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A few years old now, but still worth checking out:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_High_Cost_of_Free_Parking

Grabar's book that I linked below is probably more accessible to most people, but Shoup is of course the OG.

And in many places makes more than minimum wage.

If you have the money for it.

https://easypark.rs/news/cheapest-countries-to-park-in/

In the US, people bend over backwards to ensure that there is free storage for automobiles. And that housing and businesses are forced to include that expensive (parking spots can run into the 10's of thousands of dollars for some kinds of construction) amenity. Fortunately that's starting to change, but it is a big battle. And meanwhile, CO2 levels keep rising.

( This book goes into detail but is quite readable: https://www.henrygrabar.com/paved-paradise )

More specifically, free for the person parking.

All the rest of society pays massive amounts in construction costs:

> adding tens of thousands of dollars per housing unit and, in some cases, increasing total construction costs by more than 50%.

This is from a recent update to Donald Shoup's estimates from the classic "The high cost of free parking": https://escholarship.org/uc/item/9f88x32n