calling this "scientific denialism" seems like a huge stretch to me. It's not a science, it's housing policy.
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.
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).
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.
> 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!
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.
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.
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.
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.
> I advocate a combination of strong rent control, aggressively subsidized housing and consistent growth (especially vertically) where possible.
That assumes rational actors in local government, which strikes me as even more fanciful.
However, human needs have an expiration date and often cannot wait for the market to make sense.
| That assumes rational actors in local government
No it doesn't, if you can build enough power you can force local governments to enact these kinds of reforms.
All politicians can be pressured if you know where to push.
On the other hand, you could bet on "rational activity" from landlords and developers—aka greedy self-interest.
So, sure, you might get a conscientious grassroots group to apply political pressure for rent control when it's not in their own self-interest. But you can 100% count on developers and landlords to be greedy, and I'd much rather channel that group into the outcome I want while I wait and hope for the former.
Again, are you talking about SFBA? Because I thought we addressed that.
This is a very SFBA thing to say.
| Look who overwhelmingly applies pressure
Yeah, I'm not talking about those people.
Poor and working people have mobilized plenty of times before. That's been constant throughout modern history and only in the past few decades have we had an ahistorical low period of organizing activity. I expect that lull to end in the coming years. In many ways it already has.
I'm not sure how it's a very SFBA thing to point out that the people who have a voice in local politics are the people who haven't been displaced?
> Poor and working people have mobilized plenty of times before
This would require them working in their own rational self-interest too, though -- which (a) there isn't much evidence for, and (b) kinda negates your earlier argument about assuming rational actors.
Displacement far enough that they are outside of the local political jurisdiction is specific to there. In places like Peoria, it's just further economic immiseration within Peoria. Most of America is not being gentrified, rents are just rising. There's a difference.
| (a) there isn't much evidence for
There is plenty of evidence for that. You might just have a recency bias.
| negates your earlier argument about assuming rational actors
I don't put people mobilizing into the ideological framework of "the market". I don't put much faith into the ideological framework of markets generally. I find it only slightly more useful of a tool of understanding social forces than, say, astrology.
Importantly, I'm not talking about what will happen by virtue of some outside force or guarantee of history. I'm talking about we need to make happen by force of will.
Peoria has a 50%+ homeownership rate. Most of the people voting locally are not facing rising rents, let alone rents at all.
> There is plenty of evidence for that. You might just have a recency bias.
> I don't put people mobilizing into the ideological framework of "the market".
Ah, I see, you don’t actually care about whether people act in their own self-interest, you just don’t like capital-E Economics and are using this as an excuse to throw out all of our understanding that people respond to incentives.
“The market” is not the only ideological framework that assumes rational actors. Do you have an alternate model of non-rational humans that you are assuming when you’re talking about making things happen by “people mobilizing”? Are they somehow not considering their own self-interest?
> Importantly, I'm not talking about what will happen by virtue of some outside force or guarantee of history
Of course. But those who ignore history are condemned to repeat it.
Ha! Right back atcha, kid.
Rent control is a good tool for keeping existing tenants in their homes. That has a lot of value in itself but it must to be coupled with the construction of good quality, affordable public housing at or below the average rent controlled property in order to maintain the desired goals of keeping rents/property prices down for new entrants and increasing mobility.
The only issue with rent control is that it's applied as a band aid without also addressing the root causes.
However, I have seen some comments and articles that talk about how building more housing in the bay area will drive up demand, somehow ignoring that there is an overabundance of commercial real estate that is driving the demand in the first place. It also ignores housing pressure, namely the concept that people increasingly live with room mates or adult children keep living with their parents. These people are already in the city and are looking for an opportunity to move out. How is giving them a place to live a net loss? If anything parents might move to a smaller residence and thus free up supply for larger families that truly need a single house.
I don't know why people believe that the laws of supply and demand don't apply to the housing market. Maybe they are misapplying the idea of induced demand which is really poorly named or at least the name is not directly putting the spotlight on what is actually happening. It's basically the phenomenon that as you increase roads people will switch to their preferred mode of transport even if it is grossly inefficient. Cars carry fewer people than buses or subways so it basically has a neutral impact on traffic. The problem with applying this to the housing market is that developers actually control their plot of land. A street will just let any vehicle drive on it. A developer will instead focus on building the most efficient housing possible because he wants to optimize his bottom line. So no, he wouldn't buy a plot with a house for 2 million only to rent it out, he would try to upzone the plot and build a duplex or triplex since this will result in greater profits. The street on the other hand is fully subsidized for the people driving on it, so they end up using it wastefully.