The bedroom tax

Stephen Gibbons, Olmo Silva and Maria Sánchez-Vidal

CEP Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Performance, LSE

Abstract: Housing subsidies for low income households are a central pillar of many welfare systems, but an expensive one. This paper investigates the consequences of an unusual policy aimed at reducing the burden of these subsidies by rationing tenants' use of space. Specifically, we study a policy introduced by the UK Government in 2013 which substantially cut housing benefits for tenants deemed to have a 'spare' bedroom - based on specific criteria related to household composition. Our study is the first to evaluate the impacts of the policy on its target group considering a range of outcomes. To do so, we use a difference-in-difference methodology that compares the observed behaviour of the treated households relative to a control group determined from the details of the policy rules. We find that - as expected - the treated group experienced losses to housing benefit and overall income. Although the policy was not successful in encouraging residential moves, it did incentivise people who moved to downsize - suggesting some success in terms of one of the policy goals, namely reducing 'under-occupancy' in the long run. We find no statistically significant effects on households' food consumption, savings or employment outcomes, despite the associated income reductions. Finally, we find some evidence of a reduction in self-reported satisfaction though this effect is not precisely estimated.

Keywords: social housing; social rents; bedroom tax; housing benefits (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H2 H55 R21 R28 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-eur, nep-pbe, nep-pub and nep-ure
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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Related works:
Journal Article: The bedroom tax (2020)
Working Paper: The bedroom tax (2018)
Working Paper: The bedroom tax (2018)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cep:cepdps:dp1537

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