Driving with your foot on the gas and brake pedals at the same time

Regarding Gavin Newsom's signing of the expansive statewide rent control bill, Dan Walters of Cal Matters wonders if regulations may have the unintended consequence of making the housing crisis even worse.

"Clearly it will make older apartment houses (not exempt from the rent control--new buildings are), it could discourage their owners from spending money on improvements, particularly if they must borrow to do it. It may encourage more apartment owners to convert them into condos, and even if they retain units as rentals, they almost certainly will treat the inflation-plus 5% cap on rent increases as an annual imperative, regardless of the market.

"Bottom line: During his campaign for governor, Newsom set a goal of building 3.5 million new units of housing by 2025. Nothing that occurred in the Capitol this year would even begin to make that happen."

Read the whole thing here.