Subsidized Housing and the Concentration of Poverty, 1977- 2008: A Comparison between Eight US Cities

PWP-CCPR-2011-008

Abstract

This paper examines the link between subsidized housing and the concentration of poverty. I use newly available data from the Department of Housing and Urban Development that extends from the earliest years of subsidized housing reform to the present day. I find that neighborhoods with major public housing redevelopment experienced a decrease in their poor population. However, neighborhoods where the proportion of voucher units increased consistently experienced an increase in their poor population. These neighborhood level changes translated into implied increases in the citywide levels of segregation between the poor and non-poor. The segregative effect of subsidized housing at the metropolitan level was more pronounced for the 1980-2000 period than the 2000-2008 period.