housing & unemployment

[Michael Perelman <michael@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Tyler Cowen's Marginal Revolution web site points to Andrew Oswald's finding that
home ownership is the most reasonable explanation for differences in unemployment
rates between countries.  The scatter graph has a very impressive fit.

http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/economics/staff/faculty/oswald/homesnt.pdf

I first saw this phenomenon when we would drive through West Virginia back in the
late 50s & early 60s.  I was struck by the unemployed coal miners sitting on their
porches.  Their houses were quite nice, but nobody wanted to buy them because the
economy was dead.

Later, my brother moved to Youngstown, Ohio after then steel mills shut down.  I
remember when he called my bemoaning that a tornado missed his home by only a few
hundred yards.  At the time, arson was the most important industry in the town.



--
Michael Perelman
Economics Department
California State University
Chico, CA 95929

Tel. 530-898-5321
E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu
michaelperelman.wordpress.com