Would rent control help or hinder Nova Scotia's housing shortage?

After weeks of mounting pressure, theNova Scotia government announced Wednesday that it's temporarily bringing in rent control by capping increases at two per cent per year, effective immediately.

Before the announcement,CBC's Information Morning spoke with people who are for and against rent control as part of a series called Unaffordable or Unfit: Nova Scotia's Housing Challenge.

The series is taking an in-depth look at what many people are calling a housing crisis in this province. Record low vacancy rates and rising rental costs are pushing more and more people to seek help at homeless shelters that are already at capacity.

Housing Minister Chuck Portersaid Wednesday thathis government is stepping in to address some of these problems.

Rent increases are now capped at two per cent per year without exception. The change is retroactive to September 2020 and will remain in place until Feb. 1, 2022, or whenever the COVID-19 state of emergency is lifted.

Porter alsoannounced the creation of the Nova Scotia Affordable Housing Commission.

Hannah Wood with the housing advocacy groupACORN is a supporter of rent control. Shesaysit's one way the provincial government can help people living on low and moderate incomes.

"This is a really life and death issue for people, and putting that max on it would help control this," she told CBC's Information Morningbefore the announcement.

• More coverage of CBC Information Morning's housing series

But David Rapson, a professor of economics at the University of California Davis who lives in Halifax, doesn't believe rent control will work, even as an interim relief for people.

He pointed to other cities where it's been implemented.

"There's some really strong evidence from cities like San Francisco that this reduced 15 per cent of the rental housing supply as a result of rent control, so these are really big effects that actually adversely affect the people that we're trying to help with this policy," he said.

Listen to the full rent control debatewith Hannah Wood and David Rapson here: