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Housing Crisis in Metropolitan Areas
Housing Crisis in Metropolitan Areas
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Affordable housing remains a major problem in many U.S. metropolitan areas. Over the years, demand for housing has outpaced supply, driving up the cost of housing. Housing takes up the most spending in most American households, especially for renters. The stagnation of wages with the rising cost of living has contributed to the higher proportion of income spent on housing. Some important metro areas facing a housing crisis in the country include New York City, San Francisco, Boston, and Washington D.C. more and more people are moving to these areas, further driving up housing costs by increasing demand. The U.D. Department of Housing and Urban Development is responsible for the creation and enforcement of housing laws and policies across the country. Many other local and state bodies create and implement local housing policies to supplement the federal role of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
The main cause of the housing crisis is the fact that there are fewer houses being built. The location of these houses is also a major factor. There are various arguments as to who benefits from expansion, or lack thereof, of new housing. An explanation for rising costs of housing is the gentrification of neighborhoods, while the other reason is increasingly restrictive land-use policies that prevent the construction of new housing (Calder, 2017). Regulation plays a significant role in the housing market. Profit is the primary motive behind risky investment in housing, and excessive regulation increases the risks. When local governments enforce barriers to development, they contribute to the crisis. For example, if local governments implement restrictive zoning laws, developers may opt to acquire then rehabilitate existing properties. Old, cheap apartment buildings are then renovated and upgraded, raising their cost without providing alternative cheap housing. Such laws have contributed to the housing crisis in metropolitan areas.
The housing problem in metro areas affects multiple parties. The most affected parties are home owners and renters. People have to spend an increasing proportion of their income on housing, and some of them can no longer afford to pay for their homes. The housing crisis also affects employers. Employers need employees from all economic backgrounds, and when these employees cannot find affordable housing, they cannot take up jobs in certain areas. Employers will have a hard time filling low-level positions whose pay cannot sustain living in the area. The housing crisis also affects the economy of the metro area. When people spend more money on housing due to rising costs, they have less disposable income to spend on other things. Customers have to restrict their spending based on housing costs, affecting the economy of the area. Reducing the cost of housing will have a multiplier effect on the economy (Terwilliger, 2017). Higher consumption of goods and services will stimulate employment growth in other sectors.
One of the significant reasons why housing is so expensive in D.C. is the high cost of land in the area. One acre of land costs approximately $1.2 million, driving up housing costs (Brooks et al. 2020). This, coupled with construction and other associated costs, result in very expensive rates for housing. Another reason for the restriction of housing in D.C. is zoning laws. High-priced neighborhoods have laws preventing the construction of new housing in the area. Restrictive zoning laws drive up the price of properties in two ways. First, since developers cannot increase the number of new developments in the area, they increase the existing properties’ quality and size. This increase further drives up the values of housing, making the situation worse. Additionally, homeowners in such places have adequate space to expand their homes, increasing their value as well. A Brookings article examining the issue explains that restricted zones receive more permits for alterations and expansion than those in high-density zones.
D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser has proposed several measures to address the metro region’s housing crisis. It is approximated that the area requires an additional 320,000 housing units between 2020 and 2030. From this number, the number of affordable housing units needed stands at 75% (Brooks et al. 2020). Mayor Bowser has already set in motion plans to achieve this goal. She plans to have 36000 new housing units completed by 2025. The city has also committed to having a third of these units affordable. The Department of Housing and Community Development is in charge of this project, whose goals include the revitalization of neighborhoods and preservation and creation of affordable housing. Although these units may seem few compared to the overall need, it is still a step in the right direction. The major beneficiaries of this project are home renters and employers who will be able to hire low-level employees from the area.
President Biden has proposed several measures to ease the housing shortage in the country at the federal level. The administration has come up with a ten-year plan that will cost approximately $640 billion. Although most of the policies in the new proposal will ease the housing crisis from the covid 19 pandemic, they will also form part of long-term solutions. One of the proposals is that $ 5 billion be dedicated to addressing the health and housing needs of the homeless across the country (Skahen, 2021). Homelessness has become a major issue in metro areas where people cannot afford to pay their rent and get thrown out, leaving them with nowhere to go. Some of this money will go towards building affordable homes for low-income earners, reducing the proportion of income that families and individuals spend on rent.
These solutions will work best in a Home Rule City. Home Rule allows local governments to create and implement policies that fit their needs best. For example, with the housing crisis, local governments can implement policies for affordable housing depending on community needs. Different metro areas have different needs and demographics, meaning that flexible policies would work best. Solutions need to be tailored to local needs to make them as effective as possible. Using the example of D.C., the mayor is working with local officials to create a local solution to a local problem (Baca, 2020). Leaving the problem to state legislature would take years while the problem grows as time goes by. Home Rule also allows quicker implementation of projects as local legislatures frequently meet to discuss and decide on local issues affecting them.
In summary, the housing crisis continues to grow by the day across metropolitan areas. The higher demand for housing in these areas, coupled with lower supply, has driven up the cost of housing. Low-income earners can no longer afford to live in their former homes. The housing problem affects many people, such as people buying and renting homes, the local economy, and other players in the real estate market. Some possible solutions to the problem include implementing local regulation on affordable housing and setting aside funding for new housing projects based on demand. Home Rule cities will have an easier time addressing housing crises as they can create and implement policies that fit their unique local needs. Housing should be treated as a fundamental human right rather than a situation where the highest bidder wins.
References
Baca, A. (2020, 10 March). “DC’s housing crisis is about more than just how much housing to build—but where it goes as well.” Department of Housing and Community Development https://dhcd.dc.gov/release/dc%E2%80%99s-housing-crisis-about-more-just-how-much-housing-build%E2%80%94-where-it-goes-wellBrooks, L., Denoeux, G.,& Schuetz, J. (2020, 4 June) “The Washington, DC region needs more housing, and satellite data can tell us where to build.” Brookings. https://www.brookings.edu/blog/the-avenue/2020/06/03/the-washington-dc-region-needs-more-housing-and-satellite-data-can-tell-us-where-to-build/Calder, V. (2017). Zoning, land-use planning, and housing affordability. Cato Institute Policy Analysis, (823).
Skahen, R. K. (2021). Opportunity in a Pandemic: Ending the Eviction Cycle by Constitutionally Providing for Inclusionary Zoning with State-Enacted Land-Use Regulations. Campbell Law Review, 43(3), 375.
Terwilliger, J. R. (2017). Solving the Affordable Housing Crisis: The Key to Unleashing America’s Potential. J. Affordable Hous. & Cmty. Dev. L., 26, 255.
As soon as the gigantic church bell went, every man in my neighborhood had to gather in the church compound.
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As soon as the gigantic church bell went, every man in my neighborhood had to gather in the church compound. That day, everybody swore it was different. The familiar pattern of the ding dong was etched in our ears. Not the frantic, uncoordinated ringing that made the bell sound like a siren that i was witnessing today. Moreover, never before had the bell chimed at such a late hour. It was almost unthinkable for anyone to be walking outside in these parts shortly past midnight. However, in our little upstate town, defying a summons by the bishop was even more unthinkable.
I walked outside my cabin and reached for the water point by the chicken coop. I scooped a handful of water and hurriedly wet my face, rubbing my eyes in one swift motion. A yellow lamp shone suddenly at about knee height ten feet away from me. It startled me a little before I made out my brother’s shadow as it played in the bright light. He reached for a crowbar on the ground by his foot and set off briskly towards the church. He always had a sharper nose for danger. So I picked up a rock that perfectly fits my palm and started after the bright light ahead that was receding into the distance fast. The bells were still ringing.
On the main road, the stream of trekkers swelled by the minute as more men joined in from the adjoining lanes. I was surprised to make out several weapons in the half-lit night. Several lamps supplemented the light from my brother’s lamp. He had planted himself at the head of the rather quiet group, which was now about two hundred strong. A little forest started on both sides of the road as soon as one cleared the last house of our small town. On a normal day, one would walk for about ten minutes before the trees on the right gave way abruptly to a large wooden church. I suddenly found myself standing just below the bell between the two colossal steel poles between which it was suspended about forty feet high. The bell ringer left his role shortly after we arrived perhaps because we were the last group.
There was a constant chatter as the men found their voices. Small clusters of no more than five men had formed, but it was hard to make out what was being said. Eavesdropping was not my style either. I let my mind stray and recounted the more impactful announcements that had been made on this field in my lifetime. I also thought about my blankets and why the bishop had allowed us to stand there for more than fifteen minutes without addressing us. My brother had been moving around pretty quickly, getting talking confidentially to the more senior men in the crowd. Now I was interested in what was being discussed, but it seemed as if the people deliberately checked their speech as soon as I got close.
Within no time, there was a reorganization of the multitude into rows and columns. Most other men had seen it all before as they seemed aware of their place in what was turning out to be a parade of sorts. Several boys my age or slightly younger joined me by bell posts. My brother came to where we were and found places for each of us, among the others. He then took his place as the first person in the column I was in and whistled loudly. That was when the solemn-looking bishop came out of the massive church doors wearing his ceremonial robe, a small bottle of holy water in his hand, which he sprinkled on all of us. My brother blew his whistle again and followed the bishop as he left our presence. Two other men went into the church and came out with a sack that seemed very heavy and dropped them. My brother, who I had looked up to all my life, opened the bags to reveal a bunch of swords whose shiny blades made my throat raspy all of a sudden. I was going to war.
house of quality
House of Quality
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HOQ is total or holistic approach to business; it goes beyond just focusing on customers or products alone. Therefore an organization cannot just wake up one day and decide that they want to integrate HOQ in their operations. It is a strategy process that an organization must prepare for in advance. This is why I want to study the characteristics that are supposed to be portrayed by S.L. Horsford’s in order to show their readiness for HOQ implementation. Obviously there are some issues that will need to be addressed while there are others which may be already in place. Others may need more time to be addressed whereas others may take a short time. This is why I want to identify all the areas that this company needs to re-align in readiness for HOQ implementation.
House of Quality Defined
House of Quality is a familiar term that has been used in the business cycles for quite along time. The Gurus of HOQ discipline like Juran, Deming, Ishikawa and Crosby have all defined HOQ concept in different methods but the spirit and essence still has more or less remained the same. In the words of Deming, “HOQ is a continuous quality improvement process aimed towards a predictable degree of dependability and uniformity”. He went ahead and identified fourteen principles of HOQ designed to improve performance and productivity of the company. On the same note Juran defined quality as “fitness for use.” Juran believes that every individual in the organization must be involved in activities that make goods or services that are fit for use. Crosby defines quality as “conformance to requirements”. Crosby’s aim is to do everything right at the first time so as to avoid defects as much as possible.
According to Brenda et al (1995), HOQ can be defined as an organisation’s continued endeavour to achieve quality assurance, planning, control and improvement. Thus we can say HOQ is a holistic approach to the ways in which an organisation conducts its operations. In the words of Ishikawa, (1985) HOQ can also be defined as a “management philosophy that aims to integrate all the functions of the organization”. This includes such areas like marketing, engineering, design, finance, and customer care to focus on meeting organizational objectives and customer needs even more effectively and efficiently. Thus Ishikawa agrees with Brenda et al that HOQ is a holistic approach towards organisational operations.
House of Quality looks at an organization or business concern as a collection of different processes but all aimed at one goal. It emphasizes that an organization must strive to achieve continuously improvement on its various processes. This is arrived at by incorporating the skills, experiences and knowledge of its employees. The simple objective of HOQ is “Do the right things, right the first time, every time”. Many authors in this subject have come to agree that HOQ is infinitely variable and adaptable. This is because even though originally it was applied to organisations that were in manufacturing industry (and remained so for a long time) HOQ is now becoming universally applicable to all types if organisations irrespective of the type of activity they are involved in.
One good thing about House of Quality is that it can be applied virtually in all business cycles. It does not matter how small or big, young or old, manufacturing or service, capital or labour intensive an organisation is. It can be applicable across the board. It is for this and more other reasons that HOQ has gained a lot of attention in the recent past among scholars, business executives, administrators, researchers and entrepreneurs alike (Brenda et al, 1995).
Delimitations
In each and every research that is being carried out, limitations are inevitable and this particular research is no exception. Limitations compromise the validity and quality of the research outcome and thus any researcher who wants to come up with a good report should try to minimize them as much as possible. However it is good to note that some limitations cannot be avoided, we can only learn to deal with them. The following are some of the limitations that were identified in this research:
Some respondents gave incomplete answers to the questionnaires
Difficulty in measuring some aspects of the research e.g. customers attitude
Unreliability of secondary data sources.
Limited resources e.g. time, funds, manpower etc
Prerequisites of HOQ
The measure of an organization`s quality management for manufacturing and service firms was proposed by Juran. Crosby also came up with an eight critical factors, also known as dimensions of HOQ. Later Deming developed 7 critical factors using “Deming management method” concept, which was later agreed with the empirical findings of Juran. Deming developed what is known as the Deming chain reaction. This simply means that as quality of a product or service improves, costs will substantially decrease while productivity will increase. This in the long run does not only help an organization achieve its objectives but also gain competitive advantage over rivals (Deming, 1982).
Deming maintains that his 14 points can be virtually applied across the board, to big institutions as well as small ones, to organizations in the manufacturing industry as well as the service firms. He points out that it is the system of work that determines how the job can be performed and it is only the managers that can create such system. He summarized his foundation work in quality by identifying fourteen points for institutions to follow. They are as outlined below:
Always aim to continuously improve on your products and services and the means to achieve it. This will make you remain competitive in the market.
Minimize commonly accepted levels of errors and defects as a new philosophy of quality.
Stop depending on mass inspection to improve quality. Aim o achieve quality from the first time and not wait for mistakes to happen then you start rectifying them.
Minimize cost by working with a single supplier by not awarding and choosing a supplier based on price.
The firm should always strive to improve the production system and service by continually improving test methods and identification of problems, from the very first planning stage right up to distribution to customers, thus constantly reducing costs.
Organization can also adopt current methods of training on the job. This can be met by training the workers on the best ways of achieving quality in their areas of specialization and the use of quality conformation tools such as SQC (statistical quality control).
Adopt and institute leadership to improve on a better delivery by machines and people.
Motivate the employees. Individuals tend work best when they feel that the organization values them by taking their interests in to consideration, assuring them of job security and career growth.
Adopt transparency and accessibility by creating teams of members possibly from all the institutions’ departments to prevent and solve problems.
Slogans and exhortations elimination for the workers who ask for defect free and new productivity levels.
Do away with standards of work or quotas and replace it with. Elimination of management which is based on numbers, statistical goals and if possible replaces it with leadership.
Make people feel they are part and parcel of the institution. This is done by removing hindrances that deny people off the pride of workmanship.
Put in place an education program that is vigorous and self- improving for everyone. This will improve the efficiency and quality service delivery.
Sensitize all workers of the institution to work towards accomplishing the change and transformation required in the institution. Make them understand that transformation incorporates all the workers.
The cornerstone of Deming’s philosophy is based on statistical process control (SPC), which must be implemented where corrective action can be successfully instituted. Top management involvement is a key requirement with proper delegation of quality responsibilities at all levels in an organisation. The recognition of training and leadership skills is vital in adopting Deming’s philosophy with continuous improvements never ending. The work findings on performance of business unraveled numerous studies that reveal the constructive results of putting in place and emphasizing quality management practices on business performance.
There exists a significant correlation amid the use of value performance concept and quality of firm, operations and performances in finance according to studies done by Garvin (1986). Advanced studies based on HOQ work was conducted by Crosby (1987) with the aim of to comparing the relationship between Total Quality factors and quality of the product as well as performances of finances across Europe, Asia, and North America. The study proved that almost all the 9 House of Quality factors were important for implementing quality management in Asia, Europe, and North America despite the fact that these three regions are different from each other in the lines of the relationships between the Critical Quality Factors (CQFs) for HOQ implementation and general firm performance. Crosby (1987) & Deming (1986) through their studies found out that the most significant factors for customer satisfaction and better performance of finance include; human resource focus, leadership commitment and may be process management. The focus of these studies is at identifying of critical success factors (CSFs) that the top management is committed to and the focus of human resource as major differentiating dimension of House of Quality implementation. In the real sense these dimensions of House of Quality implementation are hidden variables, and therefore are not measurable directly (Deming, 1986). For instance, the commitment of top management towards HOQ is hard to measure directly; however, noticeable involvement, direct participation in House of Quality implementation process and the availing of all required resources can be well thought-out as pure manifestations of top management’s commitment to achieving HOQ.
References
Crosby, P. B. (1987), Quality without tears, McGraw-Hill, Singapore.
Crosby, P. B. (1992). Completeness. Quality for the 21st century, Dutton, USA.
Deming, W. E. (1986), Out of the crisis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge.
Brenda Weeks, Marilyn M. Helms & Lawrence P. Ettkin, (1995) “Is your organization ready for TQM? An assessment methodology”, The TQM Magazine, Vol. 7 Issue: 5.
Ishikawa, K. (1985). What is total quality control? The Japanese way, Prentice-Hall, New York.
Ishikawa, K. (1989). “How to apply companywide quality control in foreign countries”, Quality Progress.