April/May 2010
In this Issue
Building Sound Housing Policy
Historical Building Blocks for Housing Demonstration Research
Past Research Demonstrations Pave Future Roads to Policy
Surveying HUD's Surveys
In the next issue of ResearchWorks
Past Research Demonstrations
Pave Future Roads to Policy
HUD sponsored three important research demonstrations between 1994 and 2004 to gauge the effectiveness of interventions designed to tackle problems emanating from concentrated poverty and severely distressed living conditions. These empirically designed demonstration programs — Moving to Opportunity (MTO), Jobs Plus, and the Effects of Housing Vouchers on Welfare Families — sought to pinpoint what approaches help improve quality of life for low-income families and neighborhoods.
Families participating in the MTO demonstration
lived in the nation's most distressed public housing
developments in five central city census tracts with
poverty rates above 40 percent. This experiment
examined the long-term effects on adult and child well-being
when publicly assisted families move from very poor
areas to neighborhoods with much lower poverty rates.
The key to the study was an experimental design that
shed light on the effects of moving to these areas and
the causal mechanisms that underlie the outcomes.
Each participating family was assigned to one of
three groups:
- An experimental group received housing vouchers to be used only in neighborhoods where less than 10 percent of the population earned incomes below the 1990 poverty level. This group received counseling and assistance in finding a private rental unit.
- A Section 8 group received vouchers according to the rules in place at the time for the program, with no geographical restrictions or special assistance.
- A control group received no interventions, but was eligible to remain in public housing.
An interim evaluation in 2002 revealed the following significant outcomes for the experimental group: an 11 percent reduction in the incidence of adult obesity, a decrease in adult psychological distress, and positive effects on girls' mental health. The evaluation noted that families who moved with vouchers improved the quality of their housing, neighborhoods, and neighborhood safety and satisfaction, and that these improvements were often much larger for the experimental group than for the Section 8 group.1 A final analysis of this 10-year study, including the longer-term effects of MTO, is anticipated for release later this year.
The Effects of Housing Vouchers on Welfare Families demonstration (originally called the Families Welfare to Work Voucher program) also studied the effect of vouchers on low-income families. This study examined the effects of vouchers on housing quality and locations of families with children; on obtaining and retaining employment; and on levels of welfare dependency, material hardship, and family well-being. The research was conducted in 6 cities, all of which had 2000 poverty rates above the national rate of 12.4 percent. Voucher recipients were current, former, or eligible Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) recipients who were able to become self-sufficient with housing assistance; housing- and employment-related program services supplemented the vouchers. Families were randomly assigned either to a group receiving vouchers to use in the private rental market or to a control group that received no demonstration assistance. To successfully lease with a voucher, participants could choose to remain in their current unit or identify a housing unit that met inspection standards and had a landlord agreeable to voucher use. An impact assessment of housing location, household composition, employment, poverty, and material hardship suggests that voucher assistance:
- Substantially reduced homelessness and overcrowded living conditions and freed up money for other necessary expenditures.
- Increased the chances of establishing smaller, independent households. At the same time, this improved self-sufficiency is thought to have affected another significant finding of the study — the treatment group experienced an increase in TANF benefits, possibly because of reduced financial support from other household members.
- Moderately increased the quality of neighborhood conditions when mobility counseling and housing search assistance were provided.
- Did not positively affect employment or earnings.2
The Jobs-Plus Community Revitalization Initiative for Public Housing Families study examined the effect of interventions to help public housing residents in six major cities secure work, increase earnings, and improve their quality of life. The intervention featured employment-related services (job search instruction, vocational training, and supportive services such as child care and transportation assistance) and social programs (such as a resident-to-resident outreach program that encouraged interactions with neighbors regarding work and training opportunities). The intervention also used rent incentives to promote work. Because public housing rents typically rise as earnings increase, Jobs Plus used rent stabilization or a slower rate of rent increase as an incentive to encourage participation. A key finding of the program's evaluation was that the rent incentive was very effective in its goal of work promotion. Overall, the most successful demonstration sites experienced the following results:
- Significant increases in individual earnings, averaging $4,564 per person over 4 years, with rent incentives playing a crucial role in this outcome.
- Although individual earnings increased, improved earnings were not found for the residents of the development as a whole. Development-wide earnings only increased in neighborhoods with low resident turnover.
- No significant rise in the total number of jobs or decline in the numbers of welfare recipients occured.
- Resident quality of life measures, including economic and material well-being, social capital, personal safety, and satisfaction with the housing development changed very little.3
What have policymakers and practitioners gained from these large-scale evaluations? Each demonstration investigated the value of new strategies to help families struggling with poverty and distressed living conditions and provided reliable evidence on what works for public housing initiatives. The MTO and the Effects of Housing Vouchers on Welfare Families demonstrations confirm that vouchers can positively contribute to the quality of life for families receiving housing assistance. The Jobs Plus findings underscore the value of employment-related supportive services and highlight the usefulness of rent incentives to advance public housing residents' efforts in gaining satisfactory employment and earnings. The lessons learned from these demonstrations continue to inform public policy and are applied in HUD's new housing policy initiatives, such as Choice Neighborhoods.
1 U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Office of Policy Development and Research, "Moving to Opportunity for Fair Housing Demonstration Program: Interim Impacts Evaluation," 2003.
2 U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Office of Policy Development and Research, "Effects of Housing Vouchers on Welfare Families," 2006.
3 Howard S. Bloom, James A. Riccio, Nandita Verma, and Johanna Walter, "Promoting Work in Public Housing: The Effectiveness of Jobs-Plus, Final Report," MDRC, 2005.
