Microsoft’s Leap Into Housing Illuminates Government’s Retreat | NYT

Yet another reminder that elections have consequences...

"Microsoft’s announcement is welcome news in the Seattle region, where housing costs have risen faster lately than in any other part of the country. But the fact that a tech company has to step in to help ensure the development of affordable housing points to a long-building reality nationwide: The federal government has largely retreated from this role.

The government spent about three times as much on housing programs in the 1970s as it does today, according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition. In the years since, the government has gotten out of the business of building public housing. And capital funds to repair the remaining public housing stock have been cut in half over the last 15 years.

Over this time, federal resources have increasingly shifted away from subsidizing the construction of affordable housing to subsidizing renters who find housing in the private market. And now most new below-market-rate housing is built not by public agencies, but by nonprofit developers leveraging tax credits. The value of those credits has declined recently as well, as a result of changes in the tax bill passed in 2017."

Microsoft’s Leap Into Housing Illuminates Government’s Retreat | NYT