The pitfalls of state health care reform. (Dated but still relevant.)
Scott Sumner: “Almost every time I see an expert interviewed on the macroeconomy, they suggest that a substantial portion of the inflation over the past 5 years has been supply side. That’s wrong; none of it has been supply side. I’d go even further; essentially none of the inflation over the past 50 years has been supply side.”
As if you didn’t already know, rent control doesn’t work.
Nearly one in ten doctors in the United States are employed by United Health.
The difference in brain structure between conservatives and liberal is less than previously thought.
Why is it so difficult to get a live human on the phone to make an appointment with a real doctor?
Rent control is popular with people because the benefits are immediate and concentrated, whereas the harms take awhile to manifest and are diffused. Dr. Hoch told our Econ class the reason so many affluent New Yorkers could afford a second home in Florida was because rent control lowered their housing costs. (Also rental property in Berkeley was dilapidated due to rent control)
I recently read an article about affordable housing in The Atlantic (if I recall correctly). It admitted that affordable housing is at odds with building home equity. In blue cities, if housing is made affordable, people who bought a 1200 sq ft, $50,000 bungalow 30 years ago cannot sell it for $1 million and retire. Home owners who plan to retire on their home equity will not be happy if younger, new buyers have an affordable alternative to paying $1 million for a house. Basically advocating for affordable house so more people can build home equity is an empty promise that politicians cannot deliver on.
About the only positive use for rent control that I can imagine is to limit abusive lease renewal practices, where (usually) corporate management coerces the tenant to renew a one-year lease at “only” a 5% increase, or else face continuing on a month-to-month basis with a 20% increase. The point seems to be to prevent the tenant from moving during a low-demand time of the year, and secondarily to rake in a little extra money from tenants who must then break the lease when forced to move for any reason.
An initial lease helps assure the landlord will be able to recover any expenses caused by the turnover. But requiring long-term renewal only encourages the tenant to move out before he otherwise would have.