Tesco
How Homeownership Became the Engine of American Inequality
Article

How Homeownership Became the Engine of American Inequality

Matthew Desmond
The New York Times, 2017
Read the article

Read or listen offline

automatisch generiertes Audio
  • 0.5×
  • 0.75×
  • 1×
  • 1.25×
  • 1.5×
  • 1.75×
1×
automatisch generiertes Audio

Editorial Rating

8

Qualities

  • Analytical
  • Applicable
  • Eye Opening

Recommendation

Social Security. Medicaid. When it comes to federal aid, you’re most likely to think of programs that aid the poorest Americans. However, the US government channels billions of dollars in invisible aid to wealthy homeowners. As President Donald Trump cuts housing programs and poor renters struggle, it’s important to consider how the current system exacerbates inequality. Find insight and empathy in a thought-provoking exploration with Pulitzer Prize–winning author and sociologist Matthew Desmond. getAbstract recommends his analysis to curious policymakers and activists.

Take-Aways

  • While the average homeowner has a net worth of $195,400 – 36 times more than the average renter – US housing policy favors rich homeowners and ignores poor renters.
  • Like Social Security and Medicare, the mortgage-interest deduction (MID) has grown into a ”politically untouchable” entitlement program. Experts expect the benefit’s cost to swell to more than $96 billion by 2019. 
  • The MID excludes many nonwhites and middle-class homeowners who don’t itemize their tax returns – or those saving for a down payment.

About the Author

Author and sociologist Matthew Desmond wrote the Pulitzer Prize–winning book, Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City.

Comment on this summary or Diskussion beginnen