Posted on 02/02/2020 7:01:13 AM PST by Kaslin
Presidential candidate Bernie Sanders wants to impose national rent control. He unveiled the policy proposal last September and recently reiterated his support via Twitter.
Sanders proposes a national cap on annual rent increases to 1.5 times the rate of inflation or 3 percent—whichever is higher.
Ironically, the article Sanders tweeted out attributes increasing rent prices, in part, to government control over the private housing market. This irony reinforces what many economists already know to be true: the left’s prescriptions for lowering housing prices are precisely what keeps prices high and supply low.
Rent control would be a flagrant infringement of American property rights and a vast expansion of the federal government's control over the private housing market.
The government should have no role in determining rental costs. All governments are ill-equipped to consider the many visible and invisible factors that determine the market price of a rental property.
What enforcement mechanisms would come down on the American people under a national rent control bureaucracy? If a local landlord, for whatever reason, fails to comply with the new federal standard, what kind of punishment would ensue? Might the IRS garnish his wages? Would he be fined out of business? Put in jail?
None of that passes the smell test is because none of it feels like it's an appropriate use of the federal government's power nor is it even within the scope of power that the government ought to operate in.
Sanders wants to create a new bureaucracy inside HUD which will involvemassive administrative costs. Enforcing rent control requires an elaborate bureaucracy—especially on a national level. To take an example of one city, San Francisco's Rent Arbitration Board can expect to bring in over $5 million in order to enforce rents on 170,000 rent units. The National Multifamily Housing Council explains, “Rental property must be registered; detailed information on the rental property must be collected; elaborate systems for determining rents and hearing complaints and appeals must be established.”
Sanders has proposed a myriad of dangerous, government-expanding policies. National rent control is one that has gotten very little media coverage, despite the dire effects of such a policy.
Rent control hurts the very people it aims to help. The housing market in rent-controlled cities is defined by dissatisfaction, maddening trade-offs, and paycheck-consuming prices.
If rent control on the local level causes increases in rent prices and limits housing supply, it’s not hard to imagine just how severe the effects would be on a national scale, when the federal government tries to impose Manhattan-type rent control policy on Thurmond, W. Va.
Even the socialist Swedish economist Assar Lindbeck said, “In many cases rent control appears to be the most efficient technique presently known to destroy a city – except for bombing.”
Lets create a national housing shortage.
The Democrats need to be called what they are, the anti-freedom party.
Sanders proposes a national cap on annual rent increases to 1.5 times the rate of inflation or 3 percent—whichever is higher.
Actually that sounds pretty good to Landlords. Gives license for an automatic rent increase of 3% every year. And if inflations comes back will be higher.
FDR has risen!
Do they have rent control in Vermont, Bernie? I know there is rent control in New York, the city you ran away from when you finished college so you could move to Vermont, the whitest part of America.
Didn’t work in Canada, won’t work here!
Keep hammering those nails home there burnee! Easy to talk s**t when you have 3 houses and possibly #4 in the offing when the democommie party bones you yet again. Ah yes. A nice dacha on a lake. Oh, he has that already.
The US Constitution does not empower the federal government to regulate rents in the States. Does Sanders think he’ll get a rent-control Amendment?
Screw this old communist fart.
Don’t worry, millions of gullible idiots will fall for it and vote for him.
Make it illegal to rent to illegals, we wouldn’t have a “housing crisis.”
I would hate to be a renter the day after the election. Ouch.
And I would hate to be a landlord during a time of escalating interest rates and inflation. (Because we can only stay at 3.45% for so long!)
20 million illegals drive rental prices through the roof.
Most rental owners are bottom feeding scums.
Property management companies are bottom feeding scums.
Constitution? What constitution? He’s counting on an executive order and activist judges.
What I most object to is requirements to pay people to move, eviction procedures which are long, expensive and drawn out... That is seizing private property.
Owner occupied evictions should be the same as an eviction at a hotel. You call the cops, the cops say you're leaving now, pack. Out and done. Forcing someone to live with someone who is being forced out is insanely stupid.
Non-owner occupied evictions should be a few days at most for non-payment; payment for additional time should be optional for the property owner and through the court. A month's notice for someone on month to month rent is not ideal, but it should be the most required.
This is where the theft of private property is happening.
And mind you, fixing the eviction system fixes the housing system. Sure, a few times a year you'll have sob articles about how a single mom was being evicted with her new baby. Right, got it. But by fixing the eviction system, those who have been evicted before can finally re-enter the rental market rather than being limited to pretty much only hotel rooms.
Why would you rent to someone who's had an eviction before if your state's system requires a 2-4 month long procedure to get them out (and skip paying rent during that time too.) The average eviction costs $4,000, excluding the lost rent and repairs required. Fix the system, you fix a whole lot of people who can't get rentals.
As for first in time polices (hey, Seattle), bans on criminal background checks (hey, Seattle...), stop. All those bans do is...absolutely nothing. First and foremost, federal housing requires background checks - the government gets more rights than the people? Seattle, you gonna win in court over this? Nope. And property owners are still going to do it, they're just going to do it when no one is looking. They'll change application dates and times to put someone else first in line, etc.
National housing shortage for U.S. citizens.
Funny how all the agricultural giants demand local governments subsidize rents for their wetback laborers.
But why stop with landlords?
We also need to impose wage limits on college professors, and limit all colleges nationwide to charging a maximum $25 per credit.
Salaries for actors and actresses should be capped at $75,000 per year.
And journalists, both print and electronic, should, by law, have a mandatory income limit of $50,000 per year.
Where did I come up with these numbers?
The same place Bernie did.
I pulled em out of my derrière.
There should be commie control. Like don’t let them control anything.
Private property and public property is stolen every time an foreign alien crosses that border.
Big agricultural producers demand local governments subsidize housing for their illegal foreign laborers.
Most rental owners are bottom feeding scum. Rental properties are like the old feudal system.
I want people owning houses instead of renting.
If there is anything that should be fixed it is the usurious loan structures that prevent most average people from owning property.
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