Urban Infrastructure
Matthew Desmond (2017). Evicted. Cambridge: Harvard University Press 2017
Monograph Structure:
8 families (B&W families) involved with eviction process
Author Opinion:
Housing is the cornerstone of civic life
Democracy relies on this love of home (one’s house)
American Dream is failing due to increased rent burden
Housing is foundation of psychological stability
P. 299 - “Eviction is a cause, not just a condition, of poverty.”
P. 306 - “There is a lot of money to be made off the poor.”
Vocabulary:
Rent burden = 30%+ on rent
Material hardship = Varies depending on the index used, basically if families experience hunger or sickness because food or medical care is financially out of reach. + May include heat, electricity, or phone
Quick facts:
P. 296 “The likelihood of being laid off is roughly 15% higher for workers who have experienced an eviction.”
P. 297 “The year after eviction, families experience 20% higher levels of material hardship than similar families who were not evicted.”
P. 302 “... but every year rental assistance programs lift roughly 2.8 million people out of poverty.”
P. 302-303 “In 2013, 1% of poor renters lived in rent-controlled units; 15% lived in public housing; and 17% received a government subsidy, mainly in the form of a rent-reducing voucher. The remaining 67% … received no federal assistance.”
P. 303-304 “In the 1963 landmark case Gideon v. Wainwright, the Supreme Court unanimously established the right to counsel for indigent defendants in criminal cases on the grounds that a fair trial was impossible without a lawyer.”
P.311-312 “In 2013, the Bipartisan Policy Center estimated that expanding housing vouchers to all renting families below the 30th percentile in median income for their area would require an additional $22.5 billion, increasing total spending on housing assistance to around $60 billion.
Historical References:
P. 301 - Mentions Progressive movement that morphed into the push for public housing → Unfortunately, morphed into “projects” - crime ridden slums
Middle class flight to suburbia
P. 303 - 1963 Gideon v Wainwright → right of counsel for indigent defendants in criminal cases.
P.306 - Exploitation of wealth in capitalism: labor movements in 1830s supported by landlords b/c possible future profits.
Conflict between freedom to profit from rents v freedom to live in home
Rapid rise in number of evictions
Enforced by law enforcement - Sheriff full time job
Moving companies that specialise in evictions
Turgid eviction courts → large # of cases, most tenants do NOT show up
Data mining information use to record past tenant evictions and court filings
“Informal evictions” - landlords encourage/coerce tenants to leave (similar to workplaces encouraging people leave instead of firing to avoid giving unemployment benefits)
Exploitation by landlords of their tenants
Relies on government support
Subsidizes luxury condos
Extra profits from government housing assistance
Law enforcement used to remove tenants
P. 313 “No moral code/ethical principle, … can be summoned to defend what we have allowed our country to become.”
Related Economic and Social Struggles
Soaring Housing costs (just take a look at Manhattan)
Stagnate incomes
Crime rates in economically impoverished neighborhoods
Unsafe childhood development
Generational inherited poverty
Deteriorating Mental Health
Clinical depression
Risk of suicide
High resident turnover hampers community growth
Racial Disparities
Color, Women demographic affected at higher rates
Solutions and Improvements Implemented/Proposed
Federally funded Housing Choice Voucher Program
Renter covers 30% of rent
Govt covers 70%
Rental assistance programs
Lawyers provided to tenants in eviction courts
Would help reduce frivolous evictions and unchecked housing abuses
Helps tenants from needing to show up in court, esp since most have jobs
Building new public housing
Very $$$
Risk of new slums and discrimination
Possible disincentive to work?
Author - Benefits > possible loss
Poor want to improve and move up too
Expand housing voucher program to ALL low-income families
Limiting rental prices - capping potential profits
Landlords have the freedom to charge as much as they want
Fighting against housing discrimination
Race basis
Income basis
Javier Auyero and Debora Swistun (2009). Flammable. Environmental Suffering in an Argentine Shantytown (Oxford University Press). Introduction.
Argentina - Federally owned Yacimientos Petrol Fiscales (YPF)
Plan Jefas y Jefes - unemployment subsidy $150/month
Initiated after 2001 economic collapse
Lead poisoning at the Flammable shantytown (Villa Inflamable at Dock Sud, Buenos Aires)
Birth defects
Learning disabilities
Residents hear rumors about possible legal settlement for their health troubles
Environmental pollution caused by the YPF facilities
Invisible power structures that keeps the residents subordinate
Symbolic violence
Invisible elbows of external power forces
Long history of toxic living conditions in US
Common pattern:
Irate housewives turned into activist
EX
Woburn, MA
Love Canal
Most account share classical Marxist model of consciousness
Physically close and aggrieved people
Overcoming false belief/persistent uncertainties
Using tools of reflection and interaction
Cognitive heuristics
Availability - tendency of individuals to give excessive importance to info that grabs their attention
Anchoring - tendency of individuals to give more emphasis or weight on first impression
Author OP:
How do people who are regularly exposed to toxic hazards come to terms about their surroundings?
US “success” cases of Marxist vision
Argentina confused and ignorance
Temporal dispersions of contamination → relational anchoring of risk perceptions
Mixed, contradictory government response → labor of confusion
Using a local resident to talk to those that live in the neighborhood helps to remove sick front that residents put up for “tourists”
Cubist Ethnography main lesson: the essence of an object is captured only by showing it simultaneously from multiple POVs
Focus on environmental suffering - special type of social suffering caused by polluting actions by specific actors + factors that mold the experience.
Nadja Popovich and Christopher Flavelle. Summer in the City Is Hot, but Some Neighborhoods Suffer More
Heat island effect - asphalt and buildings amplified heat making cities hotter than surrounding rural areas.
Poor/minority neighborhoods often bear the brunt of the heat island effect.
Baltimore
Belt of high heat in downtown and east Baltimore
Rowhouses
Cooler near the historic neighborhoods and parks
City attempts to ease heat burden
Planting more trees - 40% tree canopy goal
Turning vacant lots into permanent green spaces
Community cooling centers
Washington DC
Hot areas Brookland, Columbia Heights, and LeDroit Park
Cooler around affluent Palisades neighborhood
City attempts to ease heat burden
Planting trees - 40% tree canopy goal
New development buildings must comply with city “green” regulations
Richmond, VA
Hot areas along Arthur Ashe Blvd and around the Fan district
Overlaps areas of low income and communities of color
Health consequences of heat island effect
Highest heat-related ambulance calls/ER visits
City attempts to ease heat burden
Planting program fell drastically in 2016 - 2017
Only 2 cooling centers in the city
Portland, OR
Hot areas around the Overlook neighborhood and industrial zone next to highways
Cool areas next to the park (downtown) and across the river, West side
City attempts to reduce heat burden
New requirements for multifamily housing/apartment buildings to reduce pavement
Limit for parking to 30% of total surface area
Only 15% allowed to asphalt
More green space between buildings and street
Albuquerque
Hot areas around the downtown area esp next to central train station and bus stations
Cool areas on city Northeast Heights area b/c high elevation
City attempts to ease heat burden
New requirements for roofing materials reflect sun energy
Solar panel push
Daniel Aldana Cohen. (2019). “A Green New Deal for Housing,”. Jacobin Magazine. https://jacobinmag.com/2019/02/green-new-deal-housing-ocasio-cortez-climate
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s Green New Deal → mainly focuses on jobs
Misses the main issue on the housing crisis
Author OP:
“Best way for Green New Deal to expand, decarbonize, and guarantee housing is to build 10 million new, public, no-carbon homes in 10 years. And again.”
Climate movement has failed to better connect the two existential threats of the century
Homelessness
Climate change
“It’s time to let go of tax credits and market nudges, and get real.”
Unequal home ownership is the single most important factor in appalling wealth disparity
1968 Fair Housing Act - should in theory ensure adequate, affordable housing
Market approach to housing problems would be disastrous
Similar to 2008 housing crisis
Building boom w/ tax credits
Financing through predatory loans
Main mechanism for federally financed affordable housing construction is Low-Incoming Housing Tax Credits (LIHTC)
Subsidizes private developers
Public-private partnership = bloated corporate giveaway
Section 8 housing equally inefficient
Concentrate poverty
Leaves broken housing market intact
Link between social housing and public power
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