U.S. homeowners and renters need stronger safety nets than existing social insurance programs provide to prevent housing insecurity during economic downturns, according to a new paper based on a study by Wharton real estate professor Benjamin Keys, Robert Collinson, economics professor at the University of Notre Dame, and Ingrid Gould Ellen, professor of urban planning and policy at New York University.

In their paper “Bolstering the Housing Safety Net: The Promise of Automatic Stabilizers,” the authors propose policy reforms that could help people stay in their homes during times of economic distress and support affordable housing construction and rehabilitation.

How to Strengthen Housing Safety Nets

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