More houses? Not in MY back yard! Building more houses will depress housing prices. Home owners tend to value their equity more than ensuring housing is affordable for others.
I own a house in Silicon Valley and I would love for them to build more housing. Keep building until housing is affordable again. Many homeowners here feel the same way.
Sure. It's never about the individual. Individually, there are plenty of great homeowners who would hurt themselves financially to help out their fellow man. Unfortunately, as is shown by reality, there aren't enough of them in aggregate to overcome the NIMBY class. Otherwise there would be action taken instead of just maintaining the status quo.