scholarly journals Extremely low-income households, housing affordability and the Great Recession

Urban Studies ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 55 (8) ◽  
pp. 1615-1635 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael C Lens
Keyword(s):  
Low Income ◽  
Great Recession ◽  
Regression Models ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
Rental Housing ◽  
Housing Affordability ◽  
Median Income ◽  
Section 8 ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
Housing Subsidies

The effects of the Great Recession on housing equity and homeownership have been well-documented. However, we know little about how rental households fared and the efficacy of housing subsidies in addressing affordability gaps. This paper examines the extent to which rental housing became less affordable for Extremely Low-Income (ELI) households – those earning less than 30% of the Area Median Income (AMI). I then run regression models to determine the local characteristics most strongly associated with larger affordability gaps, with a focus on whether housing subsidies are effective at combating such gaps. Rental affordability gaps became more pronounced during the Great Recession. In nearly 70% of the counties in my sample, there was an increase from 2007 to 2010 in the number of ELI households per affordable rental unit. Across the country, the increase was 17%, a dramatic increase in only three years. There is considerable variation across the country, with acute affordability crises often concentrated in the South, particularly Florida. Regression models provide compelling evidence that housing vouchers, public housing, and project-based Section 8 subsidies play an important role in limiting the extent to which large numbers of ELI households are competing for a shortage of low-cost rental units. However, these programmes do not respond quickly to local needs – such as those brought about by the Great Recession. A pilot study where local housing authorities had funding to be more agile and responsive would be an important step toward crafting better policy.

scholarly journals The Efficacy of Allocating Housing Growth in the Los Angeles Region (2006–2014)

Urban Science ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 43
Author(s):  
Darrel Ramsey-Musolf
Keyword(s):  
Los Angeles ◽  
Great Recession ◽  
Housing Prices ◽  
Housing Affordability ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
Coastal Cities ◽  
Housing Growth ◽  
Housing Needs ◽  
Home Values ◽  
The City

California is known for home values that eclipse U.S. housing prices. To increase housing inventory, California has implemented a regional housing needs allocation (RHNA) to transmit shares of housing growth to cities. However, no study has established RHNA’s efficacy. After examining the 4th RHNA cycle (i.e., 2006–2014) for 185 Los Angeles region cities, this study determined that RHNA directed housing growth to the city of Los Angeles and the region’s outlying cities as opposed to increasing density in the central and coastal cities. Second, RHNA directed 62% of housing growth to the region’s unaffordable cities. Third, the sample suffered a 34% shortfall in housing growth due to the Great Recession but garnered an average achievement of approximately 93% due to RHNA’s transmission of minimal housing growth shares. Lastly, RHNA maintained statistically significant associations with increased housing inventory, housing affordability, and housing growth rates, indicating that RHNA may influence housing development.

Direct Subsidies and Housing Affordability in Australian Private Rental Markets

10.1068/c0445 ◽  
2005 ◽  
Vol 23 (5) ◽  
pp. 759-783 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gavin A Wood ◽  
Matthew Forbes ◽  
Kenneth Gibb
Keyword(s):  
Low Income ◽  
Policy Design ◽  
Housing Affordability ◽  
Housing Cost ◽  
Microsimulation Model ◽  
Change Of Direction ◽  
Housing Subsidies ◽  
The Social ◽  
Maintenance Systems ◽  
Rental Markets

Many countries have undergone a broad retreat from the use of indirect (supply) subsidies to meet low-income housing-affordability problems, shifting to direct subsidies often linked to means-tested income-maintenance systems. Although the reasons for this change of direction are well documented, the efficacy of direct housing subsidies in terms of tackling affordability remains in question. The authors examine in detail one such system, Australia's Rent Assistance (RA) programme, making use of a microsimulation model of the Australian housing market linked to a model of the social security system. It is found that there is considerable targeting error because many low-income renters are ineligible for direct subsidies. It is also found that RA is relatively ineffective in overcoming affordability problems in high housing cost areas of Australia. Although RA does not of itself contribute much to poverty-trap problems, it may deter unemployed households from moving to areas where job vacancies exist. The authors conclude that future comparative work could usefully analyse the distributional and behavioural impacts of different forms of housing allowances. Moreover, alternative policies could be recalibrated within the microsimulation model in order to examine the first-round impacts of policy design change.

scholarly journals Examining building age, rental housing and price filtering for affordability in Melbourne, Australia

Urban Studies ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 004209802092783
Author(s):  
Matthew Palm ◽  
Katrina Eve Raynor ◽  
Georgia Warren-Myers
Keyword(s):  
Affordable Housing ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Government Expenditure ◽  
Rental Housing ◽  
Housing Affordability ◽  
Supply Side ◽  
Lower Income ◽  
Naturally Occurring ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
The 1960S

Governments worldwide have responded to housing affordability challenges with supply-side solutions. Proponents of these approaches often draw on the notion of ‘filtering effects’ to argue that new supply naturally trickles down to lower-income households over time, improving affordability. This study examines the characteristics of Naturally Occurring Affordable Housing in Melbourne, Australia, analysing how dwelling age impacts rental cost. We specify a non-linear relationship between building age and rents through hedonic rent modelling, reflecting a premium for historic properties in inner Melbourne. We also conduct a cluster analysis of rental listings and measure affordability by cluster. Our results problematise the notion of filtering, finding that most contemporary affordable housing was initially built in the 1960s and 1970s as social housing or targeted at low-income households. We argue that filtering in this instance is not natural but is instead a reflection of historic government expenditure and past construction choices, or ‘filter up’.

Millennial ‘YIMBYs’ and boomer ‘NIMBYs’: Generational views on housing affordability in the United States

2020 ◽  
pp. 003802612091612
Author(s):  
Max Holleran
Keyword(s):  
Baby Boomers ◽  
Affordable Housing ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Rental Housing ◽  
The United States ◽  
Housing Affordability ◽  
Single Family ◽  
Market Rate ◽  
Job Opportunities ◽  
Housing Costs

This article examines housing activism in five American cities using interviews with millennial-age housing activists, seeking more apartment development, and baby boomers who are members of neighbourhood groups that oppose growth. Many of the groups supporting growth have banded together under the banner of the ‘Yes in My Backyard’ (YIMBY) movement which seeks fewer zoning laws and pushes for market-rate rental housing. In desirable cities with thriving job opportunities, housing costs are pricing out not only low-income renters but also the middle class. The millennial activists sampled blame baby boomers for the lack of affordable housing because of resistance to higher density construction in neighbourhoods with single-family homes (characterising these people as having a ‘Not in My Backyard’ [NIMBY] mindset). The research shows that boomers and millennials not only disagree over urban growth but also more fundamental questions of what makes a liveable city.

USA Child Poverty: The Impact of the Great Recession

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher Wimer ◽  
Timothy M. Smeeding
Keyword(s):  
Great Recession ◽  
Child Poverty ◽  
Safety Net ◽  
Economic Downturn ◽  
Median Income ◽  
Relative Poverty ◽  
Poverty Measure ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
The Usa ◽  
The Impact

The Great Recession (GR) was the most dramatic economic downturn the USA has experienced in more than six decades. But against this backdrop, the USA actually made some limited progress against child poverty over the Great Recession when one considers the new US Supplemental Poverty Measure which lies at about 40 per cent of median income. The main reason was the growth of a well-targeted near cash safety net, combined with earnings enhancements in the form of refundable tax credits. These enhancements helped the working poor, but not many parents of children who could not find jobs. However these improvements had little if any effect on relative poverty counted at a European or cross-national relative poverty standard set at 60 per cent of median income. Greater progress against child poverty in the US requires a continued strong job market coupled with a child allowance.

Public Support for Smoke-Free Section 8 Public Housing

2019 ◽  
Vol 41 (8) ◽  
pp. 1170-1183 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert C. McMillen ◽  
Jonathan P. Winickoff ◽  
Mark A. Gottlieb ◽  
Susanne Tanski ◽  
Karen Wilson ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Housing ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Public Support ◽  
Rental Housing ◽  
Federally Funded ◽  
Section 8 ◽  
Section 8 Housing ◽  
Smoke Free Policy ◽  
Multiunit Housing ◽  
Nationally Representative

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) recently issued rules requiring that federally funded authorities administering public housing must have smoke-free policies. Importantly, this requirement does not extend to Section 8 housing. Under the Section 8 program, public housing vouchers provide subsidies for private rental housing to low-income residents. This study examines support for smoke-free policy options in Section 8 housing. Using a nationally representative survey of adults, we asked 3,070 respondents to agree or disagree with two potential policies. The majority (71%) supported prohibiting indoor smoking everywhere inside buildings that have Section 8 housing units. Alternatively, respondents were less supportive (38%) of a policy to prohibit smoking only inside units with Section 8 subsidies, and allowing smoking in nonsubsidized units. Prohibiting smoking in all units in multiunit housing (MUH) buildings would help protect the health of both the 2.2 million households who receive Section 8 subsidies and their neighbors.

scholarly journals Income-related inequalities in unmet dental care needs in Spain: traces left by the Great Recession

2020 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rosa M. Urbanos-Garrido
Keyword(s):  
Low Income ◽  
Dental Care ◽  
Great Recession ◽  
Unmet Need ◽  
Vulnerable Groups ◽  
Care Needs ◽  
Decomposition Approach ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
Dental Care Needs ◽  
Over Time

Abstract Background Dental health is an important component of general health. Socioeconomic inequalities in unmet dental care needs have been identified in the literature, but some knowledge gaps persist. This paper tries to identify the determinants of income-related inequality in unmet need for dental care and the reasons for its recent evolution in Spain, and it inquires about the traces left by the Great Recession. Methods Data from the EU-SILC forming a decade (2007–2017) were used. Income-related inequalities for three years were measured by calculating corrected concentration indices (CCI), which were further decomposed in order to compute the contribution of different factors to inequality. An Oaxaca-type decomposition approach was also used to analyze the origin of changes over time. Men and women were analyzed separately. Results Pro-rich inequality in unmet dental care needs significantly increased over time (CCI 2007: − 0.0272 and − 0.0334 for males and females, respectively; CCI 2017: − 0.0704 and − 0.0776; p < 0.001). Inequality showed a clear “pro-cycle” pattern, growing during the Great Recession and starting to decrease just after the economic recovery began. Gender differences only were significant for 2009 (p = 0.004) and 2014 (p = 0.063). Income was the main determinant of inequality and of its variation along time -particularly for women-, followed by far by unemployment –particularly for men-; the contributions of both were mainly due to changes in elasticites. Conclusions The Great Recession left its trace in form of a higher inequality in the access to dental care. Also, unmet need for dental care, as well as its inequality, became more sensitive to the ability to pay and to unemployment along recent years. To broaden public coverage of dental care for vulnerable groups, such as low-income/unemployed people with high oral health needs, would help to prevent further growth of inequality.

scholarly journals High rises and low-quality shelter: rental housing dynamics in Mathare Valley, Nairobi

2020 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 481-502
Author(s):  
Baraka Mwau ◽  
Alice Sverdlik
Keyword(s):  
Low Income ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
Informal Settlement ◽  
Rental Housing ◽  
Housing Markets ◽  
Single Room ◽  
Rental Markets ◽  
Central Pillar ◽  
Shelter Delivery

Informal rental housing remains a hidden – yet central – pillar of low-cost shelter markets across the global South. The large informal settlement of Mathare Valley illustrates Nairobi’s rapidly changing informal rental housing markets, with the ongoing rise of tenements alongside metal shacks. Informal single-room rental units (shacks and tenements) already house most Nairobi residents in low-quality but highly profitable shelter. This case study describes how multiple exclusions can shape access to rental housing and examines the politics of shelter delivery. We underscore the importance of private rental markets and offer recommendations for inclusive, multi-pronged interventions combining support for rental housing, land governance and infrastructure delivery. Through a better understanding of the myriad actors and dynamics of informal rental housing, it may be possible to develop strategies that serve low-income tenants for whom renting is often the only viable option.

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