This paper documents the production of a panel of price indices for housing services, other produced goods, and all produced goods for each metropolitan area in the United States and the non-metropolitan part of each state from 1982 through 2010 that can be used for estimating behavioral...

The Moving to Opportunity for Fair Housing Demonstration Program (MTO) has estimated the effects of two concrete reforms of low-income housing policy on one important group affected by them. Reforms of this type have received, and will continue to receive, serious consideration in housing policy...

The primary purposes of this paper are to (1) consider the justifications that have been offered for housing subsidies to low-income households and the implications of these justifications for the evaluation and design of housing programs, (2) describe the most important features of the largest...

Small Area Fair Market Rents is an important reform of HUD's Housing Choice Voucher Program. One argument for them is that they would reduce overpayment for voucher units in low-rent neighborhoods. This leads to the belief that the benefits of SAFMRs can be funded largely by reductions in...

The purpose of this paper is to describe proposals for reform of low-income housing assistance that will alleviate poverty without increasing public spending. Low-income housing assistance is fertile ground for such reforms. The majority of current recipients are served by programs whose cost is...

Traditional rationales for low-income housing assistance imply that a housing program is not successful unless it induces recipients to occupy better housing than they would choose if given equally costly cash grants. The general assumptions of economic theory do not imply that current housing...

Two important shortcomings of the official measure of poverty are its failure to account for noncash benefits (including the benefits of low-income housing programs) when calculating resources and differences in the cost-of-living across geographic areas when setting poverty thresholds....

This paper estimates the effects of alternative reforms of the current system of low-income housing assistance on the number of people of various types who would receive assistance. The reforms are designed to eliminate the system's substantial inefficiencies, inequities, and bias against...

This paper describes the production of a panel of price indices for housing services, other produced goods and services, and all produced goods and services for each metropolitan area in the United States and the non-metropolitan part of each state for each year from 1982 through 2012. Our...

This is an edited volume reviewing the major means-tested social programs in the United States. Each author addresses a major program or area, reviewing each area's successes and recommending how to address shortcomings through policy change. In general, our means-tested programs do many things...