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| to lower the price of housing in the interests of the general public. Its purpose is to prevent displacement, especially of the poor and elderly for whom dis

| to lower the price of housing in the interests of the general public. Its purpose is to prevent displacement, especially of the poor and elderly for whom displacement is a major negative. For that purpose, it has done very well as a policy.

zamfi 6y ago
> For that purpose, it has done very well as a policy. Well...for those who are not actually displaced, yes. But the ones that are displaced are often essentially banished by a dysfunctional housing market. Rent control is not targeted towards the poor and elderly, and there are many others who benefit in the short-term (but then, again, are unable to move because the market rate has skyrocketed, though of course not just because of rent control).
- heterodoxxed 6y ago
  | for those who are not actually displaced, yes. Yes, exactly. | But the ones that are displaced are often essentially banished Without it they would have been displaced even earlier. Speculative bubbles exist outside of rent control, especially in the US where rent control is never all that strong or comprehensive.
  - zamfi 6y ago
    I take a very SFBA perspective here, but... > Without it they would have been displaced even earlier This is mostly hypothetical. In functioning housing markets that don't manipulate prices or limit new construction through policy, speculative bubbles make little sense -- why would housing become more expensive if it's easy to build lots of it? The argument that removing just rent control would make folks worse off -- that I'm sympathetic to, of course. Obviously you also need to build. But rent control as practiced in most of the Bay Area causes lots of grief despite only helping a relative few of the desired beneficiaries. That is, unless you define beneficiaries much more widely than you do -- to basically make it a benefit to seniority. Rent control, like Prop 13 and construction restrictions, work to allocate scarce resources based on seniority rather than wealth or ability/willingness to pay. The argument that it allocates based on need (i.e., poverty, inability to move house) is weak; that's a mild side effect, and policies that just straight up subsidize housing (i.e., vouchers, etc.) for those in need could be much better targeted, and could be funded in a way that doesn't also incentivize poor maintenance, harassment, and eviction. Is allocating based on seniority better than wealth? For current residents--at least, until they're Ellis'd--sure. For their kids, who lack seniority? Almost never. Everyone needs a place to live. Right now, more people want to live here than we're allowing to (through construction limitations). So, sure, we could argue about how to allocate -- or we could just end the damn scarcity!
    - heterodoxxed 6y ago
      | I take a very SFBA perspective here I don't know how useful an SFBA perspective is, given that area is dealing with factors that very, very few other places in America are: Namely, an historic single industry boom and a lack of expansion area. The only real comparable place in America is Manhattan.
      - zamfi 6y ago
        Yeah, you're right that there are a number of SFBA-specific factors that don't apply elsewhere. But people aren't really making the rent control argument about Peoria, IL. Any place that caps both rents and housing supply through policy amid increasing demand (like Berlin, the titular locale), is going to have a ton of politics around rent control, density caps, etc., because they are choosing to allocate scarce resources by policy instead of market -- and the way to affect policy is politics.
        heterodoxxed 6y ago
        | people aren't really making the rent control argument about Peoria, IL. We are more than you think. Rising rents due to speculation or just plain landlord greed have become an issue country-wide. Even in places like Peoria. Especially in relation to stagnant wages. I advocate a combination of strong rent control, aggressively subsidized housing and consistent growth (especially vertically) where possible.
        zamfi 6y ago
        > Rising rents due to speculation or just plain landlord greed Well, you'd need both, not just one: landlord greed has a cap, average rents can't be much more than the cost of buying, though there will always be some folks who don't qualify for a mortgage for whatever reason. The only reason landlords can be greedy is the leverage they have because supply is constrained -- otherwise, their greed would be thwarted by developers' greed! Speculation and landlord greed only really affect prices in a supply-constrained environment. In markets where housing is a commodity, and can actually be produced, the cost of housing tends towards the cost of land acquisition & construction. Not always smoothly, of course...if demand jumps very suddenly, the construction market needs time to adjust, etc.

zamfi 6y ago

> For that purpose, it has done very well as a policy. Well...for those who are not actually displaced, yes. But the ones that are displaced are often essentially banished by a dysfunctional housing market. Rent control is not targeted towards the poor and elderly, and there are many others who benefit in the short-term (but then, again, are unable to move because the market rate has skyrocketed, though of course not just because of rent control).

heterodoxxed 6y ago
| for those who are not actually displaced, yes. Yes, exactly. | But the ones that are displaced are often essentially banished Without it they would have been displaced even earlier. Speculative bubbles exist outside of rent control, especially in the US where rent control is never all that strong or comprehensive.
- zamfi 6y ago
  I take a very SFBA perspective here, but... > Without it they would have been displaced even earlier This is mostly hypothetical. In functioning housing markets that don't manipulate prices or limit new construction through policy, speculative bubbles make little sense -- why would housing become more expensive if it's easy to build lots of it? The argument that removing just rent control would make folks worse off -- that I'm sympathetic to, of course. Obviously you also need to build. But rent control as practiced in most of the Bay Area causes lots of grief despite only helping a relative few of the desired beneficiaries. That is, unless you define beneficiaries much more widely than you do -- to basically make it a benefit to seniority. Rent control, like Prop 13 and construction restrictions, work to allocate scarce resources based on seniority rather than wealth or ability/willingness to pay. The argument that it allocates based on need (i.e., poverty, inability to move house) is weak; that's a mild side effect, and policies that just straight up subsidize housing (i.e., vouchers, etc.) for those in need could be much better targeted, and could be funded in a way that doesn't also incentivize poor maintenance, harassment, and eviction. Is allocating based on seniority better than wealth? For current residents--at least, until they're Ellis'd--sure. For their kids, who lack seniority? Almost never. Everyone needs a place to live. Right now, more people want to live here than we're allowing to (through construction limitations). So, sure, we could argue about how to allocate -- or we could just end the damn scarcity!
  - heterodoxxed 6y ago
    | I take a very SFBA perspective here I don't know how useful an SFBA perspective is, given that area is dealing with factors that very, very few other places in America are: Namely, an historic single industry boom and a lack of expansion area. The only real comparable place in America is Manhattan.
    - zamfi 6y ago
      Yeah, you're right that there are a number of SFBA-specific factors that don't apply elsewhere. But people aren't really making the rent control argument about Peoria, IL. Any place that caps both rents and housing supply through policy amid increasing demand (like Berlin, the titular locale), is going to have a ton of politics around rent control, density caps, etc., because they are choosing to allocate scarce resources by policy instead of market -- and the way to affect policy is politics.
      - heterodoxxed 6y ago
        | people aren't really making the rent control argument about Peoria, IL. We are more than you think. Rising rents due to speculation or just plain landlord greed have become an issue country-wide. Even in places like Peoria. Especially in relation to stagnant wages. I advocate a combination of strong rent control, aggressively subsidized housing and consistent growth (especially vertically) where possible.
        zamfi 6y ago
        > Rising rents due to speculation or just plain landlord greed Well, you'd need both, not just one: landlord greed has a cap, average rents can't be much more than the cost of buying, though there will always be some folks who don't qualify for a mortgage for whatever reason. The only reason landlords can be greedy is the leverage they have because supply is constrained -- otherwise, their greed would be thwarted by developers' greed! Speculation and landlord greed only really affect prices in a supply-constrained environment. In markets where housing is a commodity, and can actually be produced, the cost of housing tends towards the cost of land acquisition & construction. Not always smoothly, of course...if demand jumps very suddenly, the construction market needs time to adjust, etc.