Budget Deal in Congress Includes Help for Affordable Housing<br />In a news release, Ms. Cantwell called the provision a “down payment”<br />that “will help us deal with the tremendous deficit we have in affordable housing.”<br />Still, according to industry analysts, the measure won’t come close to closing the gap created by the tax cut at a time when close to half of renters struggle to pay their rent<br />and homelessness is rising in cities around the country.<br />As home building declined sharply and millennials entered the work force, the number of renters surged by about one million a year — the largest<br />increase since the baby-boom generation came of age in the 1970s, according to the Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard University.<br />It funds virtually all of the nation’s subsidized rental housing and created a sprawling industry of affordable-housing developers<br />that now makes up a vital piece of the safety net — especially in high-cost cities like New York, San Francisco and Seattle.<br />The low-income housing tax credit was created in 1986 as part of Congress’s last sweeping tax overhaul and has grown into a $9 billion-a-year program.<br />By CONOR DOUGHERTYMARCH 23, 2018<br />When Congress voted last year to sharply reduce corporate income taxes, it undermined the nation’s largest subsidized housing program.<br />Lower corporate tax rates made the credit less useful, alarming developers and agencies<br />that provide housing for the poor in rural America and large cities.
