Mistakes Made

There have been lots of mistakes made regarding public housing. Most of these mistakes can be attributed to the real estate industry and government mismanagement. Public housing was once very popular and provided cheaper and sometimes nicer alternatives to private housing. This proved to be a great threat to the real estate industry. The government with influence from the real estate industry then made public housing only available to the very poor by passing the 1949 Housing Act. This made public housing less popular and the stocks in public housing plummeted as a result. It also further isolated the poor keeping them in one area. When stocks declined government neglect of public housing began to rise. The concentration of poor people in public housing began to rise along with mismanagement and further neglect of maintenance. By 1988 the average income of a public housing household was one fifth of the national average. This shows that the changes made in public housing had a very detrimental effect. Public housing areas became areas of deep poverty and became more concentrated with minorities. In these public housing areas experiencing deep poverty crime rates and illegal activity increased dramatically. Concentration of poor, crime rates, and a discrepancy for funding public housing is why public housing is in such a miserable state today.
http://www.nhi.org/online/issues/77/pubhsg.html