Chart of the Day: Homeownership over Time

Here are two charts from a recent article in The Atlantic about changing rates of homeownership across different age cohorts and time periods:

homeownership rate chart

[US homeownership rate.]

homeownership age 3

Of course, the tone of the Atlantic’s piece is that homeownership is automatically a good thing, suggesting that “the economy has a Gen-X problem” because they’re not buying homes. While homeownership is automatically a good thing if you’re a realtor, in fact, the US has far higher homeownership rates than other countries. There might be lots of reasons that people don’t buy a house that have little to do with a weak job market.

Bill Lindeke

About Bill Lindeke

Pronouns: he/him

Bill Lindeke has writing blogging about sidewalks and cities since 2005, ever since he read Jane Jacobs. He is a lecturer in Urban Studies at the University of Minnesota Geography Department, the Cityscape columnist at Minnpost, and has written multiple books on local urban history. He was born in Minneapolis, but has spent most of his time in St Paul. Check out Twitter @BillLindeke or on Facebook.