IANAL (I am not a Legislator), but it seems to me that the primary concern from the city/state side of things is that housing is in short supply in NYC for NYC

IANAL (I am not a Legislator), but it seems to me that the primary concern from the city/state side of things is that housing is in short supply in NYC for NYC residents. AirBNB "pros" buy up yearly leases for $x and then sublease them out nightly for a monthly net of a multiple of $x. In other words, it's an arbitrage - they're taking the long-term risk of a yearly lease and gaining the short term reward of nightly rentals by tourists, for which there is strong demand, and which results in fewer hotel bookings and fewer apartments available for local residents. And, fairly enough, it also puts that arbitrage profit into the hands of the apartment renter, not the landlord, who took the risk of putting the building up (or managing it) in the first place. So hotels lose, landlords lose, NYC housing consumers lose, and tourists gain and AirBNB hosts gain. Fine. SO: Rather than making it outright illegal, why not balance out some of the incentives in the name of efficiency? Hosts SHOULD be able to rent out their place when they don't live there (improved efficiency) or rent out a spare room in a multi-room apartment (also improved efficiency), but maybe limit the amount that can be charged to a proportion of rent they themselves pay? If it stops becoming a profit center then you remove the big incentive that "pros" are going for -- sopping up available units and using them solely for tourists. If my lease for an apartment is $3000/month, the max I'd be allowed to charge is $100/night. It would change the dynamics quite a bit -- now there's zero incentive for a "pro" or landlord to go rent dozens of otherwise available apartmens to use for tourists. In fact, the landlord would go right back to preferring long-term lessors. Rather get an easy, single check per month than dozens of small and unguaranteed checks. It would remove the profit incentive of regular hosts but still allow the rent-offset incentive. However, it would make WORSE the imbalance between AirBNB and hotels, and demand for airbnb would increase (and supply would decrease because of fewer hosts). That said, it's not a bad thing. It would be real competition for hotels, and rightfully so -- that's AirBNB's job and the disruption they're causing. And more competition and lower prices for everyone is a Good Thing. I'm sure I'm missing some untended consequences here, but perhaps it's a start...