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least 50% of their income on rent, a \past decade has produced windfalls for Americans who owned before it began, but affordable housing is now a serious problem for more low- and moderate-income Americans than taxes, Social Security4 or gas prices.

2住房拥有率接近历史最高位，但有房户和无房户之间的差距越来越大，有房户和房子离工作单位80英里远的有房户之间的差距也越来越大。现在，1／3的美国人花费至少30％的收入用于住房，联邦政府将这种情况定义为“无力支付”的负担，而有一半的穷打工仔花费至少50％的收入用于租房，这种情况被称为“极其严重”的负担。在过去10年里，房地产迅猛发展，这使得在此之前就已经购置房产的美国人大赚特赚了一把，但现在廉价房对中、低收入的美国人来说，是一个比税收、社会保险、汽油价格更严重的问题。

3 America used to care a lot about affordable housing. Roosevelt signed housing legislation in 1934 and 1937, providing mortgages, government apartments and construction jobs for workers down on their luck. In 1949, Congress .set an official goaljjf \decent home and a suitable living environment for every American family,\and in 1974, President Richard M. Nixon began offering subsidized rent vouchers to millions of low-income tenants in private housing. For half a century, most housing debates in Washington revolved around how much to expand federal assistance.

3美国曾经非常关注廉价房问题。1934年和1937年，罗斯福签署了住房立法，提供抵押贷款、政府公寓，并为那些穷困潦倒的工人提供建筑工作。1949年，国会树立了官方目标——“让每一个美国家庭都能拥有一个体面的家和宜居环境，”而到了1974年，尼克松总统开始对数以百万计的低收入租户在私有住房方面提供租金补贴凭单。半个世纪以来，在华

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盛顿发生的大多数住房方面的辩论都围绕着一个主题：即应该在多大程度上扩大联邦政府的资助。

4 But for the past two decades, the only new federal housing initiative has been HOPE VI5, a Clinton administration program that has demolished 80,000 units of the worst public housing and built mixed-income developments in their place. The program has eliminated most of the high-rise hellholes that gave public housing a bad name and has revived some urban neighborhoods. But it has razed more subsidized apartments than it has replaced.

4但在过去20年中，唯一的联邦住房新提案就是HOPE VI，也就是克林顿政府拆毁80,000单位的最差公共住房，重建混合收入寓所来取而代之。该计划已经拆除了大部分高度危险的房子，它们曾使公共住房声名狼藉，并已重建了一些城市的社区。但是它更多的是把享有补贴的公寓房夷为平地而不是取而代之。

5 Overall, the number of households receiving federal aid has flatlined since the early 1990s, despite an expanding population and a ballooning budget. Congress has rejected most of President Bush's proposed cuts, but there has been virtually no discussion of increases; affordable-housing advocates spend most of their time fighting to preserve the status quo.

5总的来说，自90年代初以来，接受联邦援助的家庭数已经降到最低，尽管人口不断增加、预算不断膨胀。美国国会已经拒绝了美国总统布什提出的大部分的削减计划，但几乎没有讨论过增加计划；廉价房的倡导者花费的大部分时间都被用于努力争取保持现状。

6 And it's a tough status quo. Today, for every one of the 4.5 million low-income families that receive federal housing assistance, there are three eligible families

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without it. Fairfax County has 12,000 families on a waiting list for 4,000 assisted apartments. \golden when you get one—nobody wants to give it up,\says Conrad Egan, chairman of the Fairfax housing authority. It sounds odd, but the victims of today's housing crisis are not people living in \who aren't even that lucky.

6而现状真是很艰难。今天，有450万低收入家庭享受联邦住房救助，还有3倍于此的家庭符合被救助资格，却拿不到救助。费尔法克斯县有12,000户家庭在排队轮候4,000套救助公寓。“这太宝贵了，一旦拥有，没有人愿意放弃。”费尔法克斯住房委员会主席康拉德·艾根这样说。这听起来奇怪，但如今住房危机的受害者不是那些已经享受“救助计划”的人，而是那些没那么幸运去享受这个计划的人。

7 Some liberals6 dream of extending subsidies to all eligible low-income families, but that $100 billion-a-year solution was unrealistic even before the budget deficit ballooned again. So even some housing advocates now support time limits on most federal rent aid. The time limits included in welfare reform 10 years ago were controversial, but studies suggest they've helped motivate recipients to get off the dole. And unlike welfare, housing aid is not a federal entitlement, so taking it away from one family after a few years would provide a break for an equally deserving family.

7一些自由派人士梦想着对所有合格的低收入家庭都给予补贴，但是这个每年要斥资上千亿美元的解决办法很不现实，即便是在预算赤字再度膨胀之前也不现实。因此，即使一些曾经主张住房政策的人，现在也支持对大多数联邦租房救济金实行时间限制。人们对10年前福利改革中所涉及的时限问题有争议，但研究表明，这些时限有助于激励受助人摆脱对福利的

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依赖。和福利不同的是，住房救济金不是联邦所赋予的权利，因此几年后对一个家庭停止供给意味着给另一个同样需要救济的家庭一个喘息的机会。

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8“这是显而易见的事，”大卫·史密斯——波士顿的一位廉价房的倡导者说，“你不能让内在矛盾无限地延续。”

9 The root of the problem is the striking mismatch between the demand for and the supply of affordable housing —or, more accurately, affordable housing near jobs. Fifteen million families now spend at least half their income on housing, according to Harvard's Joint_CenterfOTHousing Studies: many skimp on health care, child care and food to do so. Others reduce their rents by overcrowding, which studies link to higher crime rates, poorer academic performance and poorer health; Los Angeles alone has 620.000 homes with more than one person per room. Other workers are enduring increasingly long commutes from less expensive communities, a phenomenon known as \

9问题的根源是廉价房的供需，或者更准确地说，工作地点附近的廉价房的供需之间极不协调。据哈佛大学住宅联合研究中心提供的数据，现在有1,500万个家庭至少把他们一半的收入用于支付住房费用；许多人为了住房甚至在医疗保健、照顾儿童和食品等方面节省开支。其他人为了减少租金，居住条件极为拥挤，研究表明，拥挤的居住条件与高犯罪率、学习成绩差、以及健康状况不佳紧密相关；仅洛杉矶就有62万户家庭多人共居一室。其他工作者居住在较为便宜的社区，忍受着越来越长距离的交通往返，这种现象被称为“驾驶以保生活