UC San Diego

This dissertation comprises three chapters on topics related to low-income housing policies in the United States. Each chapter uses econometric methods to analyze data from administrative sources, aiming to establish causal relationships between variables of interest.

In the first chapter, I provide evidence on how the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit policy impacts children’s short- and medium-run human capital formation. I construct a novel dataset using the San Diego Unified School District administrative data and the California LIHTC database. Combining propensity score matching and difference-in-differences, I find an 0.28 percentage points decrease in the absenteeism rate, a 0.049 standard deviation increase in standardized English scores, and a 0.048 standard deviation increase in standardized math scores for students who moved into LIHTC during the study period. I also find positive effects on high school completion, college enrollment, and college completion.

In the second chapter, I explore the impact of LIHTC on homelessness. Although an increase in affordable housing supply is observed, the effect on households at risk of homelessness is unclear. Combining point-in-time homeless counts and the LIHTC database from the Department of Housing and Urban Development, I construct a panel dataset that allows me to examine changes in homelessness on the Continuum of Care level from 2009 to 2019. With a first-differenced model, I find that one additional LIHTC unit is associated with a decrease of 1.1 homeless people. I also find that sheltered families and children are the primary beneficiaries of new LIHTC units.

In the third chapter, I estimate the impact of the right-to-counsel policy in housing courts. New York City introduced a novel policy in 2018 to provide the right to counsel in housing courts for income-eligible tenants facing eviction. This policy allows low-income households better access to the formal justice system. Taking advantage of the staggered roll-out schedule on the zip code level, I estimate the causal effect of the policy change using a difference-in-differences approach. Despite no statistically significant impact on eviction filings, I find a 16.9 percent decrease in quarterly evictions. The results demonstrate positive impacts of tenant representation on evictions in the short run.