"I dont understand what the argument of this article is. As someone who has tried to maintain a blue collar job in a large city (im an engine mechanic) Its near

"I dont understand what the argument of this article is. As someone who has tried to maintain a blue collar job in a large city (im an engine mechanic) Its nearly impossible to live anywhere near your job without rent control." Although I am not an economist, I believe that the point of the article (and of the economic consensus from both right-leaning and left-leaning economists) is that the affordability issues you cite are actually worse now than if there had not been rent control. Expanding on that ... rational landlords are going to: "front-load rent hikes, select tenants likely to stay for short periods, or provide poor service during tenancies if underlying market rents are rising rapidly. At worst, tenancy rent controls would increase overall market rents by raising risks to landlords and reducing investment in new stock, particularly if the controls are perceived as a precursor of more-onerous regulation." I think part of the confusion is that, other than the misaligned incentives and general bad behavior of landlords, someone who actually receives a rent-controlled unit is definitely better off than those who do not. If you win that little mini-lottery, you've got a definite gain. However, the overall market for rental housing - and any new entrants to the rental market - are made worse off. If you successfully converted the entire rental market to rent-controlled units, the market would respond: "That's because landlords confronted with the regulation are incentivized to convert properties to other, higher-return uses. Developers, meanwhile, find new rentable accommodations less profitable to build, compounding the scarcity-of-supply problem that often drives high rental prices in the first place."