In fact, depending on where you live, water appliance efficiency has reduced sewer flows to the point where systems stop functioning, since a lot of systems are designed around a minimum amount of flow to make things move.

Most water consumption these days comes from the state's agriculture, which bringing more residents in would not really impact since denser housing would not really go in areas that are rural.

As with living in a crowded bug-hive apartment building instead of a house, reducing water consumption by making showers, toilets, washing machines, dishwashers, and other appliances function poorly is just masking a real decline in standard of living by clipping coins.

“We’ve reduced water, power, meat, and space consumption by XX%” is not good news. That just means we’re getting poorer. Good news would be “we’ve halved the cost of water, power, meat, and space, so everyone have a good time”.

The contradiction here is that, overwhelmingly, the most effective way to decrease the price of space (in terms of square mile per person of land) is to increase unemployment -- which basically nobody actually wants.

Some Northern California cities are literally out of water.

https://ktla.com/news/california/please-conserve-water-touri...

In the Monterey Peninsula area residential building permits have been restricted for years due to a persistent water shortage. That's been going on since well before the current drought.

Not just per capita but absolute. East Bay MUD total deliveries fell by half in the last 40 years while the population increased by 70%.