In Homelessness Is a Housing Problem, Gregg Colburn and Clayton Page Aldern seek to explain the substantial regional variation in rates of homelessness in cities across the United States. In a departure from many analytical approaches, Colburn and Aldern shift their focus from the individual experiencing homelessness to the metropolitan area. Using accessible statistical analysis, they test a range of conventional beliefs about what drives the prevalence of homelessness in a given city—including mental illness, drug use, poverty, weather, generosity of public assistance, and low-income mobility—and find that none explain the regional variation observed across the country. Instead, housing market conditions, such as the cost and availability of rental housing, offer a far more convincing account. With rigor and clarity, Homelessness Is a Housing Problem explores U.S. cities’ diverse experiences with housing precarity and offers policy solutions for unique regional contexts.
Gregg Colburn is an assistant professor of real estate in the University of Washington’s College of Built Environments. He received his Ph.D. in Public Affairs from the Humphrey School of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota. His research interests include housing policy, housing markets, housing affordability, and homelessness. He is the author of Homelessness is a Housing Problem (order the book here).
Gregg entered academia after spending the first seventeen years of his professional life in the private sector. At the University of Washington, Gregg enjoys teaching courses in housing, economics, and finance at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. He maintains an active research agenda focused on housing policy, housing markets, housing affordability, and homelessness. Gregg is also actively engaged in a wide range of community efforts to address the acute housing crisis in the Puget Sound region.