ABSTRACT
This book explores five of the US'.s most fundamental recurrent issues in housing its population in an effort to explain why housing remains among the United States' most enduring social problems. It describes five major housing problems the US currently faces: unaffordable housing; homelessness; segregation and discrimination in the housing market; homeownership and home financing; and housing planning, land use, and the environment. Two primary debates recur throughout each chapter of this book: (1) how do we balance the social and economic goals of housing in a capitalist system?; and (2) what is the government's role in the housing market? Two major trends have characterized government intervention in the housing market in the past four decades: the neoliberal turn—the political shift toward funding market-based solutions to social problems; and the devolution of housing policy—the reliance on local governments to set and enforce housing policy.
