Roofs or Ceilings?
Kevin Brancato of Truck and Barter has scanned in Friedman and Stigler's classic attack on rent control:
Truck and Barter: Roofs or Ceilings?: Sorting through some papers I acquired a while back, I found an original copy of Roofs or Ceilings? The Current Housing Problem by Milton Friedman and George Stigler, as originally published in 1946 by the Foundation for Economic Education. This classic essay argues against the use of rent control:
Rent ceilings, therefore, cause haphazard and arbitrary allocation of space, inefficient use of space, retardation of new construction and indefinite continuance of rent ceilings, or subsidization of new construction and a future depression in residential building. Formal rationing by public authority would probably make matters still worse.
Although the essay is in the public domain, I couldn't find it on the net. So I've scanned it in, and put it on my university server.
Enjoy!
