Production and Provision: New Evidence on Federal, State, and Local Housing Policies

Session Submission Type: Panel

Abstract

Housing sits at the intersection of multiple social challenges including unaffordability, unequal access to opportunity, and climate change. Policymakers grapple with tradeoffs between these sometimes competing goals when deciding what conditions to place on the administration, funding, and construction of housing. This panel includes new research on housing production and provision that brings evidence to bear on active policy debates.

First, two papers focus on how policies shape housing production. Kouchekinia evaluates the effect of local inclusionary zoning ordinances on supply. Findings reveal tradeoffs between generating deed restricted affordable units and market rate development. Inclusionary zoning reduced housing production in California cities, and it pushed multifamily housing to lower-income areas. Torres Rodríguez and Steil analyze the impact of energy codes on housing supply, among other outcomes, exploring important heterogeneity in the relationship across housing types, market conditions, and climate types. 

Second, two papers focus on policies and practices that shape tenants’ access to affordable housing. Lochhead and Blanco examine conversion of public housing to project-based vouchers through the Rental Assistance Demonstration (RAD) program. Analyses find that RAD conversions serve a lower-income population than the prior development population, in part due to management practices. Owens and colleagues examine tenants’ applications and lease-up in affordable housing units in the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) program. They find that centrally listing and advertising affordable units can facilitate families’ moves to higher-opportunity neighborhoods, and their project will also evaluate how tenant managers screen LIHTC tenants, with implications for understanding inequalities in access to opportunity.
These papers provide new insights on federal, state, and local housing policies that aim to address pressing social problems, including housing affordability, segregated residential patterns, and climate change. The range of policies and practices explored by the authors facilitates the consideration of policy tradeoffs that ultimately shape housing production and provision to tenants.

Policy Area

• Housing, Community Development, and Urban Policy

Chair

• Justin P. Steil, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Discussants

• Michael C Lens, University of California - Los Angeles

• Nicholas Kelly, Northeastern University

Organizer

• Sonia Torres Rodríguez, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Individual Presentations

• Private Provision of Public Housing: Impacts on Targeting - Presenting Author: Elizabeth Lochhead, New York University

• Inclusionary Zoning and Housing Supply: Evidence from California's Palmer Fix - Presenting Author: Noah A Kouchekinia, University of California Irvine

• Quantifying the Housing Supply, Energy Savings, and Climate Resilience Effects from Energy and Building Codes - Presenting Author: Sonia Torres Rodríguez, Massachusetts Institute of Technology