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Housing Affordability and Health: Evidence From New York City

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  • Rachel Meltzer
  • Alex Schwartz

Abstract

It is generally understood that households make tradeoffs between housing costs and other living expenses. In this article, we examine the relationship between health-related outcomes and housing-induced financial burdens for renters in one of the most expensive cities in the world, New York, New York. Drawing from the Housing Vacancy Survey for 2011, a representative survey conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau of more than 16,000 households in New York City, we estimate the effect of housing cost burden on the overall health of renters and the extent to which they have postponed various types of medical services for financial reasons. Results show that higher out-of-pocket rent burdens are associated with worse self-reported health conditions and a higher likelihood to postpone medical services for financial reasons. This relationship is particularly strong for those households with severe rent burdens. In addition, housing cost burden is equally or more important than other physical housing characteristics in explaining the variation in self-reported general health status and health care postponement. These findings are robust across specifications with different degrees of household, unit/building, and neighborhood controls, and among longstanding and newer renters. Our findings point to the importance of considering health-related outcomes when designing housing policies, and that housing subsidies should target both renters' out-of-pocket costs and place-based repair and maintenance.

Suggested Citation

  • Rachel Meltzer & Alex Schwartz, 2016. "Housing Affordability and Health: Evidence From New York City," Housing Policy Debate, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 26(1), pages 80-104, January.
  • Handle: RePEc:taf:houspd:v:26:y:2016:i:1:p:80-104
    DOI: 10.1080/10511482.2015.1020321
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    Cited by:

    1. Shirmin Bintay Kader & Md Sabbir Ahmed & Kristen Desjarlais-deKlerk & Xavier Leloup & Laurence Simard & Catherine Leviten-Reid & Nazeem Muhajarine, 2024. "Rental Housing Type and Self-Reported General Health and Mental Health Status: Evidence from the Canadian Housing Survey 2018–2019," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 21(9), pages 1-19, September.
    2. Dimitris Zavras, 2020. "Studying Healthcare Affordability during an Economic Recession: The Case of Greece," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(21), pages 1-21, October.
    3. Siliang Wang & Conghui Cheng & Shukui Tan, 2019. "Housing Determinants of Health in Urban China: A Structural Equation Modeling Analysis," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 143(3), pages 1245-1270, June.
    4. Min Zhou & Wei Guo, 2023. "Self-rated Health and Objective Health Status Among Rural-to-Urban Migrants in China: A Healthy Housing Perspective," Population Research and Policy Review, Springer;Southern Demographic Association (SDA), vol. 42(1), pages 1-24, February.
    5. Cohen, Nevin & Ilieva, Rositsa T., 2021. "Expanding the boundaries of food policy: The turn to equity in New York City," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 103(C).
    6. Swope, Carolyn B. & Hernández, Diana, 2019. "Housing as a determinant of health equity: A conceptual model," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 243(C).
    7. Denary, Whitney & Fenelon, Andrew & Schlesinger, Penelope & Purtle, Jonathan & Blankenship, Kim M. & Keene, Danya E., 2021. "Does rental assistance improve mental health? Insights from a longitudinal cohort study," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 282(C).
    8. Hembre, Erik & Collins, J. Michael & Wylde, Samuel, 2024. "A rising tide lifts all homes? Housing consumption trends for low-income households since the 1980s," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 233(C).
    9. Aynaz Lotfata & George Grekousis & Ruoyu Wang, 2023. "Using geographical random forest models to explore spatial patterns in the neighborhood determinants of hypertension prevalence across chicago, illinois, USA," Environment and Planning B, , vol. 50(9), pages 2376-2393, November.
    10. Chen, Jun-Hong & Jones, Dylan & Lee, Jihye & Yan, Yufu & Hsieh, Wan-Jung & Huang, Chieh-Hsun & Yang, Yuanyuan & Wu, Chi-Fang & Jonson-Reid, Melissa & Drake, Brett, 2024. "Do the benefits of homeownership on mental health vary by race and poverty status? An application of doubly robust estimation for causal inference," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 351(C).

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