Even with the rents decreasing, they are still way to high for most people and adjusted for inflation, far higher than they were 30 years ago. The reason for t

Even with the rents decreasing, they are still way to high for most people and adjusted for inflation, far higher than they were 30 years ago. The reason for the high rents are structural -- the use of politics to create artificial shortages in housing by use of zoning density restrictions. This is the deliberate creation of market failures due to "rent seeking" -- use of politics to create artificial scarcity to benefit a special interest group. The artificial scarcity inflates the value of property to landlords such as Donald Trump harming renters. An example, regarding taxi cabs: NYC had a law creating a limit on taxi cabs to 13,000 medallions --needed in order to drive a yellow, hail-able cab. The market value of the taxi medallion was $1.2 million which meant that for drivers who typically lease cabs, a substantial part of their income went towards leasing the cab with medallion. Thus, taxi riders (renters of use of cabs for trips) were paying far more than they should and taxi medallion owners (landlords) were receiving a huge windfall. Then Uber/Lyft came to NYC and the political artificial scarcity of (electronic) hail-able cabs was relieved. The result is that the medallion price went from $1.2 million to < $700,000 and far more drivers were no longer paying high leases to medallion owners and driving for Uber/Lyft instead. Our prices for taking hail-able cabs have decreased and continue to decrease. Everyone gains except the medallion "landlords." This rent-seeking market inefficiency tremendously damages the economy. Fewer housing units are built than they should be in an efficient market. Tenants are paying a far greater proportion of their income for rent instead of goods and services. Simply fixing this law that benefits wealthy landlords can be a substantial stimulus to the economy. Another cause of high rents is the number of illegal immigrants that are allowed to stay in certain cities. This NYTimes article claims there are about 600,000 "undocumented" immigrants in NYC (of a population of 8.5 million)[1]. Almost all undocumented immigrants are in the country illegally and hence the more correct word is illegal. These 600,000 illegal immigrants adds substantial market pressure that otherwise would not be there if the law were enforced and hence the rents are far higher for low-income New Yorker American citizens than they otherwise would be. [1]. "Some 574,000 city residents are undocumented,..." http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/23/nyregion/economic-tsunami-fearing-donald-trump-immigrants-in-new-york-spend-less.html http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/23/nyregion/economic-tsunami-...