Fair and affordable? Racial and ethnic segregation and inequality in New York City rental housing

Abstract

Using New York City as a case study, this article examines the extent to which current affordable rental housing programs and policies violate fair housing standards and exacerbate socio-economic inequality. New York City Housing and Vacancy Survey data are analyzed with Theil's entropy and information indices and logistic regression to pinpoint the sources of racial and ethnic segregation and inequality in specific types of rental housing. This study offers three major findings. First, despite increasing neighborhood diversity, Blacks and Latinos are significantly segregated from Whites, Asians, and other racial and ethnic groups in certain types of affordable housing. Second, race and ethnicity have a greater impact than socio-economic status on which type of housing a family occupies. Third, differences in employment, income, and poverty indicate that affordable housing located within mixed-income, multiple-family dwellings offers significant advantages over cluster developments such as public housing, which compound racial, ethnic, and socio-economic inequality.