Solving Our Housing Crisis Can Help Address Poverty and Child Hunger

Every family deserves the opportunity to thrive, and safety net programs can help ensure that opportunity. But if those programs fail to meet families’ needs during a time of crisis, we should be asking ourselves why, and how we can fix it.

At the Eviction Lab, we’re studying the impacts of America’s housing crisis: How the lack of affordable housing is a root cause of poverty, food insecurity, health disparities, and other critical challenges families face. Right now, we’re investigating why so many families who rely on food assistance from SNAP lose those critical benefits when they get evicted from their home.

When Housing and Food Insecurity Intersect

Access to safe, stable, affordable housing is linked with better physical and mental health, improved educational and developmental outcomes for children, financial security, and economic mobility. The loss of housing is associated with the inverse of each of these outcomes. 

Right now, there’s a nationwide shortage of affordable homes that’s forcing millions of families to spend 50% or more of their income on housing alone. This increases their risk for housing instability and eviction. Our research shows that households with children are even more likely to face eviction than those without. This could be due to numerous factors, including: 

• Childcare and employment challenges. Parents and caregivers in communities that lack affordable, reliable childcare may have more difficulty getting or keeping a job. 
• Landlord discrimination. Though children are protected under the Fair Housing Act, landlords may be less willing to rent to a mother with young children, for example, than to a single adult. 
• Income prioritization. Many families that earn limited incomes will choose to feed their kids before they pay rent.

For some families, the chance of eviction is even higher: Black and Latinx renters in general, and women in particular, are disproportionately threatened with eviction and evicted from their homes.

Improving Access to Housing and Food

The hope would be that safety net programs like SNAP would be there to help families who have been evicted get back on their feet as they seek stable housing. That’s not the reality for millions of Americans. 

For example, we’re working to understand why families lose access to their SNAP benefits when they get evicted from their homes. That includes examining the requirements families must meet to apply or re-enroll for benefits, how families receive updates and benefits, and other factors that might cause people to miss out on SNAP nutrition benefits when they’re in crisis.