A lot of the stricter codes have very real safety benefits though - modern electrical is much safer, fire sprinklers add significant cost but really do help contain fires, etc.

(Not that it's all good, e.g. I don't like Washington's WAC 51-11R which just seems way overcomplicated.)

> The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal their bread.

A bunch of houses in the mountains around me burned down a few years ago. It's one of the most populated "wildland-urban interface" areas of the world, because building more housing inside of the urban areas has been banned for half a century, so the wilderness was sacrifice to housing, as there was less regulation in the mountains.

However, regulations have caught up a bit, and people that lived in houses valued >$1M before burning down, now have to do things like install proper septic systems that cost $50k or $70k, instead of their sewage leaking into the abundant waterways that used to be habitats of salmon and the like.

These people are very aggrieved at their position of being previously house-rich, cash-poor, and apparently underinsured. I'm not sure what the right solution is other than legalizing housing in the urban core again. Which results in even bigger fights.

And then when you end up with actually accessible version of those it is different again. Which I had for a few years as student. No under sink cabinets. Even more massive bathroom. The bathroom was nearly the size of those small bedrooms.