Short-run Housing Responses to Changes in Income
利用密歇根大学收入动态面板数据，研究家庭收入增加如何影响搬家后的年度住房支出，发现短期弹性比长期弹性更适用于评估住房补贴政策。
Income maintenance and housing allowance plans, both currently being evaluated as potential federal programs for low-income families, provide households with supplements to income which increase the demand for housing. While income maintenance schemes allow the consumer complete freedom of choice with respect to consumption, housing allowance plans may constrain choice in a variety of ways.1 The response of housing demand to changes in income is a significant factor in assessing the relative merits of these two programs. The research presented here is concemed with the impact of increased income on the annual housing expenditures of households who have moved. The data employed are drawn from the University of Michigan panel study of income dynamics, which follows a sample of 5,000 households over a period of years. These panel data allow us to link each household's change in income over time with changes in its demand for housing. Most previous studies of housing demand rely on cross-sectional estimates which are long run: they implicitly assume a household would respond to a different income level just as would a household who may have been at that level for a long enough period of time to acquire a different set of tastes. To the extent that households move from one short-run adjustment to another because of repeated changes in economic circumstances, rather than ever actually achieving the implied long-run equilibrium, short-run elasticities may be more revelant for evaluating housing policy.