Leftists have a special hatred for landlords, who need to be paid to provide other people with housing. When communists took over China, many of them were publicly humiliated, beaten, imprisoned, or executed. In Tacoma, Washington, they are regulated into oblivion.

The Wall Street Journal reports on a 2023 ballot measure that…

…prohibited “cold weather” evictions between Nov. 1 and April 1, and during the school year if the renting family included a student or “educator.”

The effects were as anyone would expect.

“Since the moratorium has taken effect, people are going a year or more without paying rent,” April Black, executive director of the Tacoma Housing Authority, told the local press this month. Some 38% of the public housing authority’s tenants have fallen behind on the rent, up from 15% before the ballot measure, the Seattle Times reports.

Good thing taxpayers are there to pick up the tab for affordable housing deadbeats:

The housing authority has had to tap more than $400,000 in reserves to cover losses…

Some housing providers get carveouts. Others don’t have a seat at the table.

“[I]f the highly subsidized housing groups cannot make their business work in this type of environment, how are small rental housing providers who own just a couple of units supposed to make this work?” asks Corey Hjalseth of the Rental Housing Association of Washington, an industry group.

There are not supposed to make it work, any more than ObamaCare was supposed to make health insurance work. The idea is to drive landlords out of business, creating a housing crisis. Then Big Government can step in and be everybody’s landlord.

On a tip from Varla.