U.S. inequality since 1980. Greater inequality of course fortifies NIMBY (“not in my back yard”) fear that lower-income arrivals will lower property values—or, sometimes, that higher-income arrivals will drive up property values and taxes. But in addition, and evident in New York City resistance to the new zoning proposals, is the fact that richer people consume disproportionately more housing space and land. Thus, greater inequality lowers net density. As a personal example, in 2009, my husband and I bought three small adjoining apartments and combined them! No wonder middle- class urban neighborhoods fear “gentrification.” At the extreme, absentee investors own the apartments in the new super-luxury residential towers along Manhattan’s 57th Street “Billionaires’ Row,” creating pockets of urban dead space just south of Central Park.
Mary M. “Polly” Cleveland ’66
New York City
Jonathan Shaw cites a “broad consensus” among economists and housing experts that “the reason for the fundamental problem of insufficient supply [is] mostly, local land-use regulations and zoning.” I was surprised not to see any mention of a phenomenon that is both widespread and relatively unprecedented: the rise and rapid expansion of the short-term/vacation rental market.
In a 2016 Harvard Law & Policy Review article, Dayne Lee analyzed the effect of short term rentals (STRs) on price and aggregate supply of affordable housing rentals in Los Angeles. Lee attributes LA’s affordability crisis to “declining real wages, population growth, and zoning policies that favor single-family and luxury housing [as well as] the foreclosure crisis of 2010... pushing over 100,000 former homeowners into the rental market.” A combination of gentrification and the city’s relatively weak rent stabilization ordinance also leads to evictions of low-income tenants.
But his paper focuses on the way the “hotelization” of existing resident housing stock reduces the supply, and places demand-side pressure on Los Angeles’s dwindling stocks of subsidized and unsubsidized affordable housing. Initially pitched as an inexpensive and flexible alternative to hotel rooms, and a way for renters and homeowners to supplement their income by making a spare room available to tourists, by 2014 64 percent of LA’s Airbnb listings were used exclusively as short-term rentals, with most units booked through the service managed by full-time investors or companies that also own or lease dozens of other Airbnb listings. The company went public in December 2020, and the “hotelization” of the city’s rental housing stock continues apace.
Shaw points out that “housing prices have been rising faster than income for decades”—and that may indeed be attributable largely to zoning and NIMBY-driven local land-use regulations. But he also notes that, during the pandemic—in part because more people began to work from home—“both housing prices and rents spiked,” pushing the affordability problem to “levels not seen in 35 years.” He estimates that “the nation is thought to be short three to six million units of housing.” According to short-term rental market research firm AirDNA, the US short-term rental market in 2023 generated approximately $64 billion in revenue for some 785,000 “hosts” from over 2.4 million vacation rental listings.
Shaw concludes that the “benefits of deregulation” are compelling, “bettering poor citizens’ lives, enhancing mobility, promoting equality, and increasing growth.” But his article ignores evidence that the largely unregulated (or at any rate not enforceably regulated) growth of the short-term rental market has had the opposite effect, exacerbating the affordable housing crisis.
Susan Savitt Schwartz, M.P.P. ’87
Altadena, Calif.
How ironic! The November-December issue contains a thoughtfully written article on the housing affordability crisis—as well as a large number of not-very-affordable home listings, pushing $17 million. This goes to show that Harvard Magazine does not take sides.
Charles Rosenblatt, Ph.D. ’78
West Hartford, Conn.
“Home Unaffordable Home” is one more article about the quixotic belief of housing advocates that forcing greater density into our most desirable communities is a major requirement for solving the shortage of “affordable housing.” It’s hard not to conclude that this belief is more ideological than rational, the problem being that, in general, because of very high property values, it is impossible to create affordable housing in these communities, only expensive and highly subsidized housing. The high cost, as well as the inevitable local opposition, mean that not enough will ever be produced to have much effect on the overall problem.
Consider the revealing analysis in the article by economist Rebecca Diamond, concerning the desirability of converting current single-family zoning in Chicago to triplex zoning: “Adopting triplex zoning will not lead to massive new supply in the first decade, she cautions, because on many lots the value of existing single-family homes is too high to make replacement with multiple housing units cost-effective. But over time, as the current housing stock degrades, such a policy would help increase the supply.”
Really? The solution to our affordable housing problem is to hope that the most expensive communities degrade?
Do such advocates not notice that we have no shortage of already degraded communities: large parts of most American cities, for example, as well as what some have called “our hollowed out old industrial towns,” which once were among the most successful towns in America and often still have some good bones, a lot of useful infrastructure? Maybe what we need is a rebuilding of these communities, preferably on a large enough scale and high enough quality of design and amenities, so that they once again become attractive to a wide range of income classes, not just the lowest income one. Huge amounts of new housing could be built and the lower current property values might mean that much of it truly could be affordable, with only the lowest income residents needing subsidy. Doesn’t it make sense to increase the supply of attractive communities, rather than degrade the insufficient number that now exist?
Peter C. Moss, M.B.A. ’61
Cos Cob, Conn.
Boston—nay, the nation’s—housing crisis is truly distressing on several fronts, as Jonathan Shaw’s article makes painfully clear.
Two more factors to consider in Boston’s case. About 50 years ago, the number of people living in Boston proper (not including suburbs) earning the median national income wage and below was about 35 percent; today that number—of middle class and poorer folks—has fallen to about 15 percent. In other words, 85 percent of Boston proper’s population earns above the middle class median wage.
Also, Boston requires all of its municipal workers to live in Boston. At the Boston Public Library, for example, top curators have turned down job offers because even with handsome salaries they could not afford Boston rentals and home prices.
While Boston is wonderful for its architecture, hospitals, schools, culture and history, we all suffer in a city that has become more like a gated community.
James Berkman ’77, J.D. ’82
Boston
Jonathan Shaw’s article addresses most of the issues that are impediments to creating housing for the general American public. However, it is suggested that the final “stage” of getting the developed housing to the intended occupants warrants some additional study and effective resolution. That stage is allowing new owners to arrange for purchase before individual or corporate investors buy up the new “products.” Out here major and minor investors are aggressively purchasing new homes—then renting them out to new occupants. Hence, the prospective home “buyers” (now renters) are no better off—not having any chance to purchase, but must rent without the chance to build the equity and other benefits addressed in the Shaw article.
Some random American communities have implemented policies, et. al., to promote the sale of homes to individual new residents. But additional focus on this last “stage” is necessary. Perhaps the educators cited in the Shaw article would consider taking on these issues.
Charles Fleisher, MAUD ’68
Hillsboro, Ore.
“Home Affordable Home” by Jonathan Shaw covers up the actual cause of the absurdly high rents and prices of homes. Shaw covers up the actual cause by focusing on the down-stream part of the problem while ignoring the up-stream root cause.
Specifically, Shaw notes the downstream fact that NIMBY-enforced zoning laws to prevent excessive housing density and to preserve green space (perfectly valid concerns, by the way) limits the amount of land on which housing can be built, thus creating too little supply for the demand and hence high prices. But Shaw ignores the upstream fact that causes the downstream fact, namely this. The reason there is such limited geographical area for housing close to where the jobs are (and hence where people want to live) is because jobs are so concentrated geographically; and the reason for this is because the wealthy people who control such things want it this way because it makes for greater profits and they don’t care that it causes the downstream problem of unaffordable housing for regular people.
And the reason—going further upstream now—that wealthy people control the location of jobs is because we do not have a genuine democracy in which ordinary people—who value equality and mutual aid rather than making rich people even richer—have the real power. In a genuine democracy people could more geographically spread out economic enterprises in a manner so that everybody could live in a nice home in a neighborhood close to where they worked with green space and not too-high density, and not be accused of “evil NIMBY-ism” by the likes of Jonathan Shaw.
John Spritzler, S.D. ’92
Brighton, Mass.
“Home Unaffordable Home” fails to mention even once the word “race” or the words “Black” and “white.” Yet race is an inextricable part of the affordable housing problem, going back more than 60 years to the era of “blockbusting” (scaring owners to sell homes below market value) and “white flight” (people abandoning the city for the suburbs). Since the 1960s, low-cost housing projects have been viewed as only for the Black and poor, while single-family housing is considered to be white and upper-middle-class. It is not possible to separate zoning battles from desegregation and civil rights battles.
To a lesser extent, the housing affordability crisis has also been exacerbated by the deinstitutionalization of the mentally ill, and the explosion of drug addiction, both problems also originating in the 1960s and continuing on now through the 2020s. The possibility that affordable housing will turn into “human dumping grounds” for the mentally ill and drug addicted, without sufficient social services to treat their conditions, is a genuine concern for current homeowners and a driver for NIMBYism in many communities. These are serious issues, and zoning battles and Office To Residence (OTR) conversions will not be won unless the reality of race (and other concerns) are recognized and dealt with.
Judy Resnick, J.D. ’90
Far Rockaway, N.Y.
I wonder if, during the research Jonathan Shaw did for his housing article, factors other than zoning came up. As with most complex issues, there are often multiple causal factors, and focusing only on one can be problematic.
A few examples:
· In high cost states, the State and Local Tax deduction (SALT) was capped at $10,000 per year in 2017; prior to that it was mostly unlimited. Property taxes on owned homes are a significant portion of tax bills for home owners, and often dominate what they pay in SALT. Thus, the cap increased the after-tax price of home ownership for many high-cost U.S. coasts. These caps wouldn’t apply to corporate owners of homes, and those owners receive other tax preference items as well (such as deducting depreciation as a business expense, lower tax rates on carried interest for private equity owners, and the ability to escape capital gains taxes entirely through Opportunity Zone programs). As of the end of 2022, investors rather than owners purchased nearly 30 percent of homes on the market, though the share in early 2024 was about half that.
· There has been growing concentration in owners of multifamily homes, and even more so in the property managers of those buildings. This market concentration can be a factor in rising rents. There are also data aggregators who collect detailed information on rental properties and sell services to boost yields for building owners. Obviously, if you are collecting data across buildings in a single market, it is at higher risk for price collusion. In fact, there is now a national antitrust case against RealPage for this, including impacts in Boston.
· Even in the area of affordable housing units, private equity is heavily involved. Many of these units have a preset period during which they must be rented below market, and then can revert to market rates. The private equity firms are involved in that process, and tend to benefit either by converting them to market or getting high compensation for keeping them below for longer.
· One way the cost of housing can be relieved is through strong public transit links that allow people to have reasonable commutes even if they live far away. This allows home ownership in areas with more open space and lower housing prices. Particularly in Boston, we just don’t seem able to get these links working well. I’ve not yet found comparison studies for how far people can travel in different municipalities for similar commute times, but it would be an interesting metric and somebody must be doing this type of work.
Doug Koplow, M.B.A. ’92
Belmont, Mass.
Jonathan Shaw responds: The issues are complex. In the course of my research, many other contributing factors were raised, some long term, some short. For example, the exodus of Gen Z renters into one bedroom apartments and studios during and after the pandemic, and of Millennials from rented units to homes during that time; the reluctance of existing homeowners to move because the interest rates they hold on mortgages are far lower than they could obtain in the market today, depressing the inventory of homes for sale; the role of Airbnb in allowing investors to purchase rental properties for conversion to short-term rentals; the lack of skilled immigrants in recent years who helped the construction industry during the last peak build 1.8 million units of housing in a single year—the list goes on. I tried to focus on the one long-term issue—zoning—that seemed best correlated with high prices in the most economically vibrant urban areas in the country.
Certainly, there is much more to be said about this issue.
The housing article is seriously shallow and flawed. It makes no mention of court efforts to override local zoning, as in Mount Laurel, New Jersey, even though these efforts have received serious attention from such scholars as Charles Haar and Douglas Massey. Neither does it mention that the Federal government got out of the housing business in the Reagan years and has done nothing ever since to support new construction. In fact, the article is utterly devoid of solutions. And the Law School has never replaced Professor Haar and this has contributed no scholarship on this issue.
So as a whole, Harvard has contributed very little to resolution of the dearth of housing.
Peter Buchsbaum, J.D. ’70
Stockton, N.J.
I very much appreciated the effort to address home affordability in your November-December issue (“Out of Reach: America’s housing affordability crisis”). What I wish had been mentioned in the article was the effect of the emergence of housing as a largely unregulated investment vehicle. To blame the increased cost on lack of supply and the lack of supply on regulations is certainly the approach favored by real-estate developers. But it misses one of the most important stories of the last several decades and puts things exactly backwards. The lack of regulation, perverse tax incentives, low interest rates, as well as the efficiencies provided by technology have led to a boom in investment in property around the world. It is high time that regulations came to grips with this damaging development.
Practically speaking, all the empty buildings in my prosperous part of Brooklyn are in the hands of investment firms. Also, never in my life have we had as much construction as has been underway in New York City for decades. We have not had a major population boom that is absorbing all of those units and making them expensive. What we do have are lots of empty luxury housing units and office spaces, and many empty shop fronts. Apparently, landlords do not need the money from rents, or do better by taking the paper losses. Who knows? Further from home, my understanding is that major firms have even been buying up the land under trailer homes and jacking up rents—that is hardly a matter of excess regulation of the building industry.
From London, to Vancouver, to New York, to trailer parks all over our own country, this is not a problem of people not wanting things built in their back yards, and more construction will not in itself yield a solution to the affordability crisis.
Looking at the buildings rising all around me—and all of the homeless misery below those buildings—I do wish our journalists would not keep gaslighting us on this urgent topic.
Jonah Siegel
Distinguished Professor, Department of English
Rutgers University
Jonathan Shaw makes a number of good points in his article on the affordable housing crisis in the U.S. Unfortunately, he makes a common mistake in lumping all single-family zoning into the same category. There is a huge difference between a zoning code that permits a single-family dwelling on a 2,500-square-foot lot (.057 acre or 17 units per acre), which is common in many U.S. cities, and one that requires five, 10, or 20 acres for each single-family dwelling, as is common in many American suburbs.
Shaun McElhatton
St. Paul, Minn.
In Jonathan Shaw’s interesting article about the housing crisis, the emphasis was entirely on zoning and other restrictions on new construction, but I failed to find mention of two important points. The first is the rapid increase in people’s ability to work remotely, using Zoom and other electronic aids. Because of this development very many people now live far from their downtown offices but are able to function efficiently. No doubt this trend will continue, if not curtailed, partly in response to cost of living pressures, and will moderate to some extent the rise in metropolitan housing prices. The second point is the inadequacy in this country of investment in rapid inter-urban transportation. In France, high-speed trains have greatly expanded the range within which people can reach the center of Paris in an hour or less. Obviously, this allows the French to live where housing costs are lower without sacrificing the benefits of the center. Nothing like that exists today in the United States. To make headway in resolving a complex problem. the policy community will have to think more broadly about a suite of useful interventions.
Robert Repetto ’59, Ph.D. ’65
Boulder, Colo.
“Technocracy”
The article on Latanya Sweeney (“When Technology and Society Clash,” by Lydialyle Gibson, November-December 2024, page 27) was outstanding! Thanks for peeling back the onion on algorithmic bias.
Although probably not in the algorithmic category, well over a decade or so ago, I was stunned when my reservation for an Air-bnb in Southern California was cancelled at the last minute. I don’t know if the owners looked up my LinkedIn profile, but I was pretty darn sure they figured out that I was African American!
Conway Downing ’68
Washington, D.C.
Athletes’ Success
I found “Why Ivy Athletes Score in Careers” (by Jonathan Shaw, November-December 2024, page 10) very interesting, but its conclusions were not surprising. An intercollegiate athletic experience provides life lessons that are not taught in classrooms, but are very beneficial after graduation.
In 1962, I was a freshman walk-on at Newell Boathouse, never having even seen a racing shell. Three years later, our crew was pictured on the cover of Sports Illustrated with legendary coach Harry Parker. Rowing taught me the lessons listed in the article, plus another that I think is even more critical to achieving career success: just how hard you have to work to be really good at something, maybe even better than anyone else. In my experience, working hard, being a team player, and perhaps a little luck are more likely to result in success in life than a cum laude diploma (though having that as well doesn’t hurt)!
Brian Clemow ’66
West Hartford, Conn.
I’m not surprised that Ivy college athletes have more “successful” careers than non-athletes, as detailed in the research of Paul Gompers. But what a shallow measure of a career. Income as the only measure makes as much sense as using the presence of a criminal record as the only measure. One would hope that Harvard holds greater aspirations for its graduates than high incomes. I’m sure the athletes would prefer their careers to be evaluated by more than their incomes. Scholars in the field, including Gompers, are undoubtedly familiar with broader and more appropriate concepts of success and societal contribution. Why didn’t they use them?
Kenneth E. Powell ’63, M.P.H. ’69
South Hadley, Mass.
Jonathan Shaw and Paul Gompers miss two key components of athletes’ success: 1. Athletes tend to be popular and develop the self confidence that comes from being picked first and 2. Athletes may be healthier and better looking on average. Advancement in business and other professions often depends on these characteristics, especially since sales talent is key.
James Kardon ’71
Scarsdale, N.Y.
The Sackler Name
In reference to “Retaining the Sackler Name” (News in Brief, November-December 2024, page 17): While Arthur Sackler’s fortune did not come from deadly opiates, his pioneering of medical advertising has introduced a surreal and expensive addition to our healthcare costs. Pharmaceutical companies advertise drugs to sell, and not to educate; and what useful education about complex pharmaceuticals comes from a 30-second spot? This Sackler may have had a more pernicious effect on our healthcare system than his nephews.
James Kardon ’71
Scarsdale, N.Y.
Addressing Antisemitism
“An Academic Agenda,” the 7 Ware Street column in the November-December 2024 issue (page 4), reports that “members of Congress and of the Harvard Jewish Alumni Alliance have recycled factually preposterous reports that billions of dollars of contributions from foreign entities (‘Middle Eastern anti-democratic governments’) have warped Harvard’s policies and positions.”
Harvard is being sued and investigated for antisemitism, which many students, professors, and alumni acknowledge is a serious issue. The University’s alumni magazine might play a more constructive role by investigating and reporting on the foreign funding, rather than by attacking the Jewish alumni volunteers and members of Congress who are raising the alarm.
The Harvard Gazette reported in 2005 a $20-million gift from a Saudi prince for “the creation of a University-wide program on Islamic studies.” In 2008 the Gazette reported a $2-million gift from a Qatari sheikh. In 2011, a subsidiary of the Qatar Foundation “commissioned Harvard University to undertake a multi-year research study to establish a holistic framework by which to document, analyze, and decipher the principles of urban sustainability among selected case-study cities in Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman, Iran, and Iraq.” In 2012 Harvard Law School announced that the Qatar Foundation had become “a leading sponsor” of the Institute for Global Law and Policy. The Crimson reported in 2023 that Harvard had disclosed $4,387,575 from Saudi Arabia, $3,305,984 from Qatar, and $1 million from Kuwait for a period of January 2022 to April 2023. In November 2018, the Qatar Foundation’s Hamad Bin Khalifa University announced a “groundbreaking” agreement with edX, then jointly owned by Harvard and MIT, to be the first Middle Eastern university to provide courses through the online platform. It’s not clear from the column what precisely rises to the level of “preposterous”—that the totals from these and similar agreements might mount over the years into the billions, especially including other Ivy League universities such as Cornell, which has opened a full campus in Qatar, or that Harvard’s policies and positions might have been warped by the money. What’s really preposterous is the persistence of the reflexive tendency by Harvard officials and publications to lash out at the Jewish alumni and the members of Congress. A better approach would be to listen and act to address the concerns raised, which are legitimate and went unaddressed for far too long.
Ira Stoll ’94
Boston
The editors respond: The HJAA audit of Harvard (covered in depth at harvardmag.com/antisemitic-24) reports (page 34):
Between 2014 and 2019, Harvard received $894 million from Middle Eastern anti-democratic governments. During those same years, Harvard’s five gifts from Israel totaled $3.1 million.
From 2020 to 2023, Harvard’s Center for Middle Eastern Studies (CMES) allegedly received $1.5 billion from foreign entities and governments.
The underlying source is not very carefully interrogated (if at all). The CMES budget is something under $2 million per year, and its total funding since the early 1950s is nothing like the sum reported—and according to the University, CMES received no funding from any foreign governments or allied entities during that period. Given total University gift receipts, for current use and endowment, of about $1 billion per year in recent years, even during campaigns, these figures aren’t credible (nor are they made so by the figures Stoll cites), and running them this way, without further questioning, undercuts the credibility of HJAA’s report and associated arguments—unfortunately, under the circumstances.
Stoll is also somewhat selective. The paragraph in the column following the one he cites critiques protesters’ intent and efficacy, and their unwillingness to face the consequences of their civil disobedience. The column aimed at an evenhanded assessment of the arguments and actions advanced during the University’s fraught year, in an attempt to elevate the quality of campus discourse—an obligation of all community members.
Teaching Reading
Kudos to Nina Pasquini for “A Right Way to Read?” (September-October 2024, page 23). Having done graduate work in reading theory, I have long been frustrated at the way reading instruction frequently turns into a political football after the release of disappointing scores. When that happens, as Pasquini points out, too many schools provide a knee-jerk reaction by insisting on a single “science-based” approach—frequently isolated phonics instruction. As the best educators point out, balanced approaches draw on the benefits of both phonics and whole-language instruction, allowing for varied instructional opportunities. Another impressive aspect of this well-researched article is acknowledging that schools must recognize the time and effort needed for excellent reading instruction, but frequently are unwilling or unable to pay for the training to provide it. The professionals involved in such an important endeavor deserve to be compensated accordingly.
Charles Steltenkamp
Bloomfield Hills, Mich.
Amplifications: Morning Prayers…
The latest College Pump (“New Traditions,” November-December 2024, page 60) claimed that the College’s tradition of Morning Prayers began in 1636. Samuel Eliot Morison’s The Founding of Harvard College states that the College was authorized and promised funding by the General Court in 1636 but didn’t begin operating until “some time between early June and September” of 1638.
Christopher M. Jedrey, Ph.D. ’77
Boston
Editor’s note: For what it is worth, Memorial Church’s website claims, “A daily service of Morning Prayers has been kept at Harvard since its founding in 1636.”
…and H.H. Richardson
The second sketch of Harvard Law School’s Austin Hall by its architect H.H. Richardson (“Harvard, H.H.R., Houghton,” November-December 2024, page 52) is not as stated in the article a view of “the built scheme.” Richardson made a number of changes afterward, the most immediately obvious of which is the movement of the “turret” from the left to the right of the front of the elevation. I’m not an architect, but I have long admired the building as a gem counteracting the neighboring ponderous and pompous Langell Hall. (I think H.H.R. should have just excised the turret, which would have made it a more handsome building.) Austin Hall’s Romanesque arches and steps have deservedly been chosen as the backdrop to generations of student and faculty group photos.
Ira Finkelstein, J.D. ’72
Portola Valley, Calif.
Thoughts on Academic Agendas
Responding to a suggestion in the editorial “An Academic Agenda” (November-December 2024, page 4), I would like to briefly compare the anti-Vietnam War and anti-Gaza War protests on campus. I was a participant in both.
In the 1960s, we hit the streets—and broke some windows—fighting for the lives of all the young men we loved. These protests were massive because so many were threatened by the draft. Today’s protests include Palestinians whose loved ones are living in terrible conditions or have already been killed by bombs, disease, or starvation; Jews who are horrified at what Israel is doing in our name; and other community members who have become increasingly aware of the lopsided cage fight that is the Middle East.
The current protesters at Harvard have been remarkably well-behaved. (See my report on last spring’s encampment at www.alicet4.com.) The camp was strictly self-policed, as were previous Occupy and Living Wage tent cities, and did not litter or vandalize. Campers were quiet, except for an hour a day of noise timed for the least possible disruption of classes and study. They were non-confrontational, even when a small but aggressive group of pro-Israel demonstrators marched into their midst. Sympathizers might have transgressed but the actual campers were determinedly polite. They decamped peacefully before Commencement. They were punished anyway.
My question for the University is simple. What kind of protest is acceptable on campus? Evidently not silent protests in libraries, or prayer protests in the Divinity School. Certainly not encampments or building occupations, although Harvard has endured them many times before. Possibly we can chalk on sidewalks, like kindergartners. During a massacre, does the University believe students should only be allowed to decry it in letters to the editor?
Jane Sass Collins ’71
Medford, Mass.
The editorial brought up this old-timer’s idea:
A long time ago the Federal Communications Commission had a “fairness doctrine.” As applied to political speech (advertising, really) on TV networks, it required equal time for opposing views, a concept arguably wedded to the “two-party system,” but perhaps the last vestige of regulation of political speech limiting the dominance of the wealthiest. Perhaps during the Reagan administration, the doctrine was abolished—perhaps as unenforceable, or perhaps as it burdened broadcasters’ profits. Of course, since that time the Supreme Court has in many ways reinforced the economic dominance of political speech, leaving “democracy” visibly skewed. (Commercial speech, entitled to First Amendment protections, therefore morphed into “Money is speech,” a Libertarian notion fundamentally at odds with government by the people.)
Rather than block “offensive” speech (such as “anti-Zionism is not antisemitism”) to protect the sensitive, a better approach would be to ensure equal time—or equal access to the public—for opposing viewpoints, together with hardly debatable restrictions on “hate speech.” Granted in the Internet age, recreating the “fairness doctrine” is a formidable task, requiring, for example, a distinction between political and nonpolitical speech on social media—something arguably beyond Facebook’s intellectual capacities. Nonetheless, it could shift focus from subjective feelings, which no one can really prevent, to fairness of discourse.
My late Harvard Ph.D. father was among the group of University of Michigan faculty members who invented the “teach-in,” a unique though dated mechanism by which the University embraced free speech rather than attempting to stifle it. This was around the time of the Free Speech Movement in Berkeley, which led one of my Berkeley Law professors to undertake to educate the administration about free speech on campus. I submit that both of these historical trends bear study in the effort to resolve freedom of speech issues on all university campuses. The free, and peaceful, exchange of idea is vital to whatever noncommercial purposes universities want to preserve.
Tim Morgan ’71
Benicia, Calif.
Academic Freedom
I have to say that Edwin Chemerinsky’s aphorism—that “either there is complete protection for the expression of all ideas and views, or there is an orthodoxy of belief”— rings far truer to me than Robert Post’s notion that only the expression of “correct” ideas need be protected in the academy (“Academic Freedom and Free Speech,” by Lincoln Caplan, September-October 2024, page 32). I think Post’s approach is a real slippery slope, one that inevitably requires a gatekeeper as Chemerinsky suggests and invites frustration, suspicion, and hostility toward the gatekeeper on the part of all those whose ideas aren’t allowed through the gate.
John Butler, J.D. ’79
Jupiter, Fla.
“American Jewish Life After October 7” (published online October 8, 2024) about professors Derek Penslar and Noah Feldman demonstrates the incredible power of Israel’s narrative over the Palestinian narrative. Penslar and Feldman purport to represent “mainstream American Jews,” implying they own the dominant and respected position on this topic. They promote what they call “education and discussion” versus what they call “acts of force” and “antisemitism” by “pro-Palestinian protests,” as well as books like Ta-Nehisi Coates’s The Message. This argument is not education nor discussion. No facts are disputed nor presented. It’s a stunted one-sided proposition. Where are the many other Jewish scholars within our academic communities in this discussion like Noam Chomsky, Avi Shlaim, Ilan Pappe, Jason Stanley, and many others? Are they merely fringe Jews? I find these Jewish scholars informative and enlightening. Are they antisemitic? And why not Palestinian or other non-Jewish observers and scholars with developed expertise in the Middle East and regional conflicts? Harvard, with its reputation for academic excellence in many other areas of study, should not be silencing those who disagree with and provide evidence of Israel’s false narrative. Rather, Harvard should bring them forward for true education and discussion. Academic freedom and democratic government in the United States and world is at stake.
David A. Souers, MAUD ’82
Friendship, Me.
Protest on Campus
As a Jewish graduate of Harvard I have closely followed the brutal and unnecessary crackdown on Harvard students protesting Israel’s abundant war crimes in Gaza, the West Bank, and now Lebanon.
I am therefore baffled that Harvard Magazine celebrates the life of Thomas Wentworth Higginson (Vita, November-December 2024, page 36)—a militant abolitionist who supported John Brown—who preached “that some parishioners were complicit in evil as bankers for slave plantations and owners of slaving ships” (divestment!), “helped form the Boston-based Vigilance Committee to defy the Fugitive Slave Act” (lawbreaker!), and plotted in 1859 to free John Brown (a terrorist!).
I guess we will have to wait a century or two before Harvard celebrates the brave students who once fought for justice for Palestinians and against the war crimes perpetrated with their tax dollars. Or, maybe, Harvard only celebrates those who hold everyone except Harvard to account.
Dr. Howard Jeffrey Gale, Ph.D. ’93
Seattle
Healthcare Costs
The article reporting leading thinking on the future of medicine (“How to Reform Healthcare,” published online October 2, 2024) left out the single biggest issue, the cost of modern medicine. Inflation in medical care costs in this country is one of the major sources of inflation in labor costs, which then go to almost every other type of inflation (except, perhaps, fossil fuel, the perfect example of supply and demand). Continuously increasing medical care costs (and complexity w.r.t. access) is also one of the greatest sources of discrimination in this country. There are small-scale efforts to control one or another aspect of drug costs, but those are largely overshadowed by the massive charges for new therapies. There appear to be no significant efforts to actually control costs at a systemic level, delivering care for fewer dollars per patient. Private healthcare “insurers” simply pass on increased costs to their customers, primarily employers, and Medicare/Medicaid have only minor power to influence things.
Tracy Mallory ’74
Danvers, Mass.
Editor’s note: “The World’s Costliest Health Care,” by Eckstein professor of applied economics David Cutler (May-June 2020, page 44), is pertinent.
Ivy League Sports
Reflecting on “The End of the Ivy League?” (by Max J. Krupnick, November-December 2024, page 32): I arrived at the Yard, among other things, as a multiple High School All American swimmer. One of the reasons I chose Harvard was that I was told that I wasn’t receiving an NCAA swimming scholarship, but one of the Harvard College Scholarships, so grades were my concern, not swimming. (I was told I didn’t even need to swim if I didn’t want to, and the idea of being a “gentleman amateur swimmer” was appealing.) Central to my decision was the tenuous nature of NCAA scholarships at the time—a coach’s opinion or an athlete’s injury could mean the end of a swimming college career, and with that, scholarship money.
Perhaps a meditation on the Corinthian movement in sport would be useful now at Harvard, as a leader among educational institutions? It’s happened before—in the late nineteenth century for example. And Harvard has the financial muscle to pull off high level Corinthian athletics. (Look at the old natatorium pool, for example, as an ancient antecedent.) Can the Ivy League continue to be a place where student-athletes test themselves against the best? Of course. But remember the immortal words of Hunter Thompson—something to the effect that “when the going gets tough, the weird turn pro.” There is a delicious rush when an amateur bests a professional. It’s a matter of perspective, and think, Harvard could be at the vanguard of a glorious reboot of Corinthianism in sport! The end of the article asks, “Can Harvard get the next Okpara to stay?” The next question might be “Would Harvard keep the next Okpara if he were injured?” Maybe? If he were worth $200,000 per year and not playing? Who gets booted out of Harvard these days?
Paul Scott ’74
Friday Harbor, Wash.
Gilbert and Sullivan
I was sad to hear of the waning interest in Gilbert & Sullivan at Harvard, where it had a long, jolly history. From 1952 (or possibly earlier) to 1956, there was the Gilbert and Sullivan Players at Winthrop House, where I produced its last The Mikado. The Harvard-Radcliffe Gilbert and Sullivan players then took over; and 30 years later, my son, Nicholas Ivor Martin ’88, was its president.
Robert G. Martin ’56, M.D. ’60
Washington, D.C.
Climate and Trees
In the September-October 2024 Harvard Magazine edition, the juxtaposition between Erin O’Donnell’s “Climate Change’s Crippling Costs” (page 9) and Jonathan Shaw’s “Cultivating Friendships with Trees” (page 44) is ironic. The answer to the former’s climate adaptation is the latter’s climate mitigation. Trees and other nature-based climate solutions are part of the solution. We should continue to focus on fighting climate change before the war is lost and we do indeed need to assess global adaptation to the consequences.
Steve Y. Kim, A.L.M. ’21
Asia-Pacific Regional Counsel
Conservation International Foundation
Singapore
On Obituaries
It was saddening to see balance and objectivity, long under threat throughout most of the realm of journalism, against the ropes in an obituary.
The brief entry on journalist Lou Dobbs ’67 (middle name apparently Carl, not Earl) fell short. He was a fair-minded seeker of truth, a quality lacking in parts of the obit. The almost meaningless, one-dimensional pejorative “far right,” rarely if ever balanced with like use for the far left, is today often applied to nearly anyone to the right of Mao Zedong. Equally abused to vacuity in our day is that word “racist,” an epithet a leftist once just as slanderously turned on me immediately upon learning I was merely no longer a Democrat.
As history (my field of study), like science, is not a static realm but an evolving, dynamic one, I consider it overreach to dogmatically declare all alternative opinions “false” or “debunked,” or we might still be living today under an authoritatively adjudicated flat earthism.
A greater fairness would have styled divergent views here a belief or claim, and not thinly hinted support for President Trump itself a misstep. The prejudicial term “conspiracy theories,” notoriously invented by the CIA in 1963, implies the axiomatic fallacy of any non-mainstream view not toeing the Infallible Party Line, and being named in a defamation suit happens; even rulings may mean little, or every court outcome in history would be inerrant and unappealable.
Harvard and academia’s current uncomplimentary reputations as free-speech-unfriendly may linger until people more widely recognize the spread of narrow certitude, wokeist intolerance, Soviet unfreedom, political double standards, pseudo-liberal cancel culture, and dare I say “left-wing” neo-McCarthyism in even their more attenuated instances.
I don’t argue de mortuis nil nisi bonum, but at least nisi iustum. Please aim slightly higher.
Chris Rodgers ’88
Livingston, Mont.
Errata
“Maps of the World” (Montage, November-December 2024, page 44), Flinders Island, Tasmania, was misspelled, as Sheldon B. Kovitz ’65 astutely notes. And Storehouse of Treasures was incorrectly rendered as Storehouses in Off the Shelf (page 48). We regret our mistakes.
