BPC: Under your plan / idea: What share of income should folks be REQUIRED to pay for rent?
Originally Posted by BPC
But subsidizing rich persons' housing costs through tax abatements on luxury condos is okay?? The skewed tax system, and the resulting subsidies, have pushed up NYC prices (especially Manhattan).
That distortion, I believe, is greater than any effect that may or may not be being caused by rent stabilization -- especially because the number of units under stabilization/control is shrinking, but we keep seeing 421-a etc. exemptions being granted.
ali r.
{downtown broker}
^And broad arguments about the supposedly negative effect of rent stabilization upon the housing stock simply ignore those instances in which the program serves to increase supply. Example: as an incentive for converting my building -- one of the largest in the West Village -- from commercial to residential use, the City gave the owner a tax abatement but subjected the building to rent stabilization for the duration of the tax abatement and in some instances beyond.
I don't really have a plan. I would like to see the free market govern housing, in the same way it already governs food and clothing and many of life's other essentials. We don't really have a housing shortage. There is plenty of housing. What we have here is an INCOME shortage. In other words, many people cannot afford to live here. Price controls never solve a shortage; they only worsen it. Rather, the most efficient method is to find who cannot afford housing, GIVE THESE PEOPLE MONEY, and allow them to decide how best to spend it. In the long run, such a system costs a lot less, and benefits poor people a lot more. Indeed, we already follow these policies to a certain extent with AFDC, the Earned Income Tax Credit, etc., but not nearly enough. The tax abatements discussed in the two above posts actually worsen the problem. Why give public funds to rich real estate developers to allow other rich persons to live in below-market housing? How on earth does that make any sense?
Well, when you put it that way, I would take money.
ali r.
{downtown broker}
Free markets govern food? Since when?
got milk?
They certainly do from the consumer end, which is what I was referring to above. When people can't afford food, we give them food stamps. We don't establish price caps at the grocery store. If we did, we would have food shortages akin to the housing shortages we have in NYC.
Milk prices are controlled.
Moderator,
Is this the correct forum for this thread?
Milk prices are controlled in that there are price FLOORS, not price CAPS, which is another really bad public policy unrelated to the rent control discussion. It would be as if we passed a law setting the minimum monthly rent at $2K, in order to keep landlords in business.
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