The measurement and trend of housing inequality in the United States, 1978–85

Abstract

Inequality in housing services for renters, owners and all households in the United States is estimated for 1978 and 1985. Hedonic techniques are applied to data from the American Housing Survey to derive values for housing services that include publicly provided as well as subsidized housing. We find significant disparities in housing, but substantially less inequality than in incomes. In 1978 the top decile garnered 19.2% of housing services while the bottom decile received only 5.1%. The trend, however, is towards greater equality in housing with large and statistically significant shifts across all deciles. By 1985 the share of the top decile dropped to 16.3% (a percentage decrease in share of 15.3%) while that of the bottom decile rose to 5.7% (a percentage increase of 11.4%.)