The share of income that households spent on their housing has been increasing over time in a wide range of countries, particularly among lower income households. In theory, the share of income spent on housing can reflect variations in household preferences for housing consumption but for low-income household, high burdens are likely more reflective of constraints and force these households to face tradeoffs between housing and non-housing consumption that negatively affect their overall life satisfaction. This paper uses data from the 2018 European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC) for 14 countries. We find that, controlling for household sociodemographic characteristics, households spending more than 30 percent of their income and those spending more than 50 percent of their income on housing report significantly lower levels of life satisfaction. The estimated relationship is largest for this latter heavily cost burdened group. The negative relationship between housing cost burden and reported life satisfaction is found across countries but varies in magnitude, suggesting that stronger welfare systems may mediate the negative impacts of housing cost burdens, although further research is needed to confirm both this relationship and the precise mechanisms driving it.

在许多国家，家庭用于住房的收入比例随着时间的推移一直在增加，特别是在低收入家庭中。理论上，住房支出占收入的比重可以反映家庭住房消费偏好的变化，但对于低收入家庭来说，高负担可能更能反映约束因素，迫使这些家庭面临住房与非住房消费之间的权衡，从而对低收入家庭产生负面影响。影响他们的整体生活满意度。本文使用 2018 年欧盟 14 个国家收入和生活条件统计数据 (EU-SILC) 的数据。我们发现，在控制家庭社会人口统计特征的情况下，住房支出超过收入 30% 的家庭以及住房支出超过收入 50% 的家庭的生活满意度显着降低。对于后者成本负担沉重的群体来说，估计的关系最大。住房成本负担与报告的生活满意度之间的负相关关系在各个国家都存在，但程度不同，这表明更强大的福利制度可能会调节住房成本负担的负面影响，尽管需要进一步的研究来证实这种关系和驱动的确切机制它。