Housing

...TO RECAPITULATE, there are, at minimum, some 16 million housing units with structural deficiencies of one sort or another, and there are, at a conservative estimate, some 21 million households paying more than they can afford for housing...

...one-fifth requires moderate subsidy (interest rates of 1-4 percent...

...COST: Again, according to the 1974 Annual Housing Survey, there were 9,664,000 renter households paying more than 25 percent of their incomes for rent...

...Quality is only one dimension of low-income housing needs...

...However, the 1970 Census of Residential Finance showed that 18.7 percent of all owners carried 121 housing costs in excess of one-quarter of their income...

...Neither is likely...

...whereas only 8.4 percent of threeormore-person households have incomes in the lowest quintile, and another 14.9 percent in the second quintile...

...Because this has not been done in the past, we have divided our society into black and white, rich and poor, urban and suburban, with housing a major cause...

...the top fifth can probably buy or rent new housing without assistance...

...The foregoing data demonstrate that some 16 million units, out of a total occupied inventory in 1974 of 71 million units, are "structurally deficient...

...And so, more than three-quarters of the households with incomes below $3,000 paid over 25 percent of their incomes for shelter...

...Based on analysis of 1974 income levels, roughly one-fifth of all households require very deep subsidy (cost of housing plus all or part of such operating expenses as heat, repairs, and taxes...

...Therefore, although cross-tabulations by income are not available, the 1974 Annual Housing Survey shows the following numbers of people with specific housing problems, which can be assumed to be income-related...

...one-fifth requires shallow subsidy...

...We never could afford the human cost of neglect, and still can't...

...The Ford administration last year proposed more money for housing than Congress appropriated, and its proposal for 1978 was calculated to fund 600,000 subsidized units...

...In addition, there are units that are overcrowded, and others that lack basic plumbing, heating, or kitchen facilities...

...Most of these units would be provided through the programs of the Department of Housing and Urban Development, but some 100,000 are targeted for small towns and rural areas through the Farmers' Home Administration...

...This is manifested locally by exclusionary zoning and building regulations and at the federal level by failure to subsidize low- and moderate-income housing...

...The two commitments are incompatible: it simply is impossible to make a meaningful impact on lowand moderate-income housing needs while straining to balance the federal budget—unless there is a substantial tax increase, or a new method of subsidizing housing that will remove the constraints of federal budget-making...

...More than half the renters paying over 35 percent of their incomes for rent had incomes below $3,000, and an additional 30 percent had incomes between $3,000 and $5,000...

...The consequences of not dealing with lowincome housing problems have been with us for decades, because these problems have never been meaningfully addressed...

...If we addressed our housing needs meaningfully, we would create full employment in a very short time, enabling us to curtail other programs designed to create jobs, and to lower the cost of unemployment compensation and related training programs...

...Other critical dimensions are cost and opportunity to choose the type, tenure, and location of one's housing...

...In 1970, 8,145,000 households paid more than one-quarter of their income for rent...

...On the other hand, the President is committed to a balanced budget by 1980...

...Perhaps even more effective is exclusion through provision of housing for affluent people only...

...For 31.5 percent of one- and two-person households have incomes in the lowest quintile, and 25.1 percent fall into the second quintile...

...The Carter administration probably will propose some modest increases in the programs developed and implemented by the Ford administration and the low-income public housing program, a measure mandated by the Congress last year...

...two-thirds paid over 35 percent...

...Just as people don't choose to live in poor housing, they don't choose to spend high proportions of incomes on housing unless they have to...

...Clearly, there is both an overlapping in the above categories of need, and also a degree of acuteness...

...It seems inconceivable, however, that costs in the shortrun can be reduced to levels that will make unsubsidized new housing generally available to households with below-median incomes...

...On economic grounds, the cost of meeting our lowincome housing needs has increased with each year of neglect...

...Only 0.1 percent had incomes above $15,000...

...Analysis of the available indices shows that the basic problems of quality and cost are highly correlated with income, with poorest people having the greatest problems...

...No bath 2,107,000 households Shared bath 526,000 No kitchen 1,441,000 Shared kitchen 141,000 Bedroom lacks privacy 6,352,000 Bedrooms used by 3+ People 3,784,000 Rodents present 6,676,000 Exposed wiring 2,373,00u Rooms lack outlets 3,078,000 *Structural deficiencies 15,909,000 *Structural deficiencies include one or more of the following: water leakage in basement, roof leaks, open cracks or holes in interior walls or ceilings, holes in floor, broken plaster or peeling paint...

...Based on these data, it seems conservative to assume that 40 percent of all renters and at least 25 percent of all owners-11.4 million owners and 10 million renters—are spending more than onequarter of their incomes for housing in 1977...

...Assuming that by and large one- and two-person households will prefer to rent, and larger households will prefer to buy their housing, well over half of all small units built should have deep subsidies, while roughly 20 percent of all owned housing requires deep subsidies...

...While I will focus here on households requiring major or very deep subsidies (the bottom 40 percent—roughly 28 million households), it is important to bear in mind that only about 15 million households can afford new housing without subsidy...

...one-fifth requires major subsidy (cost of producing housing, but no operating subsidy...

...Nationally, we have paid a stiff price: the lack of 122 decent housing and suitable living environments is a major, though of course not the only, contributor to a divided and alienated society, crime, high unemployment, and a breakdown of family life...

...Therefore, to achieve balanced production, 60 to 80 percent of all new housing should be subsidized, with 40 percent receiving major or deep subsidies...

...On both human and economic terms, federal action should be delayed no longer...

...How does this level of housing subsidy compare to housing needs...

...Otherwise, low- and moderate-income households will not have access to new housing, much of which is concentrated in new neighborhoods, and perhaps even have no access to entire communities...

...This vast difference is only in part accounted for by differing assumptions...

...Recent data for owners are not available...

...This is an increase of more than one-half million from the 1973 figure...

...Nevertheless, through the Ford proposals, for the first time since 1972, the subsidized housing level established as a goal in the Housing Act of 1968-600,000 units annually— would be met...

...It can be assumed that few people live in bad housing by choice...

...in larger part it has resulted because we have, during the last decade, permitted the abandonment of a good portion of the housing stock of our inner cities, and because high costs and financing terms have shut off a continuing supply of modest-cost housing for purchase by middleincome working families...

...the problems of moderateand above-moderate-income people have to do more with lack of choice and inability to satisfy preferences than to what might be categorized as absolute need...

...They include householders' physical problems, illnesses and injuries such as mental retardation caused by lowgrade lead poisoning, and alienation or segregation by economic status and race or nationality...

...This is confirmed by 1974 Annual Housing Survey data, indicating that less than I percent of households with incomes above $25,000 live in housing that lacks plumbing, heat, or kitchen...

...It seems more likely, however, that Congress will change the mix of programs proposed by Ford—probably with more emphasis on new construction and less on subsidizing existing units—rather than propose significant increases in the amount of subsidized housing...

...q 123...

...Thus, if there is to be a sustained effort to keep the building industry going and provide new housing units at the level of 2 million to 3 million annually, either the bulk of production will have to be subsidized to some degree or costs will have to be substantially lower...

...The total sum includes existing units as well as new construction and rehabilitation...

...a comparable estimate, though somewhat more elaborate, made in 1975 put the cost at $100 billion annually...

...As we know, lack of decent housing and adequate privacy is a major barrier to self-development and selffulfillment...

...While many occupy housing with structural deficiencies, they are in a sense additive, because repair of the deficiency is almost certain to increase housing cost...

...CHOICE, ACCESS, SUPPLY: Overt discrimination is only one method of excluding minorities and low-income people from choice of and access to decent housing...

...On the one hand, both President Carter and new Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Patricia Roberts Harris are committed to deal with the urgent housing problems of low- and moderateincome people...

...E.g., in the mid-1960s, I estimated the cost of providing every low-income household with decent housing at rents or costs they could afford as about $3 billion annually...