Homeownership and Unemployment: Not So Fast

Folks have been asking me about a new study showing a strong link between homeownership and unemployment. The study finds a long-term of elasticity of the unemployment rate with respect to homeownership close to 1. This means that if the homeownership rate in a state doubles then we should expect its unemployment rate to double. For the country as a whole, since the homeownership rate has risen by roughly 20 percent from its 1950 level we should expect the unemployment rate to be roughly 20 p...