William Baumol's insights into the construction productivity puzzle explain why my old house would not be built the same way today

Have we forgotten how to build houses efficiently? Or are important economic ideas missing from the construction productivity debate?

The above photo is of my house in Brisbane. It was built in the early 1880s.

The original portion of the home is 46 square meters (460 square feet) internally, with a small front and rear verandah. It sat on twenty timber posts dug into the earth and secured by ramming in the dirt around them. It had four doors (two external, two internal) and eight wind…