Low-income elderly homeowners in very old dwellings: the need for public policy debate

This paper assesses whether the usually favorable depictions of older homeowners in the United States can be generalized to those who have extremely low incomes and occupy the oldest housing stock. Theoretical treatments and past empirical research findings offer a strong rationale for distinguishing this subgroup of older households. Analyzing 1999 American Housing Survey data, this paper finds that poor older homeowners in very old dwellings are more likely to be demographically disadvantaged and to occupy physically deficient dwellings. The paper calls for public debate on the comparative benefits and costs of governmental programs that help these vulnerable older persons to age in place as opposed to offering them alternative affordable housing options.     

Housing price, elderly dependency and fertility behaviour

Sustaining declines in fertility have increasingly become an alarming issue in most of the world economies. Many governments have been making enormous efforts to alleviate such intertwined problems as falling fertility and soaring elderly dependency. What really makes fertility rates fall? Does housing price have a role (as many argue)? Most researchers addressed this issue from a demographic perspective, but have yet to fully unravel the mystery of human fertility behaviour. The paper aims to investigate the novel linkages between birth rate, housing price and elderly dependency, with the case of Hong Kong. It employs two key methods: (i) the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) to co-integration procedure and (ii) Granger causality, to disentangle the complicated relationships, long-run and short-run. The empirical results show that a 1 percent increase in housing prices and elderly leads to 0.52% and 1.65% decreases in birth rate respectively. Besides, both housing price and elderly dependency Granger cause birth rate in the long-run. Our findings not only shed light on fertility behaviour, but also provide implications for policy change. That is particularly relevant to those economies whose low fertility situations need to be ameliorated.     

Housing affordability among elderly female heads of household in nonmetropolitan areas

This study investigates the extent and nature of housing affordability for elderly nonmetropolitan female heads of household using data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. The results indicate that over one-third of elderly nonmetropolitan female heads of household experience housing poverty and that those who rent, who have fair to poor health, and who are minorities are particularly vulnerable. Housing affordability, measured by the concept of housing poverty, identifies households struggling to meet basic needs while the conventional 25% of income for housing expenditures ratio identifies a larger population. The findings suggest the need for multifaceted public policies to address the problem of housing poverty. Her research interests include housing affordability, housing and community vitality, and decision making. She received her Ph.D. from Purdue University. Sooyoun Park is in the same department as a Project Assistant on a USDA-funded research project entitled “Housing Affordability in Rural Areas,” which is a joint project between Nebraska and Wisconsin. Her research interests focus on housing management behavior in relation to housing expenditure burden. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.     

Effect of mortgage indebtedness on health of U.S. homeowners

This paper examines the effect of excessive mortgage indebtedness on health among homeowners using nine waves of the Health and Retirement Study from 1992 to 2008. Health status is measured by subjective well-being, number of depressive symptoms, and incidence of hypertension. Using average annual state-level home prices as an instrument, we attempt to identify the causal effect in an panel IV framework. Results from the panel IV estimations suggest that having a high mortgage loan to home value (LTV), defined as LTV at or above 80 %, leads to more depressive symptoms and a higher incidence of hypertension, but has no effect on subjective well-being. Since the results from panel estimations did not show that debt affects health, whether the panel IV results demonstrate a causal relationship depends critically on the exclusion assumption.     

Parental transfer of financial knowledge and later credit outcomes among low- and moderate-income homeowners

It is well established that acquiring financial skills during childhood is linked with better savings in adulthood. Little is known, however, about the relationship between parental teaching of money management early in life and children's financial outcomes in adulthood. This is particularly true for low- and moderate-income (LMI) households. Using data from Community Advantage Program survey data for 2,389 LMI homeowners, we find that adults who report receiving high levels of money-management teaching in childhood from their parents are associated with higher credit scores and lower credit card debt in adulthood. We also find that the level of parental financial teaching influences the relationship between children's later educational attainment and credit scores. These findings suggest implications for initiatives promoting financial capability for parents and children.     

Family support for the elderly in Korea: continuity, change, future directions, and cross-cultural concerns.

This article discusses major issues and concerns regarding family support for parents and elderly people in industrialized and urbanized Korea. It summarizes new trends in family support for elderly members, continuing influences of the traditional value of family support (filial piety), growing needs for public services for elderly people and their families, urgent calls for the state to assume greater responsibilities for providing social security and services for the elderly, needs for cross-cultural studies of family support, and certain cultural similarities and differences to be considered. The article concludes with some suggestions for future research.     

将廉租房与公租房并轨，创新租赁型保障房管理模式

目前,我国基本形成了以廉祖住房为基础、以公共租赁房为重点,包括适当发展经济适用房和限价商品房、加快各类棚户区改造在内的城镇住房保障体系。这种住房保障制度和体系存在诸多问题,如产品种类偏多、管理不善、退出机制缺失等。针对租赁型保障房,应创新运行管理模式,逐步将廉租房与公租房并轨,统一规划、统一建设、统一审核、统一管理,实行分级补贴、租补分离、明收明补,以完善租赁型保障房制度体系。     

Environmental concerns and international migration

"This article focuses on international migration occurring as a result of environmental changes and processes. It briefly reviews attempts to conceptualize environment-related migration and then considers the extent to which environmental factors have been and may be significant in initiating migration. Following is an examination of migration as an independent variable in the migration-environment relationship. Finally, ethical and policy dimensions are addressed."     

Subsidized Elderly Housing

Starting in the early 1960s, the federal govenunent joined with the private-sector housing developers in a partnership: in return for subsidized mortgages and tax benefits, developers would rent to low- and moderate-income tenants. Today, many elderly people live in these "publicly subsidized" units. The initial agreement, however, held out an escape clause: after 15 to 20 years, for-profit developers that wanted to end the partnership could prepay their mortgages, leaving tenants in those buildings "at risk" of rent increascs and/or evictions. This article discusses that partnership, its options for dissolution, and the current solutions to the problem of the expiring agreements, including a moratorium, vouchers, and incentives. The compromise legislation responds to all interested parties- owners, current and would-be tenants, local governments, taxpayers- through a multi-stage sequence of dissolution, yet such a finely tuned, acutely sensitive legislative solution may not work easily or efficiently.     

Ecogenic Housing:

No abstract available for this article.     

基于住宅过滤理论对广州城市廉租房建设模式的思考

受到政府资金供给不足影响,广州廉租房建设出现了政策覆盖面窄、廉租社区配套不足等问题。由住宅过滤理论对城市住房保障问题的启示,笔者认为广州不应再采用规模兴建新住宅的方式,而应该引导、促进市场的住房过滤,将市场过滤出的低质量住宅作为向低收入家庭提供廉租住宅的主要渠道。     

Sheltered Housing in Britain

Following an analysis of the growing "need" and demand for sheltered housing, the paper considers the function of different sheltered housing types and the role of the warden. Sheltered housing management is also addressed and planning and policy conclusions drawn. The principle sources of data referred to in the paper consist of surveys of 17 housing managers, 156 wardens and some 5,000 or so tenant records, drawn from the urban West Midlands and rural Devon. Management and warden opinions and characteristics are analaysed against site and tenant characteristics (e.g., demographic, health, activity and movement/transition patterns).