Rent vouchers

Economics Economics Questions
1

I was listening to the case studies on price controls by Salerno and and he made a comment on rent vouchers being better than rent control. I’m not under the impression that Salerno would prefer those to no intervention, but it did make me think if vouchers are that much better. Rent vouchers will still drive up demand for housing artificially and jack up prices until new housing can be built to increase supply (creating a nice little price bubble, I assume). The only ‘positive’ result I can see is forcing people to be more economical with living space and thus housing more people. But I doubt that is the intended method of increasing housing.

Am I on the right track or did I miss something?

2

I think you’re right. The only good side to the voucher system is that you aren’t limited to what buildings you can live in. Under rent control you have this apartment or this building is control and you can only live there. However, with a voucher I can take it to any landlord that will accept them whether it is an apartment, house, tent, or shack under a bridge. So it’s sort of voluntary but not really. Voluntary in the sense that you can take the voucher to any landlord if they accept them not in that somenes money was stolen by the state to provide that voucher.