The great thing about this episode is that it actually does something that most popular discussions of rent control don’t do: it acknowledges that it does work, for the rent controlled people. It also acknowledges that the harms of rent control are smaller, and spread across a large number of people (which is why rent control policies are popular).
I know just one anecdotal example and I am sure there are many other examples on the other side where rent control helps. But to me, it looks like rent control really distorts the market way too much to be an effective solution to the housing crisis.
Decommodify housing. Full stop, no rents. Housing by need.
I've lived, though as a child, in a place where housing was distributed "by need" -- the USSR, though even then in the 80s things were liberalizing some. It was, in retrospect, a horrible combination of corruption, underinvestment in housing, and what would in the modern West be considered terrible living conditions.
And anyone relying on their labor. If the cost of living goes up for those people then the cost of other things go up. It's in everyone's interest that cheap housing is available (by some means or other), but lately we've all been sacrificing for the literal rent seekers.
People wanting the goods and services wouldn’t be happy with what is available and they would leave.