TY  - JOUR
AU  - Glaeser,Edward L.
AU  - Sacerdote,Bruce
TI  - The Social Consequences of Housing
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 8034
PY  - 2000
Y2  - December 2000
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w8034
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w8034.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Edward L. Glaeser
Department of Economics
315A Littauer Center
Harvard University
Cambridge, MA 02138
Tel: 617/495-0575
Fax: 617/495-7730
E-Mail: eglaeser@harvard.edu

Bruce Sacerdote
6106 Rockefeller Hall
Department of Economics
Dartmouth College
Hanover, NH 03755-3514
Tel: 603/646-2121
Fax: 603/646-2122
E-Mail: Bruce.I.Sacerdote@dartmouth.edu
AB  - The social capital literature documents a connection between social connection and economic outcomes of interest ranging from government quality to economic growth.  Popular authors suggest that housing and architecture are important determinants of social connection.  This paper examines the connection between housing structure and social connection.  We find that residents of large apartment buildings are more likely to be socially connected with their neighbors, perhaps because the distance between neighbors is lower in apartment buildings.  Apartment residents are less involved in local politics, presumably because they are less connected with the public infrastructure and space that surrounds them.  Street crime (robbery, auto theft) is also more common around big apartment buildings and we believe that this also occurs because of there is less connection between people in apartments and the streets that surround them.
ER  -