Unfettered supply and demand. I did not claim the results are always pretty, hence the quotation marks I used around “ideal”. I’m not a full-on Libertarian, but I can see the damage overcontrol has done too with the belief “the economy is a social structure that we can legislate and structure”.
At Strongtowns.org they frequently talks about the damage to smaller town structure done simply by not allowing mixed use buildings, no apartments above retail. It sounded good at the time, but has played a part in the demise of vibrant town centers.
It’s not the carbon foot print of the horse you need to worry about it’s where to put your own feet. Someone calculated that the advent of motor transport saved New York from being buried in horse manure.
Most of us here agree that there has to be a balanced approach whether or not there’s a lot of land left to build on. Short-sighted greedhead developers who conveniently think that all regulation is eeevil and short-sighted NIMBYs who overuse and abuse regulation are both impediments to have the kind of cities we want to see, not the regulations themselves that legislate and structure the local urban housing market and that can be changed.
If we elect true progressives who care about the urban environment we can have rent regulation and smart zoning and affordable housing stock and better transit and cities that plan for the future. If we keep electing officials who always place money before people we’ll keep getting Houstons and San Franciscos.
Also, a lot of methane entered the atmosphere with all that horseflop. Probably not as bad as cattle on the McDonalds ranches today, but it didn’t help.
Rent regulation is a sign of failing at those other things. We should no more ask only rental property owners to supply housing for the less fortunate than we should ask only doctors to pay for the healthcare of the indigent.
I’m puting it in there because I don’t think the other things will completely eliminate the greed of certain types of short-sighted landlords (I say this as someone who’s owned a rental property myself). The failing is baked in to a certain degree and should be addressed.
General and reasonable limitations on annual rent increases and the like are not the same as demanding that landlords “supply housing for the less fortunate” (that task usually falls to the public housing authority anyhow). Rent regulation does tend to benefit the working poor and middle-class people living in a city along with the affluent people whose urban experience is made better by the services they provide.
Well, I think there is lots to unpack when someone says “natural” economy. There is no “natural” about it. It’s all social relations, which means they can be shaped and reshaped in ways that benefit the most people.
I think you’re examples are spot on in showing that there is nothing natural about supply and demand, but it’s created by human needs, human expectations, and how those play out in our political system.
There are other elements besides human needs that influence supply and demand and the desirability of living in cities. Land is indeed scarce in a place like the city of San Francisco or Manhattan, and not every square foot of and public park and square should be given over to housing stock. That doesn’t mean that smart zoning can’t mitigate the situation, and the NIMBYs of San Francisco are an impediment in that regard. However, a policy of “allow developers to build higher than before” has in Manhattan recently led to monstrous eyesore condo buildings catering only to the ultra-wealthy.
To a large extent rent regulation created the housing crisis in NYC. Implemented during WW2 as an emergency measure, the emergency never ended. If any new building with greater than 4 units was to be rent regulated, then no one was going to build and satisfy the demand. This went on for decades.
Pointing to Manhattan as the prime example is not useful, it’s an outlier in almost every way that is less and less relevant to what is happening throughout the metro area. There’s tons of developable land out there in low rise and virtually suburban parts of the boroughs.
Rent control creates a cage match between landlords and tenants that doesn’t exist in a healthy market. Only a scumbag with an eviction plan will buy a building with absurdly low rents. I have market rate apartments I rent in small 100+ year old rowhouses, I value my tenants and they value me and what I provide. No conflicts, no victims.
How did you get that from what I said??? Socialize social support, don’t delegate it to private entities.
I wasn’t discussing Manhattan or even NYC only in the comment to which you were responding. I’ve lived in Manhattan, but I’ve also lived in non-outlier but highly desirable cities where rent regulation worked fine for both landlords and working- and middle-class tenants: the former had full occupancy of their units, the latter could count on the fact that their housing costs roughly paralleled the rate of inflation. The situations where it failed ones involving the kind of scumbag landlords you mention who cut corners on maintenance and let their own properties fall into disrepair; otherwise the “cage match” mentality just wasn’t evident in the public discourse (the debate in those cities were more about the insane costs of buying a home or condo).
You do realize society is made up of private entities? Also, comparing landlords to doctors is hilarious, doctor’s provide a necessary service, landlords just won the class birth lottery and sit on wealth at the expense of everyone else.
Oh no, not a tax on the people who can afford it the easiest! Horrors!
Wow, what world do you live in? Last I knew, housing was a necessary service, much it provided by middle class people like me who invested their hard earned savings in a business like any other. It’s exactly this attitude that support the idea that rent controls are a tax on the rich and therefore perfectly OK.
