The nexus of poverty and housing insecurity : Developing a Household Housing Insecurity Index (HHII) / Steven Henry Dunga
Abstract
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) recognise poverty as one of the biggest challenges to the achievement of global development. Poverty is featured among the top challenges of the 21stcentury, which include ecological collapse, climate change, war, chemicals in the environment, food, disease and delusional thinking. The World Bank in its 2020 report titled “reversals of fortunes” acknowledges the reversals that are being experienced due to the covid-19 pandemic on the progress made in achieving SGD1. The relevance of poverty in developmental discourse cannot be over emphasised. But the question remains, is the nature of poverty really understood beyond the modelling and economic terminology and policy jargon? This question arises based on the gaps that appear in the conceptualisation and measurement of poverty. Crucial components of the poverty question are either left out or blatantly underrepresented. One of the important imperatives in the fight against poverty which is housing insecurity is almost entirely unaccounted for. Housing is top of the Maslow’s hierarchy of needs together with food, water, health etcetera, however, in the seventeen SDGs driving the 2030 global Agenda, housing security does not feature. This huge gap in global recognition of the most basic need, and the trifling literature on the same, prompted the focus of my research interest and the subsequent development of the measure to be discussed in this presentation. I make use of the metaphor of an animal with multiple heads to demonstrate that poverty is multifaceted, or has many heads. I make reference to a number of papers which I wrote, some with colleagues over the past 5 years and to existing literature, howbeit small, explicating the significance of housing insecurity and the nexus between poverty and housing insecurity. The presentation starts by shedding light on poverty as it is conceptualised in literature, and beyond that, the shortfalls in the understanding and hence policy around poverty in general. The Household Housing Insecurity Index (HHII) is then introduced, conceptualised and then a case is made for a clear calculation of the HHII. The presentation ends with policy implications that include the proposition of housing as a mixed good requiring government involvement in its market for the achievement of maximum social benefit in South Africa and globally.