Post-election fact check: the right data for the best progress

Hello again, Blue Mass Group. Some of you may remember us as longtime contributors who met on these pages during the 2013 Boston mayoral campaign and ended up working together at City Hall. Now, after nearly four years, we look back with immense pride at the work that Mayor Walsh has done to advance the values espoused here at Blue Mass Group and across progressive Boston. If you are interested in learning more, much of this work is documented at the mayor’s re-election campaign website.

As we look ahead to the next four years, we are as determined as ever to take on the challenges that hold down opportunity and well-being in Boston and indeed across the nation. Wealth and income inequality, housing affordability, disparities in health, education, and mobility–these are not abstract concepts in City Hall. They are sources of real pain that everyone in the Walsh Administration is feeling, hearing about, and responding to every day.

It should go without saying that we can’t tackle these problems effectively unless we understand them well. So we were troubled, during the recent mayoral campaign, to see false and misleading data enter the conversation on these vital issues.

To move forward now as a progressive city, we don’t have to agree on every strategy, but we do need to work from a shared basis in facts. We should avoid the pointless arguments, wasted effort, and, in some cases, worse outcomes that bad data can produce. Bostonians (and especially progressives) want and deserve a robust and reality-based discourse.

To that end, what follows is a series of corrections to misused, misleading or false claims that have been circulating, plus—most important—explanations of why getting them right matters.

We want to be absolutely clear: our purpose is not to reduce the urgency around these issues or undersell the severity of the pain they are causing. On the contrary, our goal is to call greater attention to them and to strengthen our collective response with context that allows greater scope for local action.

Claim: Boston has the highest income inequality of any American city.

Source: “City and metropolitan inequality on the rise.” The Brookings Institution, 2014.

Clarification: The measure of inequality Brookings uses is the “95/20 ratio,” which compares household incomes at the 95th percentile and the 20th percentile. This is one of many ways to measure inequality—it happens to be one that puts Boston at the top of the list. By other measures, we don’t crack the top 10 or top 20. The reason we perform so poorly on the 95/20 ratio is significant. Boston is distinguished by two large groups of residents who have very low incomes by definition. One is students (undergrad and graduate) and the other is public housing residents (more on that below). Together they easily make up a fifth of our population. And we’re proud of that! They reflect our city’s historic identity as both a capital of higher learning and a progressive pioneer.

Why getting it right matters: No one disagrees that Boston has a wide income gap, and that it’s a major challenge for us both socially and economically. But moving down the ranks on the 95/20 ratio would not guarantee a more economically just city. It might just make things worse. By way of illustration: San Francisco outperforms us on 95/20, despite having a richer top end, because it has fewer low-income residents left in its bottom 20. Detroit outperforms us, despite significant poverty, because it has fewer upper middle-class jobs. These cities are working to address their challenges. But their current situations, despite looking better on the 95/20, are not models for Boston to emulate. In addition, while income gaps matter, wealth gaps do more to compound disadvantage across generations. Brookings scholars themselves argue that income inequality, being regional and national in its causes, is not a promising policy focus for mayors who want to spread economic opportunity.

Mayor Walsh’s approach to inequality has been two-fold. First, he advocates at the state and national levels to change the structures that cause wage stagnation and poverty. Second, he has focused city policy on economic mobility. He has made it clear that our goal is not to displace low-income residents but to get them the jobs, the tools, and the supports they need to move up into the middle-class and build wealth. Those include:

• A seeded college/career savings account for families of (soon to be all) 5-year-olds.
• A credit building program reaching 25,000 people.
• Free community college for high school graduates from low-income families.
• Learn-and-earn apprenticeships moving hundreds of low-income workers into careers with living wages and benefits.
• A long-term plan that prioritizes good working-class jobs in underserved neighborhoods and transit access to good jobs citywide.

This year, Mayor Walsh created an Economic Mobility Lab devoted to achieving a deeper understanding of what it takes to reverse generational inequality. Operating on the principle that no one family needs the exact same supports, it will collect and analyze data to better design tailored interventions. We are very excited about it.

 

Claim: The average net worth for a white household in Boston is $247,500; for the average black household, it is $8.

Source: “The Color of Wealth in Boston.” Federal Reserve Bank of Boston with Duke University and The New School, 2015.

Clarification: The “Boston” of this report is not the City of Boston, nor even “Rte. 128 Boston”: it is the full Boston Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA). As spelled out in the report, the Boston MSA “is home to 4.6 million residents and accounts for almost one-third of New England’s population,” spanning Essex, Middlesex, Norfolk, Plymouth, and Suffolk counties, as well as Rockingham and Strafford counties in New Hampshire. It is 74% white, compared to the City of Boston’s 46% white population. The City of Boston contributes around 14% of the MSA’s population. The report’s conclusions are based on a survey of 403 families across this region (p. 9). We can infer that the number of Boston families surveyed is in double digits.

Why getting it right matters: The racial wealth gap is terrible and it’s getting worse. By 2053, a recent report projects, black household wealth in America will average zero. In the City of Boston, the gap is likely a similar order of magnitude to that of the larger MSA. But anyone who is serious about understanding causes and solutions will recognize it as a national problem that has been built, and continues to operate, through discriminatory regional systems in housing, labor, transportation, education, and criminal justice. This is precisely what the regional data in “The Color of Wealth” reflects.

The Mayor has asserted that long-standing, deeply rooted systemic racism is a leading cause of all the forms of inequality we are confronted with locally, regionally, and nationally. He has called it the kind of “slow-moving disaster” that we need to treat as an existential threat. This is why he set Boston apart by making racial equity the focus of our resilience strategy, our guide for surviving and thriving amidst the uncertainties of the 21st century.

In addition to the economic mobility agenda described above, the Walsh Administration has launched initiatives aimed at reducing the structural racism, along with the multi-generational stress and trauma it causes, that do so much to create and sustain wealth gaps. They include:

• Partnering with the Black Philanthropy Fund on The Boston Basics, a groundbreaking program to support parents of young children.
• Expanding free, high-quality pre-kindergarten–with the goal of universal access–to close a key opportunity gap in education.
• Making Boston a leader in President Obama’s legacy youth program My Brother’s Keeper.
• Holding Boston’s first citywide dialogues on race to heal the social wounds left untreated since the busing crisis.
• Creating Boston’s first Office of Diversity, and increasing transparency with a Diversity Dashboard for the city’s workforce.
• Calling on businesses to do more to close racial opportunity gaps.

These actions may not close the regional gap that “The Color of Wealth” describes. But they are making a difference for real people and communities in Boston. And they set an important example. They put racial equity at the head of the agenda in the region’s economic and cultural capital.

 

Claim: With the median income in Boston at $35,000, most Bostonians can’t afford what the city calls “affordable housing.”

Source: “Boston’s Workforce: An Assessment of Labor Market Outcomes and Opportunities.” City of Boston, Office of Workforce Development, 2016.

Clarification. This median income figure, drawn from 2014 American Community Survey data, represents everyone who participated in the labor force, of any age (including every teen or college student with a part-time job). According to the report, 25.6% of labor force participants were part-time workers and, of those who earned less than $35,000, 51% were part-time.

This data reflects a wide and worrisome income gap—which is why it was highlighted by the Office of Workforce Development that the Mayor created. But it does not describe the universe of people who are responsible for housing payments. That group is better (but not perfectly) represented by “household income.” Boston’s median household income is $63,621 and its median family income is $71,103 (2016 ACS data).

Why getting it right matters: Rolled up in that $35k figure are all sorts of troubling issues—under-employment, sub-living wages, wage theft—that are the proper focus of workforce development policy and Statehouse advocacy. But it would be a bad number on which to base affordable housing definitions for the private market. The subsidy required at that income level is so steep that it would sharply reduce the number of units produced. It also ignores the challenges to low ($35-50k) and moderate ($50-$125k) income households. The median household income of $64k still tells us that more than half of Boston households struggle to find affordable housing, but it points more accurately to the full scope of the public policy challenge.

 

Claim: Boston lacks a clear definition of “affordable housing,” and is shifting the goalposts on “affordability” above the standard 30% of income.

Source: In two tables of the City’s 132-page Housing Plan, costs at 35% and 50% of income are used in order to highlight the extent to which low-income and middle class households are being priced out of many neighborhoods. These numbers were chosen to illustrate cost burdens, not to reference affordability standards.

Correction: The City maintains a clear definition: households in deed-restricted units spend 30% of their income on rent. A market-rate unit is considered accessible to the middle-class when a $50k-$125k household would spend up to 33% of their income on rent. 33% is chosen for this higher income bracket (not for low-income making < $50K), as they have more disposable income after paying that amount. This HUD article explains why the 30% standard was designed to protect low-income families and may not be applicable beyond that role.

Why getting it right matters: The city must meet the full range of challenges presented by Boston’s fast-growing population and attendant housing shortage–low income and moderate income, seniors and residents with disabilities, students and artists, homeowners and renters. That’s why, in his first year in office, the Mayor launched a housing plan that set unprecedented goals for each category of income and need. To meet those goals, the administration has:

• Raised inclusionary development (IDP) requirements for the first time since the policy was created. Working with housing advocates and developers, we’ll be revisiting these levels again next year.
• Improved IDP and linkage collections to get over $100 million into affordable housing production led by nonprofit community developers.
• Put hundreds of small city owned parcels out for nonprofit development targeted to first-time homeowners.
• Fast-tracked community planning for mixed-income housing in transit-oriented, high-demand corridors along the Red Line and Orange Lines.
• Made the development process at the BPDA more inclusive, efficient, and transparent.

The result has been record production of both market and deed-restricted units. Of the 22,000 housing units started or completed since the plan was launched, 19% are deed-restricted affordable (at the 30% of income standard) and another 22% are market rate units accessible to the middle class (at 33% of income in the $50k-$125k bracket). And, nearly 6,000 dorm beds have gone into production. This new capacity is having the intended effect: rents in the existing housing stock have, on average, stopped their upward climb.

All of this is cold comfort to those looking to rent, buy, or deal with a rent hike in Boston right now. The pain remains very real in our high-cost city. This is why Mayor Walsh also created an Office of Housing Stability and signed the Jim Brooks Community Stabilization Act, to help protect residents from displacement. He has moved the city’s shelter system toward a housing-first model, so far housing more than 1,200 formerly homeless individuals. And he led the charge to pass the Community Preservation Act in Boston, providing a new revenue stream of up to $20 million annually for affordable housing, open space, and historic preservation. Finally, Imagine Boston 2030, our new citywide plan, is a roadmap for mixed-income housing growth in under-developed areas, while preserving character and enhancing quality of life for existing neighborhoods.

 

Claim: Boston has very little low-income housing.

Source: none.

Correction: With nearly 1 in 5 housing units shielded from market forces, Boston has a higher proportion of deed-restricted affordable housing than any major city we have found. A study by the Urban Institute this year confirms as much, concluding that Suffolk County (primarily Boston) has the 3rd-highest ratio of affordable units to “extremely low income” renters among the 100 most populated counties in the U.S., following two counties in Texas.

Why getting it right matters: The conversation recently has focused on what we can require of private developers. But it’s important to understand that providing housing for low income residents must go far beyond the IDP.

The main source of our national leadership in low-income housing is the Boston Housing Authority, one of the nation’s largest such agencies. The BHA serves 58,000 Bostonians with either direct housing provision or vouchers, charging rents exclusively based on residents’ ability to pay.

Public housing has not gotten much love in recent decades. The federal government stopped producing new units in the 1990s, and has underfunded maintenance of existing developments since then. In part due to that very disinvestment, public housing has long been associated with sub-par living conditions and concentrated, isolated poverty. Public housing fell so far out of favor that, to this day, some progressives hardly seem aware of its existence when they talk about low-income housing.

Mayor Walsh, by contrast, believes in public housing and is backing it with the full power of his office. He sought and won the last major housing grant of the Obama administration, $30 million for the Whittier Street development in Roxbury. He has taken the historically rare step of sending City dollars to the BHA, by allocating $35 million from the sale of the Winthrop Square Garage to renovate and expand public housing in East Boston and South Boston. (This is in addition to the developer’s $25 million obligation to fund affordable housing in Chinatown.) And he is backing plans to rebuild Boston’s oldest and largest public developments in some our most expensive neighborhoods of South Boston, Jamaica Plain, and Charlestown. The new developments will replace every single one of a total 2,400 deeply subsidized units, with a guaranteed right of return for existing residents, while resituating them in integrated, mixed-income communities.

 

Claim: Life expectancy in the Back Bay is 91; in Roxbury it is 58.

Source: “Social Capital and Health Outcomes in Boston.” Center on Human Needs, Virginia Commonwealth University, 2012. (Examines census tracts using data from 2003-2007.)

Clarification: 91 and 58 are not neighborhood-wide numbers; they reflect the individual census tracts (of around 2,500 people) with the highest and lowest life expectancies in the city. In the case of the “Roxbury” number, it is the tract that runs west from Mass. Ave. between Shawmut St. and Albany St., which is home to the city’s densest concentration of shelters and residential addiction treatment facilities, serving the most vulnerable people from all across the state. Since this tract’s life expectancy is significantly lower than the rest of Roxbury, we speculate that these institutions depress the mean life expectancy. The only other tract in the city that falls below 62 years is the one in the South End that contains Pine Street Inn (recall this is 2003-07 data, prior to the new housing developments nearby).

For neighborhood-wide numbers, a soon-to-be-released Boston Public Health Commission analysis of 2011-15 ACS data shows life expectancy in Roxbury to be 77.8 years, compared to 84.5 in the Back Bay, and 80.3 citywide. The neighborhood with the lowest life expectancy is South Boston, at 77.1.

Why getting it right matters: 85 versus 78 is a significant difference and supports the claim that poverty and structural racism are matters of life and death in Boston, as they are across America. But the similarity among neighborhoods like South Boston, Roxbury, and Hyde Park points to nuances that need to be understood if we are to close the gaps. We need to understand the social determinants of health on a neighborhood-by-neighborhood, street-by-street, home-by-home basis–in their effects on quality of life as well as longevity.

The Walsh administration is committed to understanding health disparities at a granular, actionable level. For example:

• The Boston Public Health Commission produced a study of the health impact of low wages to accompany the mayor’s revision of the Living Wage Ordinance that also informed his support for the $15 minimum wage.
• The Mayor’s Office of Recovery Services is conducting a citywide prevention study on the different substances and routes into addiction affecting each community.
• The City partners with Boston’s 22 Community Health Centers on a range of localized prevention initiatives, from prostate cancer to diabetes to addiction.
• The Boston Public Schools has expanded access to fresh, nutritious food as well as physical, social, and emotional learning opportunities both in school and over the summer.

Finally, health disparities are another area where national advocacy is essential. The 2003-2007 data used in the above-cited report precedes the state health care reform law that produced effectively universal coverage. After 10 years of this law, as well as the Affordable Care Act, we suspect that increased access to healthcare is at least partly responsible for the progress we have made closing the gaps. The mayor has been a leader in the fight to stop Washington from reversing this progress.

 

Claim: $140 million has been cut from BPS in the last four years.

Source: this one is pure fiction. It smashes together a variety of mismatched numbers, none of which reflect budgets proposed or signed by the mayor.

Correction: The BPS budget has grown by $154 million over the last four years.

The claim of de-funding draws erroneously from two factors. First, prior to the spring budget process, BPS typically estimates the dollar increase it would take to keep all services level across the district in the following year. The purveyors of the “cut” narrative cite these projected gaps as if they were the final budget numbers when, in fact, the actual budgets that followed filled these gaps.

The second factor being misrepresented is the weighted student funding system that the School Committee and the City Council approved starting in 2012. This formula–specifically designed to increase needs-based equity–allots schools money for each enrolled student based on that student’s particular needs. The “cut” story adds up school-specific enrollment shifts and presents them as overall district cuts–not mentioning that this (increased) funding has followed students to other district schools, and not mentioning the variety of additional funding sources that go to schools with enrollment drops.

The notion that the mayor has sought to disinvest from BPS schools bears no relation to reality. In addition to boosting the operating budget by $154 million, he has launched a 10-year, $1 billion building and renovation plan, which roughly doubles the previous annual capital spending on schools and draws on the city’s new partnership with the Mass. School Building Authority. BPS has also produced a Long-term Financial Plan to get annual cost increases under control.

Why getting it right matters: Education policy in Boston elicits strong passions and has done for a long time. That’s not going to change. But progressives should at least agree that we need to get beyond the status quo. This means new investments in high-quality pre-kindergarten, more learning time, special education, English language instruction, technology, arts, social and emotional learning, wrap-around social services, and better facilities with stronger connections to communities. This is what the mayor and the superintendent have done—all while investing more each year in direct funding to schools and increasing teacher pay through collective bargaining.

The defunding myth is divisive and demoralizing at a time when we need more than ever to be able to work together. Public schools enjoy broad support, as proven by the overwhelming solidarity in districts and communities on Question 2. We need to build on that solidarity to reach local consensus on school building and renovation plans; to advocate at the Statehouse for universal pre-kindergarten and increased education aid; and to fight off the attacks on public education coming from Washington.

 

Claim: The City wrote GE a $25 million check.

Source: media reports using vague language to describe tax incentives.

Correction: On top of the $25 million GE has committed to the Boston Public Schools, the tax agreement by itself increases city revenue. Like all sound Tax Increment Financing agreements, it pegs tax breaks to increases in the taxable value of the land due to development. This increased revenue is in addition to the ripple-effect investment, talent, and entrepreneurship that hosting GE’s headquarters brings. It’s a net positive for the City.

 

IN CONCLUSION …

Yes, the data on inequality is daunting. And yes, it’s an indictment of where we are at as a society. These facts are our shared basis for understanding this reality and changing it.

If you have criticisms, questions, or suggestions about any of the above, or any of this administration’s policies, as the mayor has made clear, we are listening. All are welcome in the conversation about achieving shared prosperity in Boston. The more voices that join in, the stronger our city’s collective actions will be–and need to be.

In the coming year and beyond, we’ll be making important decisions together as a city on development without displacement, inclusive growth, and school building. We’re going to be pushing for regional housing solutions. We’re going to be advocating at the Statehouse for living wages, paid leave, and bold investments in education and transportation. We’re going to be fighting the endless stream of crap coming out of Washington, D.C., and fighting like hell to win that town back for the reality-based community.

As progressives, our energy should go into building our collective strength, not tearing each other down. And yes, we’re a little bit self-interested in making this appeal. We don’t want to have to spend any more time beating back lousy data from folks who are our natural allies. We want to focus on building relationships and forging solutions that work for people in Boston and set an example for the nation.

We hope you will join us.

 

Eoin Cannon and Joyce Linehan