Yet it’s not the most radical part of his agenda. The mayor also vowed to “take aggressive legal action” against landlords who chronically fail to maintain their buildings to his standards. That could result in government seeking to “transfer ownership to responsible stewards” of his choosing.

In practice, that means expanding use of the city’s 7A program, which allows the Department of Housing Preservation and Development to pursue legal action against owners whose rental units have fallen into disrepair. No doubt there are some irresponsible landlords, but they aren’t the primary driver of New York’s housing crisis.

The truth is that a century of improper state interventions in the rental market are the leading culprit for why so many apartments have deteriorated.

The pattern is always the same. Rent controls are introduced. Landlords pull properties from the market, reducing housing supply. The quality of the remaining housing declines because there is little incentive — and even less money — to renovate or improve units.

For Mamdani, this downward spiral is not proof that rent control has failed. It is a pretext to double down. The more buildings deteriorate, the more government agencies can use the law to seize property and transfer it, as he promised, to “community land trusts, nonprofits or even the tenants themselves.”

Mamdani is understandably worried about such a radical shift pushing money and people out of his city. That explains why the mayor’s team told the Wall Street Journal ahead of his housing rollout that he plans a rent-freeze exemption for as many as 300,000 vacant, government-regulated units.

Mamdani will permit one-time rent increases to ensure the apartments get rented. The city will also create a $5 million loan program for landlords whose tenants are not paying rent or refusing to vacate units.

Notably, these provisions were omitted from the manifesto. But they reflect an implicit recognition that market forces are the real solution to the imbalance between supply and demand.

Landlords do not need taxpayer subsidies. They need the freedom to charge and collect market rents to generate the income necessary to maintain their properties.

If a policy has such negative effects that it requires a special fund for relief and temporary exemptions to enforcement, why not make the exemptions permanent — or abandon the policy altogether?