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Can I cite an economics professor whose name I've forgotten?

He discussed how rent controls prevent both raising prices and selling the controlled property, so the owners can't make money from the property in any way.

Thus, many of these buildings stand abandoned and unsafe for decades.




Here's one quote: http://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/2009/02/news-flash-economists... 93% of economists agree that: "A ceiling on rents reduces the quantity and quality of housing available."


"He discussed how rent controls prevent both raising prices and selling the controlled property, so the owners can't make money from the property in any way."

That's basically the position of every economics instructor I've ever had - at least in 1xx and 2xx economics. I didn't go any further in economics, but I have been told that the basic jist of 3xx and 4xx economics is to demonstrate how everything we learned in 1xx and 2xx models is pretty much demonstrably incorrect in the real world, and why.


I have a relative who owns a townhouse in Brooklyn. When they bought their place, they got a substantial discount because it came with a couple of un-evictable tenants who were paying under $100/mo in an area that would have bore $1500/mo otherwise for those apartments. They literally spent more on utilities for that apartment than they received in rent.

In looking for apartments in NYC, I ran across at least one other that was rent controlled and was absurdly cheap, and the person living there was subletting from the person to whom the rent controlled place was passed down to for more than he was paying, but still less than market rent.

I don't think it's a defensible system, at all, and I'm normally relatively in favor of welfare programs. This one is just completely broken.




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