Live data from Hacker News

Stanford paper says rent control is driving up cost of housing in San Francisco

sf.curbed.com

191–200 of 326 posts

Re: Stanford paper says rent control is driving up cost of housing in San Francisco

#191
post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The term for this is called "labor mobility". Instead of increasing commute times, more typically it involves simply not taking jobs that are further away. Restricting labor mobility is really bad for obvious reasons: people not being able to move where the jobs are means jobs not being filled even as unemployment increases. There is overwhelming evidence that labor mobility has gotten drastically worse in recent dec…

Couple the labour immobility with capital extreme mobility and you get the capitalist's wet dream: lower labour costs.

Are we seeing low labor costs in San Francisco area?

Re: Stanford paper says rent control is driving up cost of housing in San Francisco

#192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you rather have rent control, or just lower rents overall? For the sake of argument. Because that's the thesis: rent control is partially responsible for the out of control rents.

I would rather see rents controlled in an area by requiring that sufficient housing is built. Address the issue with more supply. (At a livable standard of living, including proper sound isolation and fresh air, and even a space for vehicle storage* because people need to leave the city some time... *: Having an in city goods and services transport layer in weather controlled environments that leads to peripheral IO…

> requiring that sufficient housing is built.

I realize what you are trying to say (I think), but your phrasing is curious.

Shortages are almost always caused by government intervention in a market by increasing the burden for suppliers and/or capping prices. There is no need to mandate anything, but instead just let developers do what they already want to do, build. It is the prohibitions (zoning regulations) on development that are the problem, not disinterest by developers.

Re: Stanford paper says rent control is driving up cost of housing in San Francisco

#193

Another second-order effect of rent control is increased traffic. Suppose you have two residents with significantly below-market-rate housing at the same quality level, one in downtown SF and another in Mountain View. The former starts a new job at Google in Mountain View, the latter starts a new job at a trendy start-up in downtown SF. Since they're paying significantly below market rate, they're unable to trade apa…

I believe this is exactly my current dilemma: I live in San Jose, I commute to SF 3 days a week (super thankful for the chance to work remote 2x a week). My current apartment (a 1BR I live in by myself) costs a bit less than 1k a month and is rent-controlled. The equivalent in SJ is probably worth 2-2.5x as much per month, and in SF (or somewhere in-between) it can be worth anywhere from 2.5-4x as much. I've been hun…

Are you willing to live with housemates?

That's the only way you're going to come anywhere near your current rent. As a bonus you'll get more space generally and some community.

Re: Stanford paper says rent control is driving up cost of housing in San Francisco

#194

Another second-order effect of rent control is increased traffic. Suppose you have two residents with significantly below-market-rate housing at the same quality level, one in downtown SF and another in Mountain View. The former starts a new job at Google in Mountain View, the latter starts a new job at a trendy start-up in downtown SF. Since they're paying significantly below market rate, they're unable to trade apa…

I believe this is exactly my current dilemma: I live in San Jose, I commute to SF 3 days a week (super thankful for the chance to work remote 2x a week). My current apartment (a 1BR I live in by myself) costs a bit less than 1k a month and is rent-controlled. The equivalent in SJ is probably worth 2-2.5x as much per month, and in SF (or somewhere in-between) it can be worth anywhere from 2.5-4x as much. I've been hun…

Real question, why not look for a different job closer to San Jose?

Re: Stanford paper says rent control is driving up cost of housing in San Francisco

#195
post #91

Another second-order effect of rent control is increased traffic. Suppose you have two residents with significantly below-market-rate housing at the same quality level, one in downtown SF and another in Mountain View. The former starts a new job at Google in Mountain View, the latter starts a new job at a trendy start-up in downtown SF. Since they're paying significantly below market rate, they're unable to trade apa…

That's a really great insight. The fact that such good intentions often lead to bigger problems is what concerns me about UBI - it will surely have huge second-order effects. I'm not sure what they will be, but rent control in a city is tiny compared to the effect a universal change like UBI would introduce.

One second-order effect of true UBI would be to inflate the cost of goods to the level of UBI, thus rendering UBI pointless.

Re: Stanford paper says rent control is driving up cost of housing in San Francisco

#196
post #12

Rent control is a failed experiment. All it does is force land lords to massively increase rent amounts when someone moves out to account for multi-year market increases. Basically, if the real market price of an apartment is ~$3,000/mo, but in 5 years it realistically would be $5,000, they will simply list it for $5,000 now, to mitigate the loss. My mother-in-law is a land lord in Los Angeles (a very fair one at tha…

Yr right. Rent control doesn't make sense in a bull or bear market. Only when the market is stable.

Re: Stanford paper says rent control is driving up cost of housing in San Francisco

#197
I had a friend that lived on Pine and Stockton in a rent controlled apartment. His rent was around $1400 a month for a 1 bedroom decent sized apartment (900 sq ft). He moved out and the landlord immediately made some upgrades to the apartment and the next tenant living there was paying $3300 a month. It wasn't even feasible for my friend to move out and then move right back in to the same place he just left.

Re: Stanford paper says rent control is driving up cost of housing in San Francisco

#198
post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Couple the labour immobility with capital extreme mobility and you get the capitalist's wet dream: lower labour costs.

Are we seeing low labor costs in San Francisco area?

I was just talking about the macro level Washington Consensus capital/labour trade mobility.

i.e. I'm comparing the lower labour cost of the west in general vs the west before the 70s. https://www.epi.org/productivity-pay-gap/

If you want to deep dive into a present county per county labour cost specifically, then I'd argue yes as well http://projects.sfchronicle.com/2016/teacher-pay/

Anaheim teachers make ~50% more than SF teachers and spend 4 times less proportion of their income on rent.

Re: Stanford paper says rent control is driving up cost of housing in San Francisco

#199
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what's the solution for addressing this problem, AND not having local families from being muscled out by tech employees? Because whatever is proposed, if it means that local families have to leave because the rent was increased astronomically underneath them, then it's a non-starter.

The solution is for local families to be muscled out. Hi, let me introduce myself. I am SF's housing crisis. So are many of my friends. We're those "local families" who have been living in SF for 15+ years in rent-controlled apartments. We're still here because the rent is cheap. If our rent went up even moderately, we'd probably move to the suburbs; by the time you hit your 40s, you get tired of stepping over panhan…

"The solution is for local families to be muscled out."

No, it absolutely is not.

Re: Stanford paper says rent control is driving up cost of housing in San Francisco

#200
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what's the solution for addressing this problem, AND not having local families from being muscled out by tech employees? Because whatever is proposed, if it means that local families have to leave because the rent was increased astronomically underneath them, then it's a non-starter.

What in particular about incumbent renters justifies making policies that benefit that group above all others? Is there something inherently less worthy about families seeking to return to a city after having left it? About a daughter seeking to move out of her parents house?

What in particular about the tech workers justifies making policies so that they can muscle out people who are already there?
Post reply on HN