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Notes -
Americans don't like to live in anthills where public transit can theoretically be efficient. That's not a failing of Americans.
"Americans" are not a homogenous group with uniform preferences about urban living - some like it, others don't. A lot more Americans want to live in places that resemble European or first-world Asian cities than are currently able to - we know this because such places (or even simulacra of them like New Urbanist suburbs) carry a price premium.
Americans living in suburbia is not a revealed preference because urbanism is mostly illegal - both in the sense that it is literally illegal to build at density in most of the US, and also in the sense that the system will not allow you to do the things you need to police somewhere built at urban densities - and I think we all agree that crime is a good and sufficient reason why nobody with options will live in the typical American inner city. If you ask Americans on this board why they don't like cities, most (not all - people who genuinely prefer more rural-like lifestyles exist) of the responses are about crime.
Empirically, where the system is able to put up low-diversity low-crime urbanism the way America puts up Pulte Homes tackyboxes with two-car garages (parts of Spain, South Korea, Japan), everywhere else depopulates. Even high-diversity medium-crime urbanism (NYC, London, Paris) is a build-it-and-they-will-come phenomenon.
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No, Americans do like to live in cities like all settled peoples. Americans invented the skyscraper!
Until recently the US had dense and highly developed urban centres. Americans failing to defend and preserve their city centres is a serious failure.
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