so the same things that cause issues in NYC
London is having a hard time because supply is less than demand.
Stockholm, NYC, Paris for the same reason.
It's really one of the largest things that seemingly every developed country is struggling with right now.
I don't personally believe Stockholm is more affected than any other European capital except perhaps Berlin, which somehow seems to stay affordable (likely because of supply).
Not Japan! Tokyo rents are surprisingly cheap relative to other major cities.
In Tokyo?
In other words, Japan lacks the regulatory environment (common in all these other countries) that depresses supply.
The only way to avoid it is a very tyrannical East German system where people rat on each other to, we’ll, gain something, maybe that coveted apartment…
It's hard to make sure either of this never ever happens, but it is definitely possible to make sure it's not happening as much as to become a social problem.
If a subletter voluntarily enters into an agreement with a lessee to pay above the rent control amount, who is the victim?
Is it not a victimless crime?
The victim is the person not able to rent on a first-come-first-serve basis instead of someone willing to pay more than is allowed.
That's indeed the only sensible thing I can think of. But it's a very odd thing to me (that a mutual, consensual agreement between two people is governed by the interests of third parties).
And also because "consensual agreements" rarely are. Typically one party has more power than the other and can force terms.
By definition, you only get truly consensual agreements when the balance of power is equal - which it very much isn't in rental markets with deliberately restricted stock.
For the group of aspiring startup founders HN community has a very high percentage of Marxists in it :)
https://www.quora.com/What-is-your-worst-landlord-story
Of course some tenants are terrible too, but those stories seem to be rarer.
Even if the "agreement" was "voluntary" for the parties who entered it, it can still affect third parties.
Would you be less hurt when there is nothing available?
All rent control does is favor "first-come-first-serve" instead of "who pays the most".
Perhaps there's a lesson to be learned from that.
More generally. Non reproducible assets/aka monopolies can extort more money out of people now that people have more money thanks to low interest rates. Notice how being rich doesn't make you rich because of abuse of monopoly power to do perfect price discrimination.
This has got to be satire, right?
There are a thousand things to do with a property and the government decides, hey guys, stop that 1 thing out of thousands. Then people will do all the thousand other things. The government then acts surprised that its incomplete policy has failed.
You can also just tax the land.
It's more akin to the council housing crisis in the UK.