Page:Lectures on Housing.djvu/21

 very rapid rise in the cost of constructing a house—a rise of 10 or 12 per cent, during the last 10 years. Added to these causes which have discouraged the building of new houses, the increased activity of Sanitary Authorities, under the 1909 Housing and Town planning Act, has resulted in the closing of a large number of houses. All these factors—the panic connected with the Finance Act, the condition of the money market, the rise in the cost of construction, and the great number of houses closed since 1909, have contributed to the present shortage.

But though at the moment this shortage is unusually acute, it is no new thing. There is always a shortage, and it is accentuated in times of trade boom, when money is dear, and when builders, instead of speculating, are putting up factories and shops. It will be worth while to enquire why the supply of houses always tends to fall short of the demand. A house is a commodity which it takes about a century to consume. If there is a shortage of bread, the bakers bake more