I've often wondered the same thing, but for different reasons. Year after year we see stick houses torn asunder from tornadoes and hurricanes, not to mention earthquakes.....and yet, they'll simply rebuild with the same construction materials! Better yet, we continue to sell mobile homes/manufactured homes, that fly apart even easier!!
When I lived in Guam, I saw one of the smartest decisions ever made by a local government, who made the decision over 30 years ago, after (pretty much) the entire island was destroyed twice in 25 years by super-typhoons (category 5 storms, equivalent to cat 5 hurricanes). They decided that wood just wasn't cutting it, and decreed that new construction was preferred to be reinforced concrete construction. Add to that that the insurance companies pretty much decided not to insure wooden structures any more, which leads to banks not willing to lend money for wooden structures........and 30 years later, there's 95+% concrete structures, and very little structural damage during the frequent storms there!
Oh, and for anyone who thinks that concrete means clunky looking block houses, I beg to differ. Anything you can do with wood, can also be done with reinforced concrete. I've seen some beautiful structures out there. So why do we continue to build in areas that have natural disasters, using construction materials that won't stand up to them??
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