Yeah. It has but stuff like this plays well in the echo chamber. Like most attempts at price controls it has a lot of unintended consequences such as fewer apartments built and rented out, landlords charging obscene amounts to a new renter knowing they cannot raise the prices as needed later on, landlords raising prices whether they need to or not because they can’t hike them quickly when needed, worse maintenance.
No one is proposing rent control in a vaccum. Arguing against that idea is disingenuous and is how you end up with the status quo of “rent control is actually bad for renters” that gets parroted in economics circles. State intervention is necessary for markets to exist in the first place and they have overwhelming power in shaping them.
Building large scale affordable public housing, incentive structures that promote the building of affordable high density private housing, banning corporate ownership of single family homes and short term rentals like AirBnB, limiting corporate ownership within apartment complexes, reworking zoning laws to better suit current needs, more robust mechanisms for tenant disputes and transparency for historical rental prices to prevent abuse.
All of that is possible if the political will was there.
Okay then let’s just drop an anchor into the market. Have the federal government commit to buying and managing 50,000 units in every major city. They’re available on the open market at cost plus 100 dollars a month. The 100 dollars goes into a fund and the city with the highest rents gets more federally owned apartments.
We just keep dropping anchors until developers provide reasonable housing at reasonable prices or housing is no longer a private market.
Government has a really big damn stick. If people’s needs don’t start getting met then those developers are going to feel it, right in their profits.
Yeah. It has but stuff like this plays well in the echo chamber. Like most attempts at price controls it has a lot of unintended consequences such as fewer apartments built and rented out, landlords charging obscene amounts to a new renter knowing they cannot raise the prices as needed later on, landlords raising prices whether they need to or not because they can’t hike them quickly when needed, worse maintenance.
No one is proposing rent control in a vaccum. Arguing against that idea is disingenuous and is how you end up with the status quo of “rent control is actually bad for renters” that gets parroted in economics circles. State intervention is necessary for markets to exist in the first place and they have overwhelming power in shaping them.
Building large scale affordable public housing, incentive structures that promote the building of affordable high density private housing, banning corporate ownership of single family homes and short term rentals like AirBnB, limiting corporate ownership within apartment complexes, reworking zoning laws to better suit current needs, more robust mechanisms for tenant disputes and transparency for historical rental prices to prevent abuse.
All of that is possible if the political will was there.
Okay then let’s just drop an anchor into the market. Have the federal government commit to buying and managing 50,000 units in every major city. They’re available on the open market at cost plus 100 dollars a month. The 100 dollars goes into a fund and the city with the highest rents gets more federally owned apartments.
We just keep dropping anchors until developers provide reasonable housing at reasonable prices or housing is no longer a private market.
Government has a really big damn stick. If people’s needs don’t start getting met then those developers are going to feel it, right in their profits.