In a case of temporary sanity, the Seattle City Council recently voted down a bill that would have enacted a rent control law. Though Washington State prohibits rent control, the measure proposed by socialist Councilmember Kshama Sawant would have taken effect if the state repeals its prohibition.
The council’s opponents to the law correctly argued that rent control would discourage new housing production. One said,
I just believe that the last thing that we should be doing during a housing affordability crisis is discouraging new housing production at any affordability level.
Another council member who voted against the bill didn’t oppose rent control, just tis particular iteration of it. She proposed exempting new construction and offering incentives to the developers of new housing to “voluntarily” limit rent increases. Consequently, this rare display of sanity in Seattle is likely short-lived.
Sawant, who previously championed the effort to impose a special tax on Amazon, said,
As a socialist, I believe that housing should be a human right, but capitalism turns everything into a commodity, which means that economists discuss issues like rent control, not in terms of human beings and our needs, but instead in terms of investor profits.
Despite Sawant’s claim, this capitalist does look at issues in terms of human beings. I look at policies from the perspective of promoting the freedom of individuals—every individual—to live as he chooses. And I look, not only at the short-term, but also the long-term consequences of a policy. Sawant, like all Progressives Regressives, looks only at the short-term benefits to a particular group. In the short-term, rent control benefits some individuals—those living in rent-controlled housing—while harming rental housing owners. In the long-term, rent control harms all renters because housing options will be limited when their housing needs change. For details, see my latest book, The Affordable Housing Crisis: Causes and Cures.
The council did not reject the concept of rent control. It is very likely that it will ultimately pass a rent control bill, and demonstrate that sanity on The Dutch “Solution” to the Housing Crisis the Seattle City Council is only temporary.