Housing is recognized as a "socially determinant variable". In France, housing is the main item of expenditure in the family budget (accounting for an average of 29 percent), and many families would be unable to find decent housing without some help from the State. For a long time, the main problem was the housing shortage but in recent years the deterioration of housing conditions has been giving even greater cause for concern.
Despite extensive construction programs, the problem of housing for the most underprivileged population groups has not been solved. According to a recent report, between 2 and 3 million families had serious difficulties meeting their housing costs and were living in precarious and uncomfortable conditions.
Policies designed to address the housing problem have shifted over the past few decades from a macro-economic approach promoting construction to housing subsidies. The reasons for this shift can be traced to a determination to limit public spending and to avoid some of the adversary effects of macro-economic policies. The State has to some extent ceased to finance housing, especially the construction of new projects, with the result that the cost is now chiefly and directly borne by the family budget. Many underprivileged families, which were excluded from low-rent housing for various reasons such as selection of tenants, saturation of existing capacity or bankruptcy, had no alternative but to purchase their own home and were encouraged to do so without restraint by the then easy terms of housing loans. The housing sector thus contributed to the development of the "economy of indebtedness". It should indeed be emphasized that "widespread home ownership through borrowing could only be very harmful to low-income families."
In Belgium, the quality of housing, considered the prime indicator of housing deprivation, leaves much to be desired. Low-rent housing projects have been cut back as part of the austerity (缩减) policy which is pursued by the national and regional governments, and low-income households are finding it difficult to find somewhere to live. The number of homeless has also taken on alarming proportions. An estimated 3,000 persons spend nights in refuges, but the actual figure is probably much higher. Moreover, the number of homeless women and young persons is increasing.
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In recent years, ______ is the main problem with housing.