In his 2011 work Economic Facts and Fallacies , the economist Thomas Sowell writes of an essential condition for property rights, that "existing residents and potential newcomers [must be permitted to] compete for the same space on an equal basis in the marketplace, rather than in a political process in which only the existing residents can vote." Sowell continues: "While the existing residents may choose to believe that they have a right to 'protect' their community against outsiders by using the power of government, the Constitution of the United States requires 'equal protection of the laws' to everyone, regardless of where they happen to live or how long they have lived there." Finally, Sowell asserts that "what existing residents choose to call 'our community' is in fact not their community... [e]ach resident [owning only] the private property which that particular resident has paid for." As may seem uncharacteristic of this