On California's New Rent Control Law
Attempts to control the economy are paternalistic and are only warranted when the "child" (free market's purported ability to balance itself out if left alone) has mis-behaved. But leaving things be (or rather, creating incentives for building and hope the dominoes fall accordingly) can just as easily create its own set of unintended consequences. These are band-aids on a broken system that sees housing as a commodity when in many respects, it is not. Or should not be. If you don't feel this way, and have faith in the system, then these criticisms of rent control are welcome. If not, then they appear sort of self-serving and miss the urgency of the band-aid. If, as the economists say, rent control does negatively influence incentives to build more (affordable) housing, then that too needs to be proactively addressed. Probably with government money. And that means taxes and expanding government. And we are back to the crux that defines our way forward eco