Politics

The Homevoter Hypothesis: A New Generation Gap?

We know that older people vote more than younger people and that homeowners vote more than renters; but are older homeowners, as a class, overrepresented in local elections? Katherine Levine Einstein, Maxwell Palmer, Ellis Hamilton, and Ethan Singer analyzed the…

Meet the Housing Law Enforcers

California’s state legislature has made major strides in reducing the barriers to building housing statewide. However, many local governments have failed to comply with state housing law, with some making explicit efforts to sidestep these laws by exploiting loopholes and…

Parcel Tax in California: Findings from New Data Sources

Published: 2020 | Soomi Lee | CityScape Abstract This article examines parcel taxes in California counties, cities, and special districts. Unique to California, the parcel tax is commonly known as a lump-sum tax applied to parcels of real property to…

Warding Off Development: Local Control, Housing Supply, and NIMBYs

Published: 2020 | Evan Mast | The Center for Growth and Opportunity Abstract Local control of land-use regulation creates a not-in-my-backyard (NIMBY) problem that can suppress housing construction, contributing to rising prices and potentially slowing economic growth. I study how…

The Gap: A Shortage of Affordable Homes

Published: 2020 | Andrew Aurand, Dan Emmanuel, Diane Yentel | National Low Income Housing Coalition Abstract A large-scale, sustained commitment to affordable housing for people with the lowest incomes, through such programs as the national Housing Trust Fund (HTF), Housing…

An Introduction to the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit

Published: 2019 | Mark P. Keightley | Congressional Research Service Abstract The low-income housing tax credit (LIHTC) program is one of the federal government’s primary policy tools for encouraging the development and rehabilitation of affordable rental housing.

The rise and effects of homeowners associations

Published: 2019 | Wyatt Clarkea, Matthew Freedman | Urban Economics Abstract In the U.S., nearly 60% of recently built single-family houses, and 80% of houses in new subdivisions, are part of a homeowners association (HOA). We construct the first near-national…