Misconceptions on Affordable Housing
People often think 'affordable' housing is much more expensive than it actually is, and then conclude it's a scam to make housing for rich people. But this is often based on a misunderstanding of how the prices are set.
Let's say a unit is "50% AMI" somewhere with an area median income (AMI) of $100k. You might think, and I've seen a bunch of people with this confusion, that units would rent for 50% of $100k: $50k/y ($4,170/month), but it's much cheaper than that.
Affordable has a very specific meaning in this context: spending no more than 1/3 of your income on housing. So you might think 50% AMI is 'affordable' to someone earning at the 50th percentile: 1/3 of $100k, or $33k/y ($2,750/month), but it's cheaper than that, too!
Instead, 50% AMI means someone earning 50% of the AMI would be spending 1/3 of their income on housing. This is 50% of 1/3 of the AMI, and in this case that would be $17k/y ($1,390/month).
Now, I don't think affordable housing solves everything: if it were widespread I think it would be exploited and it can be a distraction from just getting a lot of units built, but the term "affordable housing" is actually a decent operationalization of whether housing is something regular people can afford.
Maybe this isn't too related to the key idea of this post but another misconceptions of affordable housing are the driving factors behind it. The city of Boston dictates that all new multi-family developments must include 13%-20% of income-restricted units depending on the number of units built. I see criticisms about market efficiency or possible exploitation but the predominant goal of the program is to minimize displacement rather than monetary efficiency.
Mixed-income housing is a useful tool to avoid creating de facto segregation, areas of concentrated poverty, ensure workers with retail/hospitality jobs in the area can continue to work there, and make sure it is possible for lower income people to exist in HCOL/VHCOL areas.
I wonder if there are any statistics supporting the exploitation of affordable housing as Boston, and even Greater Boston, has a serious issue with income inequality putting a lot of people in the AMI bucket for the affordable housing lottery.