来源：《华尔街日报》
原文见报日期：2022年7月12日
Affordable housing can be built, but it can’t be mandated into existence. That’s the lesson from St. Paul, where a new rent-control ordinance has discouraged the construction of much-needed affordable apartments.
可以建造经济适用房，但不能强制要求其存在。这就是圣保罗的教训，新的租金管制条例阻碍了急需的经济适用房的建设。
Last November 53% of St. Paul residents voted for a ballot measure to cap rent increases at 3% a year. The new ordinance took effect in May, and it makes no exceptions for new construction.
去年11月，53%的圣保罗居民投票支持一项将租金涨幅控制在每年3%以内的措施。新条例于今年5月生效，对新建建筑也不例外。
This strict new rent control is hitting while building costs have soared. Between the first quarter of 2021 and the first quarter of 2022, construction costs rose 18.2% in nearby Minneapolis.
在建筑成本飙升的同时，这种严格的新租金控制正在打击建筑商。从2021年第一季度到2022年第一季度，明尼阿波利斯市附近的建筑成本上涨了18.2%。
“If your costs of doing business are going through the roof but your cap is 3% forever, that’s an equation for losing business,” says Donna Hanbery, an attorney who has represented residential property owners and managers in the St. Paul area for some 45 years.
律师唐娜·汉伯里说：“如果你的经营成本在不断攀升，但你涨价的上限永远是3%，那就等于去做赔钱的生意。”她在圣保罗地区代表住宅业主和物业管理公司出庭已经有45年了。
St. Paul’s rent control creates an incentive for developers to build luxury apartments to recoup their construction costs. But builders are also opting to leave St. Paul. Citing rent control, investors recently paused development on the 3,800-unit Highland Bridge project. Its builders would have set aside 20% of units for affordable housing, with 10% going to those earning 30% or less of area median income.
圣保罗的租金管制为开发商创造了一种动力，让它们建造豪华公寓以收回建设成本。但建筑商也选择离开圣保罗。最近，投资者以租金管制为由，暂停了拥有3800个单元的高地桥项目的开发。该计划的建筑商将留出20%的住房用于保障性住房，其中10%将提供给收入低于地区中位数30%的人。
“As capital is global, we need policies that encourage investment in our communities rather than stifle it,” says Maureen Michalski, vice president of Ryan Companies, the lead developer of the Highland Bridge project. “The current rent control stifles.”
“由于资本是全球性的，我们需要鼓励对社区投资的政策，而不是扼杀，”高地桥项目的首席开发商瑞安公司副总裁莫林•米哈尔斯基说。“目前的租金管制扼杀了投资。”
Multifamily building permits in St. Paul have plummeted nearly 82% between November 2021 and January 2022 compared with the same period a year prior. Proponents of the rent control note that St. Paul’s permitting rate was unusually high in early 2021 as the market rebounded from the pandemic and lockdowns. To account for such anomalies, Mercatus Center senior research fellow Salim Furth compared St. Paul building permits in the five months after passage of rent control with the average of the same months in the three years prior. By that metric, St. Paul’s multifamily permitting is still down 55%. City data shows St. Paul’s building permit revenue from January to May 2022 was $3.699 million, down from an average of $4.176 million from 2018 to 2021.
从2021年11月到2022年1月，圣保罗的多户建筑许可与去年同期相比下降了近82%。租金控制的支持者指出，随着市场从大流行和封锁中反弹，圣保罗在2021年初的许可率异常高。为了解释这种异常现象，莫卡特斯中心高级研究员萨利姆·弗斯比较了租金管制通过后五个月圣保罗的建筑许可与三年前同期的平均水平。按照这个标准，圣保罗的多户住宅许可仍下降了55%。城市数据显示，圣保罗2022年1月至5月的建筑许可证收入为369.9万美元，低于2018年至2021年的平均417.6万美元。
Voters in St. Paul’s twin city of Minneapolis also supported rent control at the ballot box in November. But instead of mandating it, that ballot initiative gave the city council permission to enact some form of cap. City councillors have been slow to act—especially now that permitting data suggests Minneapolis is a beneficiary of St. Paul’s rent-control folly. Mr. Furth’s multi-year data shows a 68% increase in Minneapolis multifamily permitting since the passage of St. Paul’s rent control.
11月，圣保罗的孪生城市明尼阿波利斯的选民在投票时也支持房租管制。但是这次投票并没有强制执行，而是让市议会获得了颁布某种形式的租金上限的许可。市议员们行动迟缓，尤其是现在的许可数据表明，明尼阿波利斯是圣保罗愚蠢的租金控制的受益者。弗斯的多年数据显示，自圣保罗的租金管制措施通过以来，明尼阿波利斯允许多户型住房许可增加了68%。
The best way cities can make housing affordable is to have policies that increase the housing supply. Rent control restricts supply and is economic madness, as St. Paul is proving.
城市要让人们住得起房，最好的办法就是制定政策，增加住房供应。租金管制限制了供应，是经济上的疯狂，圣保罗证明了这一点。