June 6, 2006
An Apartment for $94.18? You'll Have to Go to Court
By MICHAEL BRICK
The New York Times
[Under New York's rent control laws, the rent on an apartment in Bay Ridge,
Brooklyn, for a tenant who moved into the apartment in 1965 was raised to $80.72
a month in June 1970 and then to $94.18 in March 1983.]
June 5, 2006
Tenants in Mumbai Will Endure a Lot For an $8.50 Flat:
Why Sojatwala Family Stayed In Rent-Controlled Digs After a Building Collapse
By ERIC BELLMAN
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
[Here's a tale of rent control from Mumbai, a city in India. The rent on an
apartment was set at $8.50 per month in 1940 and and it remains at that level
by law. No wonder the landlord does not do any repairs. And no wonder the
tenants in the part of the building that has not collapsed yet cling
desperately to their apartments even though the building has been declared
unsafe -- not that its lack of safety was ever in doubt! -- and its water and
electricity has been disconnected.]
June 3, 2006
Delusions of the Rich and Rent-Controlled
By JOHN TIERNEY
The New York Times
[Nora Ephron, a best-selling author and the director of many successful movies
such as "Sleepless in Seattle", lived for many years in an eight-room apartment
for $1,500 a month at the Apthorp, the palatial building at Broadway and West
79th Street. This illustrates the bizarre nature of rent control laws that,
while intended to help the poor, end up subsidizing the superrich. And how did
Ms. Ephron get such a good deal? She gave the apartment's previous owner a
$24,000 bribe. This too is a typical and entirely predictable consequence of
rent control.]
November 19, 2003
Bit by Bit, Government Eases Its Grip
on Rents in New York
By DAVID W. CHEN
The New York Times
July 1, 2003
Learning From China
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
The New York Times
June 21, 2003
Albany Extends Landlord Power Over Rent Curbs
By WINNIE HU with DAVID W. CHEN
The New York Times
June 15, 2003
When Rent Control Just Vanishes
By DAVID W. CHEN
The New York Times
The great Manhattan rip-off
Jun 5th 2003 | NEW YORK
The Economist
[Rent controls, New York's particular bane, are poised to receive yet
another unwelcome extension]
May 19, 2003
Rent Control: New York's Self-Destruction
By ROBERT L. BARTLEY
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
Price Control in General
Minimum wages: November's $5.15
question
The Economist, Jun 29th 2006
[A Democratic dodge for getting supporters to the polls. The poor, who tend to
vote mainly for the Democratic Party, generally do not vote ... except when
there is a ballot proposal to boost the minimum wage. Naturally, Democrats
sometimes add such proposals to boost the voting rates of the poor.]
May 15, 2003
Tokyo Urges Set of Moves to Shore Up Stock
Market
By KEN BELSON
The New York Times
The Zimbabwean model
Nov 28th 2002
The Economist
[The pros and cons of opting out of the global economy]
May 6, 2002
Hawaiian Officials Duel Adam Smith In Plan
to Regulate Gasoline Prices
By JON HILSENRATH
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
June 4, 2001
The Outlook
The Outlook
Jon E. Hilsenrath
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL