Is immigration causing the UK housing crisis?

Source: Is immigration causing the UK housing crisis?

Today the article in Guardian is talking about the relationship between the immigrations and housing prices. In UK, some politicians argue that the current housing crisis in UK is mainly caused by the increase of the new immigrations. For example, in December 2012, Theresa May claimed that “And there is evidence that without the demand caused by mass immigration, house prices could be 10% lower over a 20-year period.” However, some research show the opposite results. According to the Oxford Migration Observatory, the more migrants in UK are in the private rented market, compared to the UK citizen. Moreover, the White Britons have the wrong perception about the level of the discrimination. Additionally, the mass-media spread the wrong perception like “Half of all social housing in England goes to people born abroad.” [Actual figure is only 9%] (Daily Mail headline in 2012)

The author mentioned the article of Filipa Sá, which focused on the relationship between the immigration and the housing price in UK. According to him, the immigration causes the decrease of the housing prices. The reason is that new immigrants to an area caused the decrease of the local income level and both housing demand and supply. However, as the author mentions in this article, this effect of the immigrants on the housing price is mixed and geographically varied. Thus, this argument seems to jump to the conclusion hasty. The housing market’s mechanism is too complicated to conclude because there are lots of factors which affect the price. 

In addition to the inflow of the mass immigration into the local housing market, this article didn’t consider the segregation in the local area. Due to the inflow of the immigrants, the original residents (mainly over middle-income) starts to move out. This caused the segregation. This segregation exacerbated the physical and psychological built-environments. This segregation will cause another type of the housing problem. 

As everyone knows, the housing is one of the basic needs. On the other hand, most of people are dependent on the housing to increase their wealth. The people who own their housing are very sensitive to the variation of the housing prices. Thus, “housing is of greater political consequence” (Doring 2015, p.13). That’s why many politicians tend to focus on the housing policy. To get more votes and political power, they tend to invoke the people’s misperception. In particular, if the issue is related to the migrants or minority, their arguments are more provocative. 

Dorling, D. (2015). All that is Solid: How the Great Housing Disaster Defines Our Times, and What We Can Do About It. UK: Penguin Books