The National Housing Act of 1934, , , also called the Capehart Act and the Better Housing Program, was part of the New Deal passed during the Great Depression in order to make

housing Housing, or more generally, living spaces, refers to the construction and assigned usage of houses or buildings individually or collectively, for the purpose of shelter. Housing ensures that members of society have a place to live, whether i ...

and home

mortgages A mortgage loan or simply mortgage (), in civil law jurisdicions known also as a hypothec loan, is a loan used either by purchasers of real property to raise funds to buy real estate, or by existing property owners to raise funds for any ...

more affordable. It created the

Federal Housing Administration The Federal Housing Administration (FHA), also known as the Office of Housing within the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), is a United States government agency founded by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, created in part by ...

(FHA) and the

Federal Savings and Loan Insurance Corporation The Federal Savings and Loan Insurance Corporation (FSLIC) was an institution that administered deposit insurance for savings and loan institutions in the United States. History Establishment The FSLIC was established by the National Housing Act ...

(FSLIC). The Act was designed to stop the tide of bank foreclosures on family homes during the Great Depression. Both the FHA and the FSLIC worked to create the backbone of the mortgage and home building industries, until the 1980s. These policies had disparate impacts on Americans along segregated lines :

Author Richard Rothstein says the housing programs begun under the New Deal were tantamount to a "state-sponsored system of segregation." The government's efforts were "primarily designed to provide housing to white, middle-class, lower-middle-class families," he says. African-Americans and other people of color were left out of the new suburban communities — and pushed instead into urban housing projects.

The

Housing Act of 1937 The Housing Act of 1937 (), formally the "United States Housing Act of 1937" and sometimes called the Wagner–Steagall Act, provided for subsidies to be paid from the U.S. government to local public housing agencies (LHAs) to improve living cond ...

built on this legislation.

References

External links

Public Law 73-479, 73d Congress, H.R. 9620, National Housing Act of 1934
{{New Deal 1934 in law 73rd United States Congress New Deal legislation Public housing in the United States United States federal housing legislation Mortgage legislation Redlining June 1934 events