Does Rental Assistance Improve Mental Health? Insights from a Longitudinal Cohort Study
| Autor: | Jonathan Purtle, Whitney Denary, Kim M. Blankenship, Andrew Fenelon, Penelope Schlesinger, Danya E. Keene |
|---|---|
| Jazyk: | angličtina |
| Rok vydání: | 2021 |
| Předmět: |
Adult
Health (social science) Article 03 medical and health sciences Renting 0302 clinical medicine History and Philosophy of Science Urban planning Humans 030212 general & internal medicine Longitudinal Studies Longitudinal cohort Poverty Budget constraint business.industry 030503 health policy & services Psychological distress Mental health United States Haven Cross-Sectional Studies Mental Health Cohort Housing Demographic economics Business 0305 other medical science |
| Zdroj: | Soc Sci Med |
| Popis: | Almost half of renters in the United States are rent-burdened, meaning that they pay more than 30% of their income toward housing costs. Rental assistance through programs administered by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, alleviates these financial strains for around 5 million households. However, due to budgetary constraints, fewer than one in four eligible households actually receive this assistance and waitlists average two years nationally. Using longitudinal data from a cohort of 400 low-income adults living in New Haven, CT, this paper investigates how access to rental assistance affects mental health through two analytical methods that address selection into rental assistance. First, we performed a cross-sectional analysis to identify how psychological distress differs among those receiving and those on a waitlist for rental assistance. Second, we used a within-person fixed-effects analysis to compare changes in individuals following entry into rental assistance. We find that those receiving rental assistance report significantly less psychological distress than those on waiting lists and that transitions into rental assistance are associated with statistically non-significant decreases in psychological distress. Our findings suggest that expanding rental assistance may be one potential step toward improving the mental health of low-income individuals in the United States. |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
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