Postwar prosperity has enabled Western Europe to catch up with the U.S. standard of living in such basic human needs as food and clothing. When it comes to housing, though, most of the Continent still lags decades behind. New
European housing often looks elegant from the outside, but much of it is backward in kitchen equipment, bathroom layout, floor plans, heating, plumbing and lighting—the innards that make the shell truly livable.
The gap yawns nowhere wider than in France, where 51 years of rent control have helped create a gargantuan housing shortage. Thus it...