Does public housing occupancy increase unemployment?

Does public housing occupancy increase unemployment?

[SHS:ECO] Humanities and Social Sciences/Economy and finances

Public housing

unemployment

simultaneous probit models

instrumental variables

This paper shows that living in public housing has no effect on the probability of being unemployed in France, once we account for the endogeneity of public housing. We estimate a simultaneous probit model of unemployment and public housing. On a first sample for Lyon, we instrument public housing with the gender composition of children. On a second national sample, the instrument is the city-level share of public housing. Both samples yield the same conclusion, which we justify by showing that a small amount of selection on unobservables is enough to eliminate the positive effect found in “naive” estimates.

Dujardin, Claire

Goffette-Nagot, Florence

Journal of Economic Geography

ISSN:1468-2702

2009

ENG

article in peer-reviewed journal

http://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/halshs-00436679

DOI: 10.1093/jeg/lbp002

http://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/docs/00/43/66/79/PDF/DujardinGoffette_JEG20098_VAuteurs-1.pdf