[chimeracoder]

> Despite paying rent for an apartment, it’s not rent-seeking. You get a place to live out of it that wouldn’t exist without the owner renting it to you.

> Rent-seeking is a very specific economic term where a party inserts themselves into a transaction and takes a cut without providing anything: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rent-seeking

> Being a landlord comes with significant responsibilities and even principal investment risk.

Economist here. Yes, this was a correct use of the term "rent-seeking behavior". It's actually quite funny to see someone try to argue otherwise, when the name was chosen because this is, literally, the textbook example.

[kortilla]

It is not the textbook example. The textbook example is regulatory capture where people put in an artificial gate and charge people to cross it.

Everything functioned fine without the gate and nothing was improved by the gate.

An apartment LEASE is literally nothing like that. You’re borrowing something you don’t have and it’s a rivalrous good so other people can’t use it while you are.

Renting (leasing) a car, an apartment, or any other good like that is not rent seeking behavior. No actual economist would argue that because it dilutes the term to something completely meaningless.