Michael Lens
Biographic Data
| ID | 4408735 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Michael Lens |
| GIVEN NAMES | Michael |
| FAMILY NAME | Lens |
| SIGNATURE | LENS M |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of California, Los Angeles |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-4693-3370 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 20 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 75 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 20 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2014 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 5 |
Mitigating the Stress of Housing Instability
The Housing Choice Voucher program is the largest low-income housing subsidy program managed by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Research shows that vouchers improve housing affordability and stability and access to higher quality housing units and safer neighborhoods. Yet less is known about how housing supports affect a household’s health and well-being and contact with other social services, and even less about the impact …
A Weak Link in Efforts to Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing? Evaluating Public Engagement Processes in Housing Plan Development in Southern California
Public participation is a core component of federal and state fair housing law implementation, but its effectiveness at Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing (AFFH) remains understudied. In this paper, we analyze the public engagement processes of eight southern California municipalities as they developed a newly mandated AFFH component for their 2021–2029 housing element update. We evaluate the timeline of plan development, outreach efforts, web…
Incoming! Spatial Enrollment Competition between Charter Schools and Traditional Public Schools
The meteoric rise in charter schools has several implications for traditional public schools and their students. One understudied implication is the geographic competition for students. Given traditional public school boundaries are often fixed while charter school boundaries are more flexible, charter schools can draw students away from existing traditional public schools, and we have very little information about how distance matters in the com…
Do Land Use Plans Affirmatively Further Fair Housing
Problem research strategy and findings: The 1968 Fair Housing Act required local government recipients of federal money to take meaningful actions to affirmatively further fair housing (AFFH). Current fair housing analysis requirements are copious but do not request an assessment of how land use policies affect the potential for neighborhood integration. A recent California law requires local governments to include AFFH analysis in existing plann…
Renter Nonpayment and Landlord Response
How renters respond to economic hardship, and how landlords respond when tenants fail to make rent, are understudied questions, owing largely to limited data. We use experiences from the COVID-19 pandemic to begin answering these questions. Drawing on both new census data and two original surveys of renters in Los Angeles County, we test nine hypotheses about the sources of renter distress and landlord reactions to it. We find that lost work and …
What is an Opportunity Enthusiast to Do
David Imbroscio offers a useful pushback against groupthink among scholars studying neighborhood opportunity, even if I quibble with the details. Imbroscio sometimes conflates problem definition with solution feasibility, and ultimately points to some solutions to economic inequality that may be even less feasible than those offered by the opportunity enthusiasts. Further, the broader problems of economic inequality are well known to housing scho…
Racial Justice and Housing Justice
Just housing
Just housing: The moral foundations of American housing policy, by Casey J. Dawkins." Journal of Urban Affairs, 45(1), pp. 109–110
Zoning, Land Use, and the Reproduction of Urban Inequality
Zoning determines what can be built where, and is ubiquitous in the United States. Low-density residential zoning predominates in US cities far more than in other countries, limiting housing opportunities for those who cannot afford large homes. These zoning regulations have racist and classist origins, make housing more expensive, and reinforce segregation patterns. While sociologists study these consequences of zoning, and other causes of unaff…
Spatial Concentration and Spillover
The lack of sufficient affordable housing in Los Angeles, California burdens many renter households with the threat of an eviction. Research has identified individual- and neighborhood-level sociodemographic correlates of eviction, but the uneven distribution of sociodemographic characteristics and housing conditions across neighborhoods likely produces broader patterns of spatial clustering in eviction prevalence across local areas. We use spati…
It’s Time to End Single-Family Zoning
Local planning in the United States is unique in the amount of land it reserves for detached single-family homes. This privileging of single-family homes, normally called R1 zoning, exacerbates inequality and undermines efficiency. R1’s origins are unpleasant: Stained by explicitly classist and implicitly racist motivations, R1 today continues to promote exclusion. It makes it harder for people to access high-opportunity places, and in expensive …
Last Thoughts From Manville, Monkkonen, and Lens
This article responds to: The View From Minneapolis: Comments on “Death to Single-Family Zoning” and “It’s Time to End Single-Family Zoning”, Ending Single-Family Zoning: Is There a Plan B?, Not a Matter of Choice: Eliminating Single-Family Zoning, Calls to End All Single-Family Zoning Need More Scrutiny, Eliminating Existing Single-Family Zoning Is a Mistake, Though Rumors of Its Demise Might Be Exaggerated..., The Detached Single-Family Home Ge…
The Neighborhood Context of Eviction in Southern California
In the United States, soaring rent burdens and a dearth of affordable housing leave millions of renters at risk of eviction. The eviction epidemic is particularly pronounced in California where advocates estimate that approximately 500,000 renters are evicted annually. Research has looked at individual–level determinants of evictions, but we know much less about the spatial dynamics of eviction and associations across neighborhoods. This is large…
Zoning and affordability
Would increasing allowable housing densities in expensive cities generate more housing construction and make housing more affordable? In a provocative article, Andrés Rodríguez-Pose and Michael Storper survey the evidence and answer no. Restrictions on housing density, they contend, do not substantially influence housing production or price. They further argue that allowing more density in growing metropolitan areas would only improve housing out…
Extremely low-income households, housing affordability and the Great Recession
The effects of the Great Recession on housing equity and homeownership have been well-documented. However, we know little about how rental households fared and the efficacy of housing subsidies in addressing affordability gaps. This paper examines the extent to which rental housing became less affordable for Extremely Low-Income (ELI) households – those earning less than 30% of the Area Median Income (AMI). I then run regression models to determi…
Daytime Locations in Spatial Mismatch
Individuals recently released from prison confront many barriers to employment. One potential obstacle is spatial mismatch—the concentration of low-skilled, nonwhite job-seekers within central cities and the prevalence of relevant job opportunities in outlying areas. Prior research has found mixed results about the importance of residential place for reentry outcomes. In this article, we propose that residential location matters for finding work,…
Do Strict Land Use Regulations Make Metropolitan Areas More Segregated by Income?
PROBLEM RESEARCH STRATEGY AND FINDINGS: Income segregation has risen in each of the last four decades in U.S. metropolitan areas, which can have lifelong impacts on the health, economic productivity, and behaviors of residents. Although it is widely assumed that local land use regulations-such as minimum lot sizes and growth controls-exclude low-income households from wealthier neighborhoods, the empirical research is surprisingly limited. We exa…
Employment proximity and outcomes for Moving to Opportunity families
The Moving to Opportunity for Fair Housing Demonstration (MTO) randomly assigned housing vouchers to public housing residents in an experimental test of the effect of neighborhood and location on household outcomes. In terms of adult employment outcomes, the 2 treatment groups did not significantly differ from the control group. We use MTO data to examine whether spatial proximity to jobs and job growth explains this lack of treatment effect. We …
Measuring the geography of opportunity
Quantitative segregation research focuses almost exclusively on the spatial sorting of demographic groups. This research largely ignores the structural characteristics of neighborhoods – such as crime, job accessibility, and school quality – that likely help determine important household outcomes. This paper summarizes the research on segregation, neighborhood effects, and concentrated disadvantage, and argues that we should pay more attention to…
The Impact of Housing Vouchers on Crime in US Cities and Suburbs
This paper tests the common belief that subsidised housing contributes to higher crime rates. To do this, panel data on over 200 US cities are used and fixed effects models are estimated to control for unobserved differences between cities that may affect both voucher use and crime. Additionally, models are estimated that focus on the suburbs, to see if the steady increase in vouchers there has had any effect on crime. In cities, it is found that…
Zoning, Land Use, and the Reproduction of Urban Inequality
Zoning determines what can be built where, and is ubiquitous in the United States. Low-density residential zoning predominates in US cities far more than in other countries, limiting housing opportunities for those who cannot afford large homes. These zoning regulations have racist and classist origins, make housing more expensive, and reinforce segregation patterns. While sociologists study these consequences of zoning, and other causes of unaff…
Daytime Locations in Spatial Mismatch
Individuals recently released from prison confront many barriers to employment. One potential obstacle is spatial mismatch—the concentration of low-skilled, nonwhite job-seekers within central cities and the prevalence of relevant job opportunities in outlying areas. Prior research has found mixed results about the importance of residential place for reentry outcomes. In this article, we propose that residential location matters for finding work,…
Zoning and affordability
Would increasing allowable housing densities in expensive cities generate more housing construction and make housing more affordable? In a provocative article, Andrés Rodríguez-Pose and Michael Storper survey the evidence and answer no. Restrictions on housing density, they contend, do not substantially influence housing production or price. They further argue that allowing more density in growing metropolitan areas would only improve housing out…
Measuring the geography of opportunity
Quantitative segregation research focuses almost exclusively on the spatial sorting of demographic groups. This research largely ignores the structural characteristics of neighborhoods – such as crime, job accessibility, and school quality – that likely help determine important household outcomes. This paper summarizes the research on segregation, neighborhood effects, and concentrated disadvantage, and argues that we should pay more attention to…
Extremely low-income households, housing affordability and the Great Recession
The effects of the Great Recession on housing equity and homeownership have been well-documented. However, we know little about how rental households fared and the efficacy of housing subsidies in addressing affordability gaps. This paper examines the extent to which rental housing became less affordable for Extremely Low-Income (ELI) households – those earning less than 30% of the Area Median Income (AMI). I then run regression models to determi…
The Impact of Housing Vouchers on Crime in US Cities and Suburbs
This paper tests the common belief that subsidised housing contributes to higher crime rates. To do this, panel data on over 200 US cities are used and fixed effects models are estimated to control for unobserved differences between cities that may affect both voucher use and crime. Additionally, models are estimated that focus on the suburbs, to see if the steady increase in vouchers there has had any effect on crime. In cities, it is found that…
The Neighborhood Context of Eviction in Southern California
In the United States, soaring rent burdens and a dearth of affordable housing leave millions of renters at risk of eviction. The eviction epidemic is particularly pronounced in California where advocates estimate that approximately 500,000 renters are evicted annually. Research has looked at individual–level determinants of evictions, but we know much less about the spatial dynamics of eviction and associations across neighborhoods. This is large…
Employment proximity and outcomes for Moving to Opportunity families
The Moving to Opportunity for Fair Housing Demonstration (MTO) randomly assigned housing vouchers to public housing residents in an experimental test of the effect of neighborhood and location on household outcomes. In terms of adult employment outcomes, the 2 treatment groups did not significantly differ from the control group. We use MTO data to examine whether spatial proximity to jobs and job growth explains this lack of treatment effect. We …
Incoming! Spatial Enrollment Competition between Charter Schools and Traditional Public Schools
The meteoric rise in charter schools has several implications for traditional public schools and their students. One understudied implication is the geographic competition for students. Given traditional public school boundaries are often fixed while charter school boundaries are more flexible, charter schools can draw students away from existing traditional public schools, and we have very little information about how distance matters in the com…
The Impact of Housing Vouchers on Crime in US Cities and Suburbs
This paper tests the common belief that subsidised housing contributes to higher crime rates. To do this, panel data on over 200 US cities are used and fixed effects models are estimated to control for unobserved differences between cities that may affect both voucher use and crime. Additionally, models are estimated that focus on the suburbs, to see if the steady increase in vouchers there has had any effect on crime. In cities, it is found that…
Measuring the geography of opportunity
Quantitative segregation research focuses almost exclusively on the spatial sorting of demographic groups. This research largely ignores the structural characteristics of neighborhoods – such as crime, job accessibility, and school quality – that likely help determine important household outcomes. This paper summarizes the research on segregation, neighborhood effects, and concentrated disadvantage, and argues that we should pay more attention to…
Do Strict Land Use Regulations Make Metropolitan Areas More Segregated by Income?
PROBLEM RESEARCH STRATEGY AND FINDINGS: Income segregation has risen in each of the last four decades in U.S. metropolitan areas, which can have lifelong impacts on the health, economic productivity, and behaviors of residents. Although it is widely assumed that local land use regulations-such as minimum lot sizes and growth controls-exclude low-income households from wealthier neighborhoods, the empirical research is surprisingly limited. We exa…
Employment proximity and outcomes for Moving to Opportunity families
The Moving to Opportunity for Fair Housing Demonstration (MTO) randomly assigned housing vouchers to public housing residents in an experimental test of the effect of neighborhood and location on household outcomes. In terms of adult employment outcomes, the 2 treatment groups did not significantly differ from the control group. We use MTO data to examine whether spatial proximity to jobs and job growth explains this lack of treatment effect. We …
Daytime Locations in Spatial Mismatch
Individuals recently released from prison confront many barriers to employment. One potential obstacle is spatial mismatch—the concentration of low-skilled, nonwhite job-seekers within central cities and the prevalence of relevant job opportunities in outlying areas. Prior research has found mixed results about the importance of residential place for reentry outcomes. In this article, we propose that residential location matters for finding work,…
Extremely low-income households, housing affordability and the Great Recession
The effects of the Great Recession on housing equity and homeownership have been well-documented. However, we know little about how rental households fared and the efficacy of housing subsidies in addressing affordability gaps. This paper examines the extent to which rental housing became less affordable for Extremely Low-Income (ELI) households – those earning less than 30% of the Area Median Income (AMI). I then run regression models to determi…
It’s Time to End Single-Family Zoning
Local planning in the United States is unique in the amount of land it reserves for detached single-family homes. This privileging of single-family homes, normally called R1 zoning, exacerbates inequality and undermines efficiency. R1’s origins are unpleasant: Stained by explicitly classist and implicitly racist motivations, R1 today continues to promote exclusion. It makes it harder for people to access high-opportunity places, and in expensive …
Last Thoughts From Manville, Monkkonen, and Lens
This article responds to: The View From Minneapolis: Comments on “Death to Single-Family Zoning” and “It’s Time to End Single-Family Zoning”, Ending Single-Family Zoning: Is There a Plan B?, Not a Matter of Choice: Eliminating Single-Family Zoning, Calls to End All Single-Family Zoning Need More Scrutiny, Eliminating Existing Single-Family Zoning Is a Mistake, Though Rumors of Its Demise Might Be Exaggerated..., The Detached Single-Family Home Ge…
The Neighborhood Context of Eviction in Southern California
In the United States, soaring rent burdens and a dearth of affordable housing leave millions of renters at risk of eviction. The eviction epidemic is particularly pronounced in California where advocates estimate that approximately 500,000 renters are evicted annually. Research has looked at individual–level determinants of evictions, but we know much less about the spatial dynamics of eviction and associations across neighborhoods. This is large…
Zoning and affordability
Would increasing allowable housing densities in expensive cities generate more housing construction and make housing more affordable? In a provocative article, Andrés Rodríguez-Pose and Michael Storper survey the evidence and answer no. Restrictions on housing density, they contend, do not substantially influence housing production or price. They further argue that allowing more density in growing metropolitan areas would only improve housing out…
Spatial Concentration and Spillover
The lack of sufficient affordable housing in Los Angeles, California burdens many renter households with the threat of an eviction. Research has identified individual- and neighborhood-level sociodemographic correlates of eviction, but the uneven distribution of sociodemographic characteristics and housing conditions across neighborhoods likely produces broader patterns of spatial clustering in eviction prevalence across local areas. We use spati…
Racial Justice and Housing Justice
Just housing
Just housing: The moral foundations of American housing policy, by Casey J. Dawkins." Journal of Urban Affairs, 45(1), pp. 109–110
Zoning, Land Use, and the Reproduction of Urban Inequality
Zoning determines what can be built where, and is ubiquitous in the United States. Low-density residential zoning predominates in US cities far more than in other countries, limiting housing opportunities for those who cannot afford large homes. These zoning regulations have racist and classist origins, make housing more expensive, and reinforce segregation patterns. While sociologists study these consequences of zoning, and other causes of unaff…
Renter Nonpayment and Landlord Response
How renters respond to economic hardship, and how landlords respond when tenants fail to make rent, are understudied questions, owing largely to limited data. We use experiences from the COVID-19 pandemic to begin answering these questions. Drawing on both new census data and two original surveys of renters in Los Angeles County, we test nine hypotheses about the sources of renter distress and landlord reactions to it. We find that lost work and …
What is an Opportunity Enthusiast to Do
David Imbroscio offers a useful pushback against groupthink among scholars studying neighborhood opportunity, even if I quibble with the details. Imbroscio sometimes conflates problem definition with solution feasibility, and ultimately points to some solutions to economic inequality that may be even less feasible than those offered by the opportunity enthusiasts. Further, the broader problems of economic inequality are well known to housing scho…
Do Land Use Plans Affirmatively Further Fair Housing
Problem research strategy and findings: The 1968 Fair Housing Act required local government recipients of federal money to take meaningful actions to affirmatively further fair housing (AFFH). Current fair housing analysis requirements are copious but do not request an assessment of how land use policies affect the potential for neighborhood integration. A recent California law requires local governments to include AFFH analysis in existing plann…
A Weak Link in Efforts to Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing? Evaluating Public Engagement Processes in Housing Plan Development in Southern California
Public participation is a core component of federal and state fair housing law implementation, but its effectiveness at Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing (AFFH) remains understudied. In this paper, we analyze the public engagement processes of eight southern California municipalities as they developed a newly mandated AFFH component for their 2021–2029 housing element update. We evaluate the timeline of plan development, outreach efforts, web…
Incoming! Spatial Enrollment Competition between Charter Schools and Traditional Public Schools
The meteoric rise in charter schools has several implications for traditional public schools and their students. One understudied implication is the geographic competition for students. Given traditional public school boundaries are often fixed while charter school boundaries are more flexible, charter schools can draw students away from existing traditional public schools, and we have very little information about how distance matters in the com…
Mitigating the Stress of Housing Instability
The Housing Choice Voucher program is the largest low-income housing subsidy program managed by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Research shows that vouchers improve housing affordability and stability and access to higher quality housing units and safer neighborhoods. Yet less is known about how housing supports affect a household’s health and well-being and contact with other social services, and even less about the impact …
Economics (14 works) · Political science (14 works) · Housing Market and Economics (13 works) · Urban, Neighborhood, and Segregation Studies (13 works) · Geography (11 works) · Sociology (9 works) · Demographic economics (7 works) · Economic growth (7 works) · Housing, Finance, and Neoliberalism (7 works) · Business (6 works)