If you’re a New York Times reporter assigned to do a story about the rising number of homeless families in the Big Apple, it is acceptable to blame the rise on the booming/faltering economy (take your pick), landlord’s unwillingness to rent to families qualifying for Section 8 housing, but of course the one thing that is absolutely out of bounds is to highlight the perverse effects of New York’s bizarre system of rent control which provides a disincentive to create new rental housing and makes it extremely difficult for poor people to compete for existing affordable housing.