Zesht asks one question
Not what was promised. Not what the press release says.
What do homeowners, landlords, students, teachers, investors and shoppers actually do once the incentives change? Zesht follows the incentive, follows the money and follows the result.
Give every buyer $100,000 when there are still only ten houses, and the check goes to the buyer while the money goes to the seller. How much depends on one thing: supply.
Who ultimately pays? Taxpayers, plus unsubsidized buyers in the same market who face higher prices.
Latest explainers
From October 1, Los Angeles charges 10.25% sales tax and Irvine charges 7.75%. The legal saving on a luxury purchase may be zero. The shopping still moves.
Under NEM 3.0, an exported kilowatt-hour can earn a fraction of a cent at spring noon and over a dollar on an August evening. That's a price telling the truth. Is the rest of the bill?
You can control the premium. You cannot control the risk. When the allowed price doesn't cover the risk, the response isn't cheaper insurance — it's no insurance.
Rent control reliably helps the tenant who already has the apartment. The best evidence shows who pays for that help: the landlord who exits and the renter still searching.
California's fire map shows hazard. Your insurer prices risk. They aren't the same thing — and the difference is where a homeowner's money is made or lost.
The easy version says loans caused expensive college. The evidence says something more specific — and more useful: schools capture aid where buyers stop comparing prices.
People talk about earthquakes like buses. Elapsed time does nudge the odds up — but faults keep no schedule, and your address matters more than the countdown clock.
California already pays schools per student — with a lag for districts and a catch for wealthy ones. We compared LAUSD, Irvine, Beverly Hills, Santa Monica-Malibu and three charter networks.
A Persian grocery, then a kebab restaurant, then six real-estate agents. Behind the joke is one of economics' most powerful forces: network effects.
The Zesht framework
Change the cost or reward attached to an action and people change their behavior.
Someone receives the benefit, someone finances it, and sometimes a producer captures it.
Run the numbers yourself
Los Angeles vs. Orange County: what a lower sales-tax rate saves at the register, what the trip costs, and what California says you still owe.
Open the tool →Give every buyer $100,000 when there are still only ten houses. Where does the money end up?
Open the tool →Before you ask
Government can correct genuine market failures, provide public goods and write the rules markets need. The interesting question is what happens after the rule is written.