[dragonwriter]

> How does prop 13 cause a housing crisis?

Because it discourages owners of existing residential real estate from upgrading it to higher density to meet new demand, since doing do would trigger full-value assessment and decrease the returns; this means even discounting NIMBYism and zoning issues, market response to demand is slower and involves more rent increase to source the same level of redevelopment as would be the case without Prop 13.

Also, it subsidized people mstsying in their currently-owned single family homes, which makes the unwilling to (and thus demanding a higher premium to) move out of a place in-demand for working people when they retire, even if they are over housed. (This is, in fact, just a slightly different view of the retirees-being-forced-out-by-property-tax image that was used to sell Prop 13.)