Does Rent Control Work?

The thought of rent control often evokes strong emotional reactions regardless of whether you support or oppose it. Anyone who has ever rented a home can relate to the feeling of disappointment (or even frustration and anger) when you receive notification of an impending rent increase. Rent control is often discussed in politics as a social issue. But when you take a step back and look at the bigger picture, there are many economic consequences when rent control is implemented and/or ceased, many of which end up hurting the very people that rent control was intended to help. This Freakonomics episode discusses exactly why rent control does not work and we highly recommend you take a listen.