Single mothers 10 times more likely to have public housing than married couples, data show

Single mothers are 10 times more likely to live in public housing than married couples, a dynamic that some experts say results from policies that discourage marriage.

According to data from the Department of Housing and Urban Development, single women with children receive 30% of subsidized housing benefits in the United States, compared to just 3% of families with two adults and children.

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The elderly and disabled make up the remainder of public housing recipients, bringing the total number of housing projects and vouchers to 5 million, serving 9 million Americans through programs that “have come to provide the means for unmarried women with children to have their own apartments,” American Enterprise Institute senior fellow Howard Husock wrote on Monday.

Noting that married couples are primarily not the beneficiaries of public housing aid, Husock said the income-based system for determining rental assistance, which uses a percentage of household income as the baseline for determining benefits, ultimately “both discourage[s] marriage and penalize[s] it.”

That’s because married couples often bring in two incomes, and the more money a public housing beneficiary earns, the fewer benefits they receive from the government.

“Subsidized households should no longer pay a percentage of their income as rent — a regulation which discourages increased earnings, as 30 cents on each additional dollar earned will go to increased rent; today set at 30% of income,” Husock wrote.

Historically, however, qualifying for public housing has required a “full background check” of factors that tended toward encouraging marriage and two incomes, according to Husock. For example, qualifying for public housing in 1950s New York City would favor two incomes, proof of good housekeeping habits, and the ability to pay rent.

The system even ensured “unwed women with out of wedlock children be denied admission,” as well as those with an “irregular work history.”

As families moved out of housing projects and into suburban neighborhoods after World War II, housing authorities began losing rent revenue, culminating in a 1969 law limiting rental responsibility to 25% of household income.

“That set the stage for the exodus of working families — whose rents would rise if their income did — and for the conversion of public and subsidized housing to the domain of the poorest,” Husock said.

Today, the median income of a person in public or subsidized housing is $8,000, according to HUD, and 77% of beneficiaries are considered “lowest-income.” Additionally, modern New York City qualifications are dramatically different from the 1950s. Priority is afforded to those “living in substandard housing, doubled-up or overcrowded in private housing, paying more than 50% of family gross income for rent.”

“One can, of course, see these rules as meant to accommodate those in greatest need,” Husock wrote. “But it’s also a way to enable the choice of single-parenthood, knowing it puts one at the head of the line for one’s own, subsidized apartment.”

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There is also no limit to how much time one can spend in the assisted housing, Husock noted, adding that the average length of tenancy is 10 years.

Husock cited some solutions to public housing that would encourage families and marriage and would include setting a flat rate for rent and a time limit on tenancy in order to encourage making a “plan for a post-subsidized life.”