00:00I am British, but I am originally North African, grew up Muslim, and I think it is undoubtedly clear that
00:05Zora Mamdani is being criticised for his awful policies and not because he is a Muslim.
00:10Now, we've got to look at this from an economic perspective.
00:13There is not very much that economists agree on, but the one thing that they absolutely do agree on is
00:18that rent control is an absolutely terrible idea.
00:21Rent controls destroy the housing market, and of course, it means that you end up having less supply as a
00:27result.
00:27Now, when you have legally mandated requirements for housing in the rental market and you reduce the capability for landlords
00:35to be able to actually raise that money, that means that that money isn't spent.
00:39So you end up having lots of properties that are vacant.
00:42We know from every single study that has been done on rent controls, it does not work.
00:48San Francisco, for example, had a 15 percent reduction in their housing supply as a result of restrictions on the
00:54price of renters.
00:55Now, we know, look at countries like Sweden, where Stockholm had enormous amounts of people on a waiting list to
01:02even get onto the rental market.
01:04Now, thankfully, Zora Mamdani does not have an awful amount of power to literally do by and by restrictions on
01:11the price of rent.
01:12But what we do have is de facto restrictions, freezes on the increase in rents in those particularly rent controlled
01:20properties.
01:20Controls on rent are an abysmal way to solve the housing crisis.
01:25But it can't be denied that New York is not a liveable city.
01:31I mean, the City Council has just released a study saying that almost two thirds of people in New York
01:39cannot live to a reasonably expectation, a reasonable standard.
01:47So, I mean, surely he's trying to do something.
01:50And isn't that a good thing?
01:52It's well intentioned, but it's an awful way to do it.
01:55And it will make the situation far, far worse.
01:57So if you want to actually ensure that house prices are affordable, that we have lots more houses, you have
02:03to increase supply.
02:04It's basic economics.
02:05If you increase the supply and demand remains relatively the same, prices will come down.
02:10The problem is people do not understand the way that markets work in this particular instance.
02:15If you want housing to be affordable, you must build more houses.
02:20And the best way, the best way, Zoran Mamdani or indeed any politician could ensure that housing is affordable in
02:26New York would be to completely abolish zoning laws.
02:30Those zoning laws, those restrictions that make it far too difficult to build end up resulting in less supply.
02:36And I think that that's really the important point here.
02:38When we're looking at Zoran Mamdani, it's only been 100, not even 100 days yet of him being mayor.
02:44And there isn't very much that he particularly can do.
02:46But it's the politics of this.
02:48It's the politics of wanting to control the market without fully understanding how it operates.
02:53If you want New Yorkers to be able to afford to live in New York, build more houses.
02:57New Yorkers to be able to afford to live in New York, build more houses.
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