U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development | Office of Policy Development and Research

Moving to Work 

Retrospective

A Picture of Moving to Work

Agencies’ Housing Assistance

Moving to Work Agencies’ 

Use of Funding Flexibility

Housing Choice and Self 

Sufficiency Outcomes at 

Moving to Work Agencies

The Impact of the Moving to Work 

Demonstration on the Per Household 

Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Evaluating the Effects of 

Santa Clara County Housing 

Authority’s Rent Reform 

Moving to Work Agencies’ 

Use of Project-Based 

Voucher Assistance

U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development | Office of Policy Development and Research
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The Impact of the Moving 

to Work Demonstration on 

the Per Household Costs of 

Federal Housing Assistance

Prepared for:

U.S. Department of Housing 

and Urban Development

Prepared by:

Christina Stacy

Josh Leopold

Daniel Teles

Ruth Gourevitch

Alyse D. Oneto

Yipeng Su

Matthew Gerken

URBAN INSTITUTE

June 2020 
The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Acknowledgments

Acknowledgments

This report was funded by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). We are 

grateful to HUD and to all our funders, who make it possible for Urban to advance its mission.

The views expressed are those of the authors and should not be attributed to the Urban Institute, 

its trustees, or its funders. Funders do not determine research findings or the insights and 

recommendations of Urban experts. Further information on the Urban Institute’s funding principles 

is available at urban.org/fundingprinciples.

Many people reviewed and contributed to this report. The authors appreciate the feedback and 

support that Elizabeth Rudd, the government technical representative for the Moving to Work 

(MTW) Retrospective Evaluation, provided throughout the course of the study. Noah Strayer 

provided valuable research assistance and Emily Peiffer provided editorial support. In addition, 

the authors thank leadership from Boulder Housing Partners, the Columbia (Missouri) Housing 

Authority, the Charlotte Housing Authority, the Housing Authority of the City of Pittsburgh, 

Home Forward (Portland, Oregon), the San Antonio Housing Authority, the San Diego Housing 

Commission, the San Mateo County Housing Department, the Seattle Housing Authority, and 

the Housing Authority of Tulare County for taking the time to speak with us. We also thank MTW 

Program Office and other HUD staff, including Lynn Rodgers, Lydia Taghavi, Alison Christensen, 

John Concannon, Debra Hamblin, Nick Miele, Marianne Nazarro, and many others, for their 

assistance in understanding administrative data sources. HUD staff, including Mark Shroder and 

Kurt Usowsksi, also provided helpful feedback on our research design. Jason Casterline helped 

us to understand administrative financial data. We thank our reviewers, Doug Wissoker and Martin 

Abravanel, along with Diane Levy and Martha Galvez, for providing input throughout the research 

process. Other members of Urban’s MTW Evaluation team provided insights, data, and comments 

on this study along the way. Finally, we thank the 39 MTW agencies for their review of an early 

version of this report.

Disclaimer

The contents of this report are the views of the contractor and do not necessarily reflect the views 

or policies of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development or the U.S. Government.
The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Foreword

Foreword

The Moving to Work (MTW) demonstration, launched in 1996, gives participating public housing 

agencies (PHAs) the flexibility to design and test new ways of providing housing assistance, 

provided that new policies are intended to achieve one or more of the following statutory 

objectives: (1) to reduce cost and achieve greater cost effectiveness in Federal expenditures; (2) to 

give incentives to families with children where the head of household is working, seeking work, or 

preparing for work; and (3) to increase housing choices for low-income families. This study, one of 

six reports produced by HUD’s retrospective evaluation of MTW, focuses on costs.

Based on a rigorous analysis of changes over time in funds received and households served, 

beginning with a pre-MTW baseline, this study shows that participating in the MTW demonstration 

was not associated with increased or decreased costs to HUD per household served. The study 

finds that, after joining MTW, agencies experienced an increase in funding, but also served 

a greater number of households. Further, the research tested whether altering program mix, 

decreasing housing quality or affordability, or serving higher income or easier to serve households 

might explain the stable cost per household, and found that these factors did not account for cost 

per household staying the same after joining the demonstration. Finally, although MTW agencies 

continued to serve the same or more households per dollar received and did not reduce per 

household spending, they generated large reserves (traditional agencies are not allowed to do 

this). 

This study is the best evidence to date that MTW agencies are innovating in cost effectiveness, but 

it stops short of describing and explaining how MTW agencies do it. The next steps for policy 

research are to understand how they are doing this and the extent to which activities of the current 

MTW agencies could improve cost effectiveness at all public housing agencies.

Seth D. Appleton

Assistant Secretary for Policy Development and Research

U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development
iv

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Contents

Contents

Executive Summary ............................................................................................................................ viii

Introduction ...........................................................................................................................................1

Background ...........................................................................................................................................4

Moving to Work Funding and Fund Flexibility ........................................................................................................... 5

Prior Research on Moving to Work and the Cost of Housing Assistance ................................................9

Housing Choice Voucher Administrative Costs ........................................................................................................ 9

Housing Choice Voucher Rental Payment Subsidies .............................................................................................10

Public Housing Operations.............................................................................................................................................11

HUD Funding Levels.........................................................................................................................................................11

Reserves ..............................................................................................................................................................................11

Total Costs per Assisted Household...........................................................................................................................12

Limitations of Prior Research.........................................................................................................................................12

Research Questions and Research Design...........................................................................................13

Research Design...............................................................................................................................................................13

Research Questions.........................................................................................................................................................15

Research Question 1: What is the effect of Moving to Work status on HUD cost per assisted 

household?.................................................................................................................................................................15

Research Question 2: Do changes in program mix, housing quality and affordability, 

or the characteristics of assisted households explain the effect of Moving to Work status on 

HUD costs per assisted household? ...................................................................................................................16

Research Question 3: Does Moving to Work status affect agencies’ total per household 

operating and housing assistance spending, or per household spending on program 

administration, tenant services, or operating reserves? ................................................................................16

Data Collection and Assembly .............................................................................................................18

Variable Calculations.......................................................................................................................................................19

HUD Cost per Assisted Household .....................................................................................................................19

Measures of the Type and Quality of Housing Assistance...........................................................................20

Measures of Public Housing Agency Spending ..............................................................................................21

External Cost Drivers...............................................................................................................................................21

Sample Construction......................................................................................................................................................22

Identifying the Comparison Group .............................................................................................................................23

Comparing Moving to Work Agencies with Traditional Public Housing Agencies ........................................24
Contents

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

v

Estimation Methods .............................................................................................................................27

Estimation Method for Research Question 1: What is the effect of Moving to Work status on 

cost per assisted household? ...................................................................................................................................... 27

Understanding the Timing of Changes in Cost per Household..................................................................28

Estimation Method for Research Question 2: Do changes in program mix, housing quality and 

affordability, or the characteristics of assisted households explain the effect of Moving to Work 

status on HUD costs per assisted household?........................................................................................................28

Estimation Method for Research Question 3: Does Moving to Work status affect agencies’ total per 

household operating and housing assistance spending, or per household spending on program 

administration, tenant services, or operating reserves? .......................................................................................29

Robustness Checks ........................................................................................................................................................30

Findings ............................................................................................................................................... 31

Public Housing Agency Trends Before and After Joining Moving to Work ......................................................31

Effect of the Moving to Work Demonstration on HUD Cost per Assisted Household.................................. 34

Effect of the Moving to Work Demonstration Controlling for Program Mix, Housing Quality and 

Affordability, and Household Characteristics...........................................................................................................38

Effect of the Moving to Work Demonstration on per Household Spending by Public Housing 

Agencies............................................................................................................................................................................40

Discussion .........................................................................................................................................................................42

Limitations ......................................................................................................................................................................... 43

Conclusion ........................................................................................................................................................................ 44

Appendix A: History of the Moving to Work Demonstration ................................................................A-1

Appendix B: Additional Analyses.........................................................................................................B-1

Alternate Size Thresholds for Comparison Traditional Public Housing Agencies.........................................B-1

Robustness Checks ...................................................................................................................................................... B-2

Using Propensity Score Matching..................................................................................................................... B-2

Multiple Imputation.................................................................................................................................................B-4

Weighting Counts of Local, Non-Traditional Housing.................................................................................. B-5

Public Housing Agency-Specific Time Trends............................................................................................... B-5

Excluding Controls for Median Rent and Government Wage.................................................................... B-5

Event Study ..................................................................................................................................................................... B-6

Repeated Cross Sectional Estimates ........................................................................................................................B-7

Appendix C: Supplemental Exhibits ....................................................................................................C-1

Appendix D: References......................................................................................................................D-1
vi

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

List of Exhibits

List of Exhibits

Exhibit ES1: Moving to Work Funding Flexibility........................................................................................... viii

Exhibit ES2: The Effect of Moving to Work on HUD Cost per Assisted Household, HUD Funding, 

and Number of Assisted Households................................................................................................................ x

Exhibit ES3: The Effect of Moving to Work on HUD Funding and Number of Assisted Households 

(Percent Change).................................................................................................................................................... xi

Exhibit ES4: The Effect of Moving to Work on HUD Cost per Household Over Time 

(Percent Change)................................................................................................................................................... xii

Exhibit 1: The Moving to Work Retrospective Evaluation..............................................................................3

Exhibit 2: Timeline of Moving to Work Agreements.......................................................................................5

Exhibit 3: Moving to Work Funding Flexibility.................................................................................................. 7

Exhibit 4: Timeline of Moving to Work Agreements and Evaluation Period (Evaluation 

Sample in Bold)...................................................................................................................................................... 15

Exhibit 5: Research Questions............................................................................................................................17

Exhibit 6: Variables for Analysis and Data Sources ......................................................................................18

Exhibit 7: Average Levels of HUD Funding and Assisted Households at Traditional Public 

Housing Agencies (2003–2017)........................................................................................................................24

Exhibit 8: Number of Assisted Households, HUD Funding, and HUD Cost per Household 

by Public Housing Agencies’ Future Moving to Work Status, 2003....................................................... 25

Exhibit 9: HUD Cost per Assisted Household in 2003 and 2017, by Public Housing 

Agency Size........................................................................................................................................................... 26

Exhibit 10: Moving to Work Agencies’ Average HUD Funding Before and After Joining 

Moving to Work......................................................................................................................................................32

Exhibit 11: Moving to Work Agencies’ Average Number of Assisted Households Before 

and After Joining Moving to Work ....................................................................................................................33

Exhibit 12: Moving to Work Agencies’ Average HUD Cost per Household Before and 

After Joining Moving to Work ............................................................................................................................34

Exhibit 13: The Effect of Moving to Work on HUD Cost per Assisted Household, HUD Funding, 

and Number of Assisted Households..............................................................................................................35

Exhibit 14: The Effect of Moving to Work on HUD Cost per Household Over Time, Using Public 

Housing Agencies With at Least 750 Assisted Households (2003) as a Comparison Group 

(Percent Change)...................................................................................................................................................37

Exhibit 15: The Effect of Moving to Work on HUD Funding and Number of Assisted 

Households (Percent Change)...........................................................................................................................38

Exhibit 16: The Effect of Moving to Work on HUD Cost per Assisted Household Controlling 

for Program Mix, Quality and Affordability, and Household Characteristics .........................................39
List of Exhibits

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

vii

Exhibit 17: Per Household Total Expenditure, Administrative Costs, Tenant Services Spending, 

and Operating Reserves, 2003........................................................................................................................ 40

Exhibit 18: The Effect of Moving to Work on per Household Total Expenditures, Administrative 

Costs, Tenant Services Spending, and Operating Reserves .....................................................................42

Exhibit A1: History of Moving to Work Agency Involvement....................................................................A-2

Exhibit B1: Sensitivity of Estimates to Alternative Comparison Groups .................................................B-1

Exhibit B2: Sensitivity of Estimates to Alternative Comparison Groups ...............................................B-2

Exhibit B3: Variables Used to Determine the Propensity Score.............................................................B-3

Exhibit B4: Robustness Check Results ..........................................................................................................B-4

Exhibit B5: Event Study Results for RQ1 Using Public Housing Agencies With at Least 

750 Assisted Households (2003) as a Comparison Group .....................................................................B-6

Exhibit B6: Repeated Cross-Sectional Estimation ......................................................................................B-8

Exhibit C1: Data Sources.....................................................................................................................................C-1

Exhibit C2: Variable Calculations From Financial Data Schedule Data ................................................C-2

Exhibit C3: Analysis of Assisted Households ..............................................................................................C-3

Exhibit C4: Research Question and Regression Specifications..............................................................C-3

Exhibit C5: Number of Assisted Households, HUD Funding, HUD Cost per Assisted Household, 

Operating Reserves per Assisted Household, and Number of Local, Non-Traditional Units, by 

Moving to Work Agency (Agencies That Joined Moving to Work After 2003)...................................C-4

Exhibit C6: Number of Assisted Households, HUD Funding, HUD Cost per Assisted Household, 

Operating Reserves per Assisted Household, and Number of Local, Non-Traditional Units, by 

Moving to Work Agency (Agencies That Left Moving to Work After 2003).........................................C-6

Exhibit C7: Households Assisted by Moving to Work Agencies, by Program, 2003 to 2017 .........C-6

Exhibit C8: Moving to Work Agency Characteristics Compared with All Traditional Public 

Housing Agencies and Traditional Public Housing Agencies with More Than 750 Assisted 

Households, 2003 ..............................................................................................................................................C-7
viii

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Executive Summary 

Executive Summary 

Moving to Work (MTW) is a HUD 

demonstration that gives selected public 

housing agencies (PHAs) greater flexibility 

with their spending and the ability to provide 

innovative housing assistance to low-income 

households. The demonstration has three 

objectives: reduce costs and increase cost 

effectiveness, promote employment and 

economic self-sufficiency, and increase 

housing choices for low-income families. This 

report focuses on the first of these objectives: 

increasing cost effectiveness.

MTW aims to make PHAs more cost-effective 

by easing regulations, encouraging innovation, 

and providing greater flexibility in how PHAs 

use their HUD funding (see exhibit ES1), 

but previous studies have found that MTW 

agencies spend more per assisted household 

than traditional PHAs. These studies, however, 

1 The analysis excludes special purpose voucher programs such as the Family Unification Program and HUD-VA Supportive Housing because these 

programs are not part of agencies’ Moving to Work agreements. 

do not account for spending levels before 

agencies joined the MTW demonstration, and 

thus do not establish whether this difference 

is caused by the MTW demonstration. This 

is the first study to examine changes in PHA 

cost effectiveness using data from before and 

after PHAs joined the MTW demonstration 

compared with traditional PHAs during the 

same period. This study therefore better 

accounts for other differences between 

housing agencies that can affect costs, and 

it isolates the impact of MTW status on cost 

effectiveness. The study also provides a 

more comprehensive picture of the impact 

of flexible funding and program assistance 

on costs by including all public housing and 

Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) program 

funding and all households assisted by those 

funds, including families assisted through 

local, non-traditional programs, which only 

MTW agencies are allowed to operate.1

Exhibit ES1: Moving to Work Funding Flexibility

MTW = Moving to Work.

Source: Moving to Work Standard Agreement Attachment C, “Statement of Authorizations,” retrieved from HUD’s MTW portal, https://www.hud.gov/program_

offices/public_indian_housing/programs/ph/mtw/mtwsa

Public 

Housing 

Operating 

Funds

Housing 

Choice 

Voucher 

Funds

Public 

Housing 

Capital 

Funds

Public 

Housing 

Operating 

Costs

Housing 

Choice 

Voucher 

Program

Public 

Housing 

Capital 

Projects

Traditional Funding Streams

..

Public 

Housing 

Operating 

Funds

Housing 

Choice 

Voucher 

Funds

Public 

Housing 

Capital 

Funds

MTW 

Fund

MTW Funding Streams

Local, 

Nontraditional 

Programs Component 

Units

Public 

Housing 

Capital 

Projects

Housing 

Choice 

Voucher 

Program

Supportive 

Services

Public 

Housing 

Operating 

Costs
Executive Summary 

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

ix

Methodology

This study defines cost effectiveness as 

“cost per household,” or the total funding 

PHAs receive from HUD each year for public 

housing and HCV programs divided by the 

number of households assisted by these 

funds. This measure was selected as the 

most comprehensive measure of cost per 

household because it includes all funding 

sources that are eligible for MTW funding 

flexibility and all households assisted 

through this funding, including households 

assisted through local, non-traditional MTW 

programs. It also allows for a more direct 

comparison of cost-effectiveness between 

MTW and traditional agencies than looking at 

expenditures because MTW agencies report 

expenditures differently than traditional PHAs.

The analysis uses 15 years of historical data, 

from 2003 through 2017, to measure trends 

within PHAs before and after receiving MTW 

status. It then compares those trends with 

traditional PHAs of comparable size during 

the same period. To better understand how, if 

at all, MTW status affects cost effectiveness, 

it creates separate estimates of the effect of 

MTW status on PHAs’ annual funding from 

HUD and on the number of households PHAs 

assist with that funding.

This analysis is limited to 2003 to 2017 

because of data quality and availability 

challenges in data reported to HUD prior 

to 2003. Therefore, the estimates show the 

effect of MTW status on cost per assisted 

household for the 18 PHAs that entered or 

exited the MTW demonstration during this 

period and for whom there is reliable data.2

The analysis excludes some of the largest 

MTW agencies—such as the Chicago Housing 

2 The 18 public housing agencies included in the impact analyses are Alaska, Atlanta, Baltimore City, Boulder, Champaign, Charlotte, District of Columbia, 

Columbus (GA), Fairfax County, Greene, High Point (NC), Holyoke, King County, Lexington-Fayette Urban County, Orlando, Reno, San Bernardino, and 

San Diego. The event study discussed in appendix B includes only 12 public housing agencies due to data limitations (see exhibit B5). 3 Because outcome measures entered the regression in log form, percentage change is calculated by exponentiating the coefficient and subtracting 1. 

For example, the coefficient for HUD funding is 0.106 and the estimated percentage change is (e^0.106)-1=0.112 or 11 percent.

Authority, Home Forward (Portland, Oregon), 

and the Cambridge Housing Authority—that 

entered the demonstration prior to 2003.

Findings

Moving to Work status does not affect public 

housing agencies’ cost effectiveness.

MTW status has no significant impact on cost 

per assisted household when MTW agencies 

are compared with traditional PHAs of similar 

size. Although MTW status is associated with 

an increase in HUD funding, the agencies 

use this funding to assist more households, 

resulting in no significant change in cost 

effectiveness.

Exhibit ES2 displays the results from our main 

statistical model, which shows the average 

change in cost per assisted household, 

HUD funding, and number of households 

assisted by a PHA after joining the MTW 

demonstration compared with other similarly 

sized agencies. PHAs receive, on average, 11 

percent more funding from HUD after joining 

the MTW demonstration and assist 10 percent 

more households.3 Because these effects 

are of similar size, the effect of MTW status 

on cost per assisted household is negligible 

(exhibit ES2).
x

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Executive Summary 

Exhibit ES2: The Effect of Moving to Work on HUD Cost per Assisted Household, HUD Funding, and Number of Assisted 

Households

Cost per Assisted Household HUD Funding Assisted Households

Impact of MTW 0.013 0.106*** 0.092***

(0.030) (0.024) (0.028)

Control Variables

Area Median Rent

0.298*** 0.144** -0.154***

(0.071) (0.060) (0.047)

Government Wage

0.048* 0.023 -0.025

(0.026) (0.026) (0.020)

Number of PHAs 727 727 727

Adjusted Within R-Squared 0.096 0.083 0.039

Observations 10,905 10,905 10,905

* p<0.10, ** p<0.05, *** p<0.01

MTW = Moving to Work. PHA = public housing agency.

Notes: Standard errors (listed in parentheses) are heteroskedastic robust and clustered at the PHA level. Data cover 2003–2017. Regressions include only PHAs 

with at least 750 households and exclude agencies that joined MTW before 2003. They also exclude the Oakland Housing Authority, Tacoma Housing Authority, 

Housing Authority of the County of Santa Clara, and Housing Authority of the City of San Jose because of incomplete data on households in public housing. 

(See footnote 2 in this report for a list of included MTW agencies.) All regressions include year and PHA fixed effects. Cost per assisted household, HUD funding, 

assisted households, area median rent, and government wages enter the regression in logged form.

Sources: Urban Institute Analysis of HUD’s Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center, Financial Data Schedule, and Voucher Management System 

data

Examining these effects on an annual basis 

shows that the main increase in HUD funding 

and assisted households occurred the year 

that agencies joined MTW, and then continued 

to increase in subsequent years (exhibit 

ES3). These two effects combined lead to no 

significant difference in cost effectiveness 

in any year before or after joining the MTW 

demonstration (exhibit ES4). 
Executive Summary 

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

xi

Exhibit ES3: The Effect of Moving to Work on HUD Funding and Number of Assisted Households (Percent Change)

MTW = Moving to Work.

Notes: Vertical dotted line and “Year joined MTW’’ represent the year in which public housing agencies (PHAs) execute their first MTW contract. The solid line 

represents the point estimate and the dashed lines on either side of this estimate represent the 90-percent confidence interval. Estimates are converted from log 

form to percent change. Regressions include only agencies with at least 750 households and exclude PHAs that joined MTW before 2005 or after 2015, because 

they need to have 2 years of data prior to joining MTW and 3 years of data after joining to enter this equation. Impact analyses do not include Oakland Housing 

Authority, Tacoma Housing Authority, Housing Authority of the County of Santa Clara, or Housing Authority of the City of San Jose because of incomplete data on 

households in public housing. All regressions include year and PHA fixed effects. Median rent and government wages are included as control variables. HUD cost 

per household, area median rent, and government wages enter the regression in logged form.

Sources: Urban Institute Analysis of HUD’s Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center, Financial Data Schedule, and Voucher Management System data 

Year Relative to Joining MTW

HUD Funding

-10%

-5%

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

-2 -1 Joined

MTW

+1 +2 +3

Estimated effect 90% confidence interval

Assisted Households

Year Relative to Joining MTW

-10%

-5%

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

-2 -1 Joined

MTW

+1 +2 +3

Estimated effect 90% confidence interval Estimated effect 90% confidence interval
xii

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Executive Summary 

Exhibit ES4: The Effect of Moving to Work on HUD Cost per Household Over Time (Percent Change)

-10%

-5%

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

-2 -1 Joined MTW +1 +2 +3

Estimated effect 90% confidence interval

Year Relative to Joining MTW

Cost Per Assisted Household

MTW = Moving to Work.

Notes: Vertical dotted line and “Year joined MTW” represent the year in which public housing agencies (PHAs) execute their first MTW contract. The solid line 

represents the point estimate and the dashed lines on either side of this estimate represent the 90-percent confidence interval. Estimates are converted from 

log form to percent change. Regressions include only agencies with at least 750 households and exclude agencies that joined MTW before 2005 or after 2015, 

because they need to have 2 years of data prior to joining MTW and 3 years of data after joining enter this equation. They also exclude the Oakland Housing 

Authority, Tacoma Housing Authority, Housing Authority of the County of Santa Clara, or Housing Authority of the City of San Jose because of incomplete data on 

households in public housing. All regressions include year and PHA fixed effects. Median rent and government wages are included as control variables. HUD cost 

per household, area median rent, and government wages enter the regression in logged form.

Sources: Urban Institute Analysis of HUD’s Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center, Financial Data Schedule, and Voucher Management 

System data 

There is no evidence that Moving to Work 

agencies maintain cost effectiveness by shifting 

their program mix, reducing housing quality or 

affordability, or serving different households.

The study also analyzed the effects of MTW 

status on cost effectiveness after including 

additional measures to control for changes in 

the mix of public housing units, tenant-based 

vouchers, and project-based vouchers in 

an agency’s portfolio; housing affordability 

and quality; and targeting of assistance to 

households that may be more expensive to 

serve. None of these factors resulted in a 

significant difference in the estimated effect 

of MTW status on HUD costs per assisted 

household, suggesting that MTW agencies 

do not maintain cost effectiveness by shifting 

their program mix, reducing housing quality or 

affordability, or serving different households.

Moving to Work status has varying effects on 

other facets of public housing agency rental 

assistance spending.

Although MTW status does not affect 

spending per household overall, it does affect 

certain spending categories. MTW status is 

not associated with a statistically significant 

change in spending on administrative costs or 

tenant services per assisted household, but it 

is associated with a large increase in dollars 

per household held in reserves. In interviews, 

some agencies’ staff said they use these 

greater reserves to provide gap financing for 

affordable housing development projects, 

which may lead to increases in the number of 

households served in the long run.

Coupled with the finding that HUD costs per 

household do not increase for agencies in the 
Executive Summary 

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

xiii

MTW demonstration, these results suggest 

that MTW agencies increase their savings in 

operating reserves while still serving roughly 

the same number of assisted households per 

dollar of HUD funding as before joining the 

demonstration.

Differences from Previous 

Research

Previous studies have found that MTW 

agencies receive more funding per assisted 

household than traditional PHAs, but these 

studies lacked data on MTW agencies’ 

costs per household before joining the 

demonstration. Studies that compare MTW 

agencies with traditional PHAs in terms 

of spending on specific activities, such 

as program administration, find that MTW 

agencies spend more per assisted household, 

but these differences diminish after 

accounting for higher housing and labor costs 

in the markets where MTW agencies operate. 

This suggests that MTW agencies’ higher 

costs per assisted household and higher 

spending may reflect preexisting differences 

between MTW and traditional PHAs, rather 

than the effects of receiving MTW status.

This study differs from prior studies in three 

ways:

• It accounts for preexisting differences

between MTW agencies and traditional

PHAs in both internal and external factors

affecting the costs of providing rental

assistance. Prior studies did not differentiate

between differences that existed before

the future MTW agencies joined the

demonstration and differences caused by

the demonstration.

• It uses 15 years of data to analyze the

longer-term impact of MTW status,

which accounts for agencies’ spending

on affordable housing development,

preservation, and the creation of new types

of rental assistance programs.

• It includes households assisted with housing

assistance through MTW agencies’ local,

non-traditional programs, which are not

captured in HUD’s administrative data and

have not been counted in prior studies.

Study Limitations

Lack of random assignment limits our ability 

to estimate the true causal impact of the 

demonstration. Eligible PHAs were not 

randomly assigned to the program or a control 

group; instead, they were chosen through 

selection processes that shifted from year to 

year before becoming more standardized in 

the later years of the demonstration. Although 

our panel method allows us to control for 

many of the differences between MTW 

agencies and traditional PHAs, we cannot fully 

control for differences in motivation that may 

prompt PHA leadership to seek MTW status.

A lack of data also contributes to three 

important limitations for this research:

• The analysis excludes the earliest MTW

agencies because cost and funding data

were not available for the earliest years of

the program. This leaves out many of the

largest MTW agencies and those that were

most active in using their MTW flexibility.

• Inconsistent and missing data reduce the

accuracy and precision of our estimates.

• Differences in how MTW agencies report

financial information limit the measures

available for analysis. In particular, the

study does not include information on the

mechanisms that allow MTW agencies to

increase their reserves without increasing

overall costs per assisted household. Nor

does it include information on how MTW

status affects agencies’ ability to leverage

other funding streams to support assisted

households.
xiv

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Executive Summary 

Finally, the study focuses only on cost 

effectiveness and defines cost effectiveness 

based on the number of households served. 

We chose this measure of cost effectiveness 

because it reflects federal costs and allows 

for fair comparison between MTW agencies 

and traditional PHAs, but it does not take into 

account the other two statutory objectives: 

promoting employment and economic selfsufficiency and increasing housing choices for 

low-income families. MTW agencies are not 

required to pursue cost effectiveness over and 

above the other objectives.

Conclusion

The MTW agencies included in our analysis 

received higher levels of HUD funding after 

joining the demonstration and also were 

able to increase the total number of assisted 

households served, resulting in no significant 

change in overall cost per household. These 

agencies also experienced a large increase 

in dollars per household held in reserves, 

suggesting that they were able to increase 

their savings while still serving roughly the 

same number of assisted households per 

dollar of HUD funding as before joining the 

demonstration.

Future studies should examine cost 

effectiveness in tandem with self-sufficiency 

or housing choice to determine the overall 

effect of the MTW demonstration on its three 

statutory objectives. Future studies should 

also estimate the relationship between MTW 

status and the number of affordable units 

within the PHA’s service area to determine 

whether MTW agencies use their reserves 

to increase the supply of affordable housing 

more than other similar agencies.

The findings in this study do not contradict 

prior studies showing that MTW agencies 

spend more per household, but rather 

show that this higher level of cost per 

household existed prior to entering the MTW 

demonstration and that the demonstration 

itself was not the cause.
Introduction

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

1

Introduction

When Congress created the Moving to Work 

(MTW) demonstration in 1996, one of its 

primary goals was to allow public housing 

agencies (PHAs) to use their federal dollars 

more efficiently. Traditional PHAs are highly 

regulated. They receive specific funding 

allocations for each component of providing 

housing assistance and their funding is tied 

to the amount of funding and the number of 

households they served in the previous year. 

The 39 PHAs in the MTW demonstration 

have greater flexibility in how they use their 

HUD funding and can ask HUD to waive 

or relax certain program regulations. This 

report, one of several produced for the 

MTW retrospective evaluation described 

in exhibit 1, assesses the effect of the MTW 

demonstration on the per household cost of 

assistance. This study examines the impact of 

the MTW demonstration on one measure of 

cost effectiveness—the number of households 

PHAs assist per dollar of HUD funding. The 

cost effectiveness measure, which we call 

“cost per household,” is the total funding 

PHAs receive from HUD each year for the 

public housing and Housing Choice Voucher 

(HCV) programs, divided by the number of 

households assisted by these programs.4

Fifteen years of historical data are used to 

measure trends within PHAs before and after 

receiving MTW status to compare with trends 

in traditional PHAs of comparable size during 

the same period. To better understand how, if 

at all, MTW status affects cost effectiveness, 

we create separate estimates of the effect of 

MTW status on PHAs’ annual funding from 

HUD and on the number of households PHAs 

assist with that funding.

Our model estimates the difference 

between MTW agencies’ actual trends in 

cost per assisted household relative to their 

expected trajectory if they had not joined the 

demonstration. The model uses fixed effects 

to account for differences between MTW 

and traditional PHAs in size, location, and 

other factors not associated with the MTW 

demonstration. We also control for changes 

in local rental costs and public sector wages 

in the PHAs’ service area that are known 

to affect the costs of housing assistance.5

Because of constraints due to data quality and 

availability, we limit our analysis to the years 

2003 through 2017 and, therefore, estimate 

effects of MTW status on cost per assisted 

household for the 18 PHAs that entered or 

exited the MTW demonstration during this 

period and for whom we have reliable data. 

The analysis, therefore, excludes some of 

the largest MTW PHAs—such as the Chicago 

Housing Authority, Home Forward (Portland, 

OR), and the Cambridge Housing Authority—

that joined MTW before 2003.

Although MTW was intended to increase 

cost effectiveness (among other goals), most 

empirical studies of the demonstration have 

shown that MTW agencies spend more per 

assisted household than traditional PHAs 

and use a lower proportion of their annual 

budgets on direct housing assistance (Buron 

et al., 2017; Fischer, 2011; GAO, 2018). Based 

on these studies, we hypothesized that MTW 

status increases the per household costs to 

the Federal government of providing housing 

assistance. We find, instead, that MTW 

status has no significant impact on cost per 

assisted household when compared with 

traditional PHAs of similar size.6 PHAs do 

receive significantly more funding after joining 

the demonstration (an estimated 11-percent 
2

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Introduction

increase in annual HUD funding), but they 

use this money to serve significantly more 

households (an estimated 10-percent increase 

in assisted households). This results in a slight 

and not statistically significant increase in 

HUD costs per assisted household. We find 

that average HUD funding increased in the 

year that a PHA joined MTW, peaked the next 

year, and then leveled off, and the number of 

assisted households increased slightly in the 

year PHAs joined and then continued to grow 

over time.

We test our results after adjusting for 

differences between MTW and traditional 

PHAs in the types of programs they offer 

(that is, public housing, tenant-based 

HCVs, project-based HCVs, and local, nontraditional programs), housing quality, housing 

affordability, and the characteristics of 

assisted households. None of these controls 

change our finding that MTW status has no 

significant effect on the costs to HUD of 

providing housing assistance.

Finally, we estimate the impact of MTW status 

on how much PHAs spend per household 

(aggregate spending), how much they spend 

on program administration and tenant 

services, and how much funding they hold 

in operating reserves. We find no increase 

in aggregate spending associated with 

MTW. We did find, however, that MTW status 

is associated with statistically significant 

increases in the amount of funding PHAs hold 

in operating reserves of approximately $840 

per assisted household.This suggests that 

MTW agencies are able to serve the same 

number of households per dollar of HUD 

funding while also saving money in reserves 

for future developments and other uses.7

Our results suggest that the MTW 

demonstration has little to no impact on the 

average costs to the Federal government 

of providing housing assistance. MTW 

7 There appears to be no impact of MTW on spending on administrative costs per household and tenant services per household, but there is too much 

variation between PHAs and within PHAs over time to measure these impacts with precision.

status leads to an increase in HUD funding 

for housing assistance and a comparable 

increase in assisted households, resulting in 

no significant effect on cost effectiveness. 

Although our study finds no evidence of MTW 

meeting its statutory objective of achieving 

greater cost effectiveness, we also find no 

evidence that MTW induces the higher costs 

found by previous studies.

Results differ from prior studies for four 

main reasons. First, the fixed effects model 

accounts for pre-existing differences 

between MTW and traditional PHAs and 

the communities they serve that affect the 

costs of providing housing assistance. MTW 

agencies received and spent more funding 

per assisted household prior to joining the 

demonstration. Cross-sectional studies 

cannot differentiate between differences 

that existed before MTWs joined the 

demonstration and differences caused by the 

demonstration. Second, by using 15 years 

of data, it is possible to analyze the longerterm impact of MTW agencies’ allocation of 

funding in affordable housing development, 

preservation, or the creation of new types 

of housing assistance programs. Third, 

this study includes households assisted 

through MTW agencies’ local, non-traditional 

programs, which are not captured in HUD’s 

administrative data and have not been 

included in prior studies. Finally, the analysis 

excludes the earliest MTW PHAs, which joined 

when there was less standardization in how 

PHAs were selected to the demonstration and 

more variation in their funding formulas.
Introduction

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

3

Exhibit 1: The Moving to Work Retrospective Evaluation

The HUD-sponsored Moving to Work (MTW) Retrospective Evaluation includes six reports and an online data feature that examine different aspects of the MTW program and MTW agencies’ activities and performance under the program’s three statutory objectives.

A Picture of Moving to Work Agencies’ Housing Assistance describes MTW agencies, the assistance they provided, and the characteristics of the households they served in 2008 and 2016. A related online data feature provides access to MTW agency-level data.

Moving to Work Agencies’ Use of Funding Flexibility examines how agencies have used MTW funding flexibility, alone and with 

regulatory waivers, and categorizes funding flexibility activities by their primary objectives—cost effectiveness, self-sufficiency of assisted households, or increased housing choice for low-income families. The study includes an indepth examination of funding shifts 

for a subgroup of eight agencies.

Housing Choice and Self-Sufficiency Outcomes at Moving to Work Agencies examines the extent to which MTW agencies meet two 

of the program’s three statutory objectives, increasing housing choice and promoting self-sufficiency for assisted households.

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance examines how MTW 

status affects the costs, to HUD, of providing housing assistance to households in the public housing and Housing Choice Voucher 

(HCV) programs.

Evaluating the Effects of Santa Clara County Housing Authority’s Rent Reform examines the impacts on work, earnings, and housing 

subsidies among assisted households of Santa Clara’s unique rent reform, which increased the proportion of income that households must 

pay toward rent.

Moving to Work Agencies’ Use of Project-Based Voucher Assistance examines multiple aspects of MTW agencies’ use of projectbased voucher (PBV) assistance, including the share of assistance and HCV budget authority devoted to PBVs, the relationships 

between PBVs and the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit and Rental Assistance Demonstration programs, the locations of PBV-assisted 

units, and case studies of three agencies’ MTW goals and activities.
4

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Background

Background

Enacted by Congress in 1996, the Moving 

to Work (MTW) demonstration8 allowed 

designated public housing agencies (PHAs) 

greater regulatory and funding flexibility 

to test innovations in housing assistance.9

MTW agencies can apply for waiver authority 

to test innovations that aim to meet one or 

more of the demonstration’s three statutory 

objectives:10

1. Reduce cost and achieve greater cost 

effectiveness in federal expenditures

2. Give incentives to families with children 

where the head of household is working, 

is seeking work, or is preparing for work 

by participating in job training, educational 

programs, or programs that assist people 

to obtain employment and become 

economically self-sufficient

3. Increase housing choices for low-income 

families

MTW agencies still must abide by statutory 

requirements and regulatory requirements for 

which they do not have a waiver. They also 

must serve “substantially the same” number 

of families as they would have if they had not 

joined the demonstration.11

Exhibit 2 displays the years in which MTW 

agencies signed, and in some cases 

terminated, their MTW agreements.12 Most 

MTW agencies entered the demonstration 

8 An additional 100 agencies will be granted MTW designation by HUD by approximately 2022 through the MTW Expansion. For more information on the 

MTW demonstration, as well as the MTW Expansion, see https://www.hud.gov/mtw. 9 In this report, we refer to the 39 PHAs that held MTW status as of 2018 as “MTW agencies” and the roughly 3,000 agencies without MTW status as 

“traditional PHAs.” The MTW Demonstration includes 39 PHAs, but the Housing Authority of the County of Santa Clara manages all housing programs 

for the Housing Authority of the City of San Jose so these two are treated as a single agency in the analysis and throughout the remaining sections 

of this report. Two agencies, Greene Metropolitan Housing Authority (Ohio) and High Point Housing Authority (North Carolina) were part of the 

demonstration but have since exited. 10 Omnibus Consolidated Rescissions and Appropriations Act of 1996. Pub. L. No. 104-134, tit. II, § 204, 110 Stat. 1321, 1321-281 (codified as amended at 42 

U.S.C. § 1437f note). 11 For information on how this is calculated, see Notice PIH-2013-02 (HA) Baseline Methodology for Moving to Work Public Housing Agencies (https://

www.hud.gov/sites/documents/PIH2013-02.PDF). 12 Additional information on agency selection into the demonstration and a more detailed timeline appear in appendix A. 13 The three PHAs selected mainly based on proposed activities rather than performance were the San Diego Housing Commission, Vancouver Housing 

Authority, and Minneapolis Public Housing Authority (Cadik and Nogic, 2010). The seven PHAs invited to join by Congress through an Appropriations 

Act were the Charlotte Housing Authority and the Housing Authority of the City of Pittsburgh in 1999; the Chicago Housing Authority in 2000; and the 

Alaska Housing Finance Corporation, the Housing Authority of the County of San Bernardino, the Housing Authority of the City of San Jose, and the 

Santa Clara County Housing Authority in 2008.

through a competitive application process, 

and HUD selected them because they 

were high performers with strong plans for 

how they would use greater flexibility. One 

agency entered through HUD’s Jobs-Plus 

initiative. Additionally, in 2000, 2007, and 

2008, Congress directly granted MTW status 

to seven PHAs.13 Some of these agencies 

were low performers at the time of their 

selection and were given MTW status to help 

improve their financial sustainability. The 

list of MTW agencies shows that they are 

disproportionately located in large, coastal 

urban areas.
Background

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

5

Exhibit 2: Timeline of Moving to Work Agreements

14 The Housing Opportunity Through Modernization Act of 2016 (HOTMA) gave traditional PHAs the flexibility to use up to 20 percent of their Operating 

Subsidy funds each year for Capital Fund Program activities. HUD issued guidance on how PHAs can use this flexibility on February 28, 2018, through 

PIH Notice 2018-03 (HA) “Guidance on the Use of Operating Subsidy for Capital Fund Purposes for Subsidy Appropriated and Allocated for Calendar 

Year 2018 and Subsequent Years.” Retrieved from: http://commdevstrategies.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/HUD-PIH-Notice-2018-03.pdf.

1999

Cambridge

Delaware

Greene

High Point

Keene

Lawrence-Douglas County

Lincoln

Louisville

Massachusetts

Portage

Portland

San Antonio

Tulare County

Vancouver

2000

Chicago

Pittsburgh

San Mateo

2008

Alaska

Baltimore

San Bernardino

San Jose

Santa Clara County

San Diego (reentered)

2010

Champaign County

Tacoma

2011

Boulder

LexingtonFayette

Orlando

2013

Columbus

Fairfax

Holyoke

1998 Reno

Minneapolis

San Diego

Seattle

2001

New Haven

Philadelphia

2004

Oakland

Greene and

High Point

left 

demonstration

2003

Atlanta

Washington, DC

King County

San Diego left 

demonstration

2007

Charlotte

Notes: The graphic shows the year that agencies signed their Moving to Work (MTW) agreement. In the initial cohort, six agencies were accepted but dropped out 

before gaining MTW status: Birmingham, Alabama; Cherokee Nation, Los Angeles County, California; Stevens Point, Wisconsin; Tampa, Florida; and a consortium 

of five PHAs in Utah. 

Source: Urban Institute analysis of documents retrieved from HUD’s Moving to Work (MTW) portal, https://www.hud.gov/mtw

Moving to Work Funding and 

Fund Flexibility

Traditional PHAs are funded for discrete 

activities through a set of clearly defined 

formulas with strict specifications about how 

they can use their funding. Each year they 

receive separate funding allocations from 

HUD for the Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) 

Housing Assistance Payments (HAP) and 

administrative fees, public housing operations, 

and public housing capital improvements. 

With some exceptions, funds cannot be 

used for anything other than the designated 

purposes.14 If traditional PHAs spend less 

than their annual allocated HAP amount, they 

receive less HAP in subsequent years. If PHAs 

spend more than their allocated amount, 

they risk going into “shortfall,” meaning they 

do not have adequate funding to cover their 

obligations. Shortfalls can result in PHAs being 

unable to serve additional households or, in 

extreme cases, terminating assistance for 

current households.

The MTW demonstration was designed with 

the assumption that giving PHAs more local 

control to set policy and invest in programs 

will allow them to make more efficient use of 

federal dollars. Each MTW agency has its own 

funding agreement with HUD that typically 

provides the same base voucher funding 

each year, with an inflation adjustment. As 

long as agencies remain compliant with the 

requirement to serve “substantially the same” 

number of households as they assisted before 

joining MTW, their funding does not go up if 

they serve more households or go down if 

they serve fewer households.
6

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Background

MTW agencies have two mechanisms not 

available to traditional PHAs that they can use 

to pursue greater cost effectiveness or other 

statutory objectives—waiver authority and 

fund flexibility. Waiver authority means that 

MTW agencies may be allowed by HUD to 

waive parts of the U.S. Housing Act of 1937 (as 

amended) in order to implement innovations 

intended to achieve one of the three statutory 

objectives (cost effectiveness, self-sufficiency, 

and housing choice). For example, through 

waiver authority, MTW agencies can increase 

their revenue by increasing the amount that 

tenants are expected to contribute to their rent 

or reduce administrative costs by reducing the 

frequency of Housing Quality Standards (HQS) 

inspections or income recertifications. 

Through waiver authority, MTW agencies 

can also offer local, non-traditional 

(LNT) assistance. There are four types 

of LNT programs: (1) rental subsidy, (2) 

homeownership, (3) housing development, 

and (4) service provision.15 Local, nontraditional rental subsidy programs provide 

a rental subsidy to a third-party (not a 

landlord or tenant) who manages intake 

and administration of the subsidy program. 

Homeownership programs provide subsidies 

that help low-income households purchase 

homes. Housing development programs 

use MTW funds to acquire, renovate, and/

or build units that are not public housing or 

HCV units, but are still affordable (although 

not necessarily to the lowest income families 

typically served by HUD rental assistance). 

Thus, LNT housing programs may provide 

shallower subsidies than the regular voucher 

and public housing programs. Finally, service 

provision programs provide services to lowincome households who are eligible for, but 

may not receive, housing assistance. 

15 HUD Office of Public and Indian Housing Notice PIH-2011-45 (HA) issued August 15, 2011, on the subject of parameters for local, non-traditional 

activities under the Moving to Work Demonstration Program.

Fund flexibility allows MTW agencies to apply 

fungibility to the three traditional funding 

streams—the Public Housing Operating Fund, 

the Public Housing Capital Fund, and the 

Housing Choice Voucher Fund (exhibit 3). 

This allows MTW agencies to reallocate funds 

across programs, by, for example, using HCV 

program funds to build or preserve affordable 

housing. This could allow MTW agencies to 

shift money from less efficient programs to 

more efficient ones. They can also use their 

public housing and voucher funds to improve 

their balance sheets or provide matching 

funds to leverage other funding sources 

for housing development or preservation 

(Levy, Long, and Edmonds, 2020). Given 

this fungibility, MTW agencies report their 

spending on public housing, HCVs, and LNT 

assistance collectively as MTW program 

spending, and the fungible funding used for 

these activities are often referred to as the 

MTW fund. Note that HUD funding for other 

programs cannot be used in this way. Most 

importantly for this study, funding for special 

purpose vouchers can only be spent on those 

vouchers and cannot become part of the 

MTW fund.
Background

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

7

Exhibit 3: Moving to Work Funding Flexibility

Public 

Housing 

Operating 

Funds

Housing 

Choice 

Voucher 

Funds

Public 

Housing 

Capital 

Funds

Public 

Housing 

Operating 

Costs

Housing 

Choice 

Voucher 

Program

Public 

Housing 

Capital 

Projects

Traditional Funding Streams

..

Public 

Housing 

Operating 

Funds

Housing 

Choice 

Voucher 

Funds

Public 

Housing 

Capital 

Funds

MTW 

Fund

MTW Funding Streams

Local, 

Nontraditional 

Programs Component 

Units

Public 

Housing 

Capital 

Projects

Housing 

Choice 

Voucher 

Program

Supportive 

Services

Public 

Housing 

Operating 

Costs

Source: Urban Institute analysis of Moving to Work (MTW) Standard Agreement Attachment C, “Statement of Authorizations,” retrieved from HUD’s MTW portal, 

https://www.hud.gov/program_offices/public_indian_housing/programs/ph/mtw/mtwsa

Some aspects of the MTW demonstration, 

however, may not be conducive to greater 

cost effectiveness. Unlike traditional PHAs, 

funding for MTW agencies is not directly tied 

to the number of households assisted in the 

prior year. This could reduce their motivation 

to make sure vouchers are fully utilized. In 

addition, MTW agencies can use their public 

housing and voucher funding to pay for more 

robust services, spend more on staff salaries 

and other administrative costs, or build-up 

reserves for future use. In the short-term, this 

use of funds may result in MTW agencies 

having higher costs per assisted household 

than traditional PHAs because less of their 

budget goes directly to housing assistance.

Historically, MTW agencies have also been 

more protected from Congressional budget 

cuts than traditional PHAs, which may allow 

them to receive a greater share of funding 

without serving more households. For 

example, some of the original MTW agencies 

have their Public Housing Operating Subsidy 

funding frozen at the levels they received 

when they entered the demonstration, 

adjusted annually for inflation. As public 

housing units have been removed from use 

and federal funding for public housing has 

declined, these agencies have received a 

greater share of HUD’s overall Public Housing 

Operating Subsidy budget. Similarly, funding 

for HCV programs at most MTW agencies is 

determined based on their MTW agreement 

rather than based upon the national HAP 

and administrative fee formulas. HUD applies 

Congressional budget cuts to the voucher 

program by applying a proration percentage 

to the full funding an agency was scheduled 

to receive. For traditional PHAs, HUD applies 

a separate proration amount to their HAP 

funding and their administrative fee funding. 
8

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Background

For MTW agencies, the HAP proration rate is 

applied to both HAP and administrative fee 

funding. Congress has made deeper cuts 

to administrative fee assistance than HAP 

funding. At its lowest point, in 2013, PHAs 

were receiving 69 percent of full funding for 

administrative fee expenses and 94 percent 

of their full funding levels for HAP.16 Thus, 

MTW agencies that combine their HAP and 

administrative fee funding have been less 

affected by recent cuts.17

16 Federal Register. 2016. “Housing Choice Voucher Program—New Administrative Fee Formula.” https://www.federalregister.gov/

documents/2016/07/06/2016-15682/housing-choice-voucher-program-new-administrative-fee-formula. 17 Discussions with MTW program office at HUD headquarters.
Prior Research on Moving to Work and the Cost of Housing Assistance

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

9

Prior Research on 

Moving to Work and 

the Cost of Housing 

Assistance

In this section, we review the relevant 

literature on the Moving to Work (MTW) 

demonstration’s effects on cost effectiveness. 

The most rigorous prior studies have 

compared MTW and traditional public housing 

agencies (PHAs) on per household spending 

on specific aspects of providing housing 

assistance, including program administration, 

housing assistance payments, public housing 

operations, and operating reserves, rather 

than looking at either total PHA expenditures 

or total HUD spending per assisted household 

(Buron et al., 2017; GAO, 2018). Generally, 

these studies show that MTW agencies 

spend more per assisted household on 

specific activities than traditional PHAs, but 

these differences diminish after accounting 

for higher housing and labor costs in the 

markets where MTW agencies operate. This 

suggests that observable differences in costs 

may be caused by differences between MTW 

and traditional PHAs unrelated to the MTW 

demonstration itself. The studies that have 

tried to compare MTW and traditional PHAs on 

overall costs find that MTW agencies spend 

much more per assisted household, but do 

not account for other factors that may drive 

spending differences.

18 Income recertification is the process through which a PHA determines a family’s income for purposes of setting the total tenant payment toward rent. 

Housing quality inspections are required to ensure that tenant- and project-based housing choice HCVs are used to house families in units that meet 

HUD housing quality standards.

Housing Choice Voucher 

Administrative Costs

Program administration accounts for a small 

fraction of the total costs of providing housing 

assistance, but it is an area where MTW 

status could create potential efficiencies. The 

MTW demonstration was expected to create 

efficiencies in program administration because 

MTW agencies have fewer administrative 

requirements. An analysis of MTW agencies’ 

annual administrative plans found that most 

agencies use their flexibility to scale back 

the frequency of annual Housing Quality 

Standards (HQS) inspections or income 

recertifications (Galvez, Simington, and 

Treskon, 2017).18 These changes, however, 

do not typically translate into lower overall 

administrative costs per assisted household 

for a few reasons. First, implementing 

policy changes carries its own costs related 

to developing the new policy, providing 

community outreach and education to 

explain the new policy, and training staff and 

updating software (Khadduri et al., 2014). 

Second, MTW PHAs typically use any savings 

generated from reduced regulation to shift 

how administrative staff spend their time 

rather than reduce overall staffing. Officials 

from several MTW agencies reported that 

staff were still spending as much time with 

residents as before their agency joined the 

demonstration, but the relationship had 

shifted from one of “auditor or investigator to 

one of mentor or advocate” (Abravanel et al., 

2004).

Two recent studies analyzed the effects of 

MTW on administrative costs per household in 

the Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) program 

as part of their larger MTW evaluations. Abt 

Associates compared average household 

costs between MTW and traditional PHAs by 

matching each MTW PHA to 3–5 traditional 
10

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Prior Research on Moving to Work and the Cost of Housing Assistance

PHAs that were most similar based on the 

number of HCV and public housing units, 

fair market rents, poverty rates, area income, 

and unemployment. It found that, in 2014, 

the average MTW agency spent $163 more 

per assisted household on administrative 

costs in the HCV program than the average 

comparable traditional PHA (Buron et al., 

2017). The difference in costs was driven 

primarily by a few MTW agencies that used 

their funding flexibility to spend administrative 

funds on resident services. Nearly onehalf (15 of 35) of MTW agencies had lower 

administrative costs per assisted household 

than their comparison traditional PHAs (Buron 

et al., 2017). Traditional PHAs cannot use HCV 

funds for resident services and generally 

rely on grants or partnerships with nonprofits if they offer these services. Excluding 

resident services, MTW agencies tended to 

have comparable administrative costs with 

traditional PHAs (Buron et al., 2017).

The U.S. Government Accountability Office 

(GAO) also analyzed differences in HCV 

administrative costs between MTW and 

traditional PHAs as part of its 2018 report to 

Congress on the MTW demonstration. Like 

Abt Associates (Buron et al., 2017), GAO 

(2018) constructed a comparison group of 

traditional PHAs similar to MTW agencies 

based on the number of assisted units, 

location, and housing market characteristics. 

Rather than looking at a single year, the GAO 

report compared median costs per household 

between MTW agencies and the matched 

comparison group between 2009 and 2015.19

GAO estimated that median per household 

administrative expenditures was $922 for 

MTW agencies and $642 for traditional 

PHAs. GAO’s estimate of administrative costs 

includes median spending of $37 per HCV 

household on resident services for MTW 

agencies, compared with a median of $0 for 

traditional PHAs (GAO, 2018).

19 Although they used multiple years of data, they pooled the years together and did not undertake an analysis of changes pre- and post-entry into the 

MTW demonstration.

Housing Choice Voucher 

Rental Payment Subsidies

Another major focus of the existing research 

has been PHAs’ average spending on Housing 

Assistance Payments (HAP) per assisted 

household. Both MTW and traditional PHAs 

receive HUD funding for HAP, which makes 

up the largest budget item for most PHAs. 

For traditional PHAs, this funding must be 

used to provide rental subsidies to landlords 

in the HCV program. MTW agencies have the 

flexibility to shift HAP funds into the public 

housing operating or capital funds programs, 

build up reserves, or develop new types of 

assistance. They can also adjust the amount of 

subsidy that households in the HCV program 

receive or provide financial incentives to 

landlords to participate in the program.

The Center on Budget Policies and Priorities 

(CBPP) estimated that, in 2010, MTW agencies 

left 16 percent of their HAP funds unused 

compared with 4 percent for traditional PHAs. 

The authors estimated that MTW agencies 

provided HCV assistance to 45,000 fewer 

households than they were authorized to 

assist because they did not fully use their HCV 

funding for subsidies (Fischer, 2015). Although 

MTW agencies could have transferred a 

portion of HCV funds to assist households in 

local, non-traditional (LNT) or public housing 

programs, CBPP was not able to track the 

funds in this way and thus considered the 

funds unused. CBPP’s analysis did not attempt 

to control for other differences, beyond MTW 

flexibility, that could have contributed to lower 

usage rates at MTW agencies.

GAO’s report, which accounted for differences 

in size, location, and market characteristics 

between agencies, estimated that MTW 

agencies have a median voucher utilization 

rate of 93 percent while traditional PHAs 

have a median utilization rate of 96 percent. 
Prior Research on Moving to Work and the Cost of Housing Assistance

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

11

In their analysis of utilization, neither GAO’s 

(2018) nor CBPP’s report (Fischer, 2015) was 

able to account for the number of households 

assisted by MTW agencies using their HAP 

funds to build or preserve housing or create 

LNT forms of housing assistance.20

The GAO report also found that MTW 

agencies spend more per household on 

rental payment subsidies than traditional 

PHAs. The authors estimated that the median 

rental payment subsidy was about 25 percent 

higher at MTW agencies than for comparable 

agencies—$8,295 per household for MTW 

agencies and $6,629 per household for the 

comparison group (GAO, 2018). The 2017 

Abt Associates report, however, found no 

statistically significant differences in average 

rental payment subsidy costs between MTW 

and traditional PHAs after adjusting for 

differences between agency fair market rents 

and national averages (Buron et al., 2017).

Public Housing Operations

With public housing, program administration 

and housing provision are funded and 

frequently examined collectively as public 

housing operations. Capital improvements 

are funded separately and have received 

less research attention. In part because 

of differences in funding formulas, CBPP 

estimated that, in 2010, MTW agencies 

received almost $3,000 more per unit for 

public housing operations than traditional 

agencies (Fischer, 2015). This estimate, 

however, did not account for variations 

between PHAs in local housing or labor 

markets. The GAO report, which did attempt 

to control for some of these differences, 

found that MTW agencies spent about $1,600 

more per unit per year on public housing 

20 The GAO (2018) report, which presented the number of households assisted through local, non-traditional activities, explained their inability to capture 

costs associated with these activities and discussed the limitation and implications of the absence of local, non-traditional spending data in their 

analysis. 21 For more information, see Title 24—Housing and Urban Development (2017) §982.503, Payment Standard Amount and Schedule, PIH Notice 

2008-15(HA) “Implementation of the Federal Fiscal Year 2008 Funding Provisions for the Housing Choice HCV Program,” Notice PIH 2009-13(HA) 

“Implementation of the Federal Fiscal Year 2009 Funding Provisions for the Housing Choice HCV Program,” and PIH Notice 2012-9 “Implementation of 

the Federal Fiscal Year 2012 Funding Provisions for the Housing Choice HCV Program.”

operations than traditional agencies (GAO, 

2018). The Abt Associates report found no 

statistically significant differences in per unit 

public housing operations costs between 

MTW and traditional PHAs after accounting for 

differences in local wages (Buron et al., 2017).

HUD Funding Levels

Some research suggests that MTW agencies’ 

funding tends to be more predictable 

and potentially more generous than it is 

for traditional PHAs. For example, CBPP 

found that the alternate funding formula 11 

MTW agencies receive for public housing 

operating subsidies accounts for $260 

million in additional funding compared with 

traditional PHAs (Fischer, 2015). In years of 

reduced appropriations, MTW agencies were 

still funded based on their MTW funding 

agreement for both their HCV and public 

housing programs.21 By contrast, traditional 

PHAs are funded according to a formula that 

accounts for local housing costs, past usage of 

HUD funds, and current obligations. HUD then 

prorates each traditional PHA’s funding levels 

to adjust for changes in total funding levels 

from Congress.

Reserves

MTW agencies can use their flexibility to place 

more money into reserves, which they can 

allocate to affordable housing development or 

preservation, or as a “rainy-day fund” in case 

of future funding shortfalls. GAO’s 2018 report 

estimated that, as of June 2017, the 39 MTW 

agencies had $808 million in HCV reserves—

more than all of the 2,000 traditional PHAs 

in their comparison group with a combined 

$737 million (GAO, 2018). This may indicate 

MTW agencies are not using as much of their 
12

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Prior Research on Moving to Work and the Cost of Housing Assistance

annual funding for direct housing assistance, 

but it can give them advantages over 

traditional PHAs in completing deals to build 

or preserve affordable housing (Abravanel 

et al., 2004). HUD’s data systems do not 

track PHAs’ affordable housing allocations 

but Abt Associates conducted a survey of 

PHAs as part of its MTW evaluation and found 

MTW agencies preserved significantly more 

affordable housing units than traditional PHAs 

(Buron et al., 2017).

Total Costs per Assisted 

Household

Neither the Abt Associates nor the GAO report 

attempted to estimate the effects of MTW 

status on total PHA expenditures per assisted 

household or HUD funding per assisted 

household. CBPP compared MTW with 

traditional PHAs on the number of assisted 

households in the public housing and voucher 

programs per $100,000 of HUD funding. It 

found that, for every $100,000 of HUD funding 

they received, MTW agencies assisted roughly 

9 households, while traditional PHAs assisted 

15 households (Fischer, 2011). This analysis, 

however, does not account for differences in 

size, location, rental market characteristics, or 

other factors that affect costs and may differ 

between MTW and traditional PHAs.

Housing assistance may be more expensive 

in MTW agencies for reasons unrelated to the 

MTW demonstration. MTW agencies tend to 

be larger than traditional PHAs and are more 

likely to be in areas with high housing and 

labor costs (Galvez, Gourevitch, and Docter, 

2020). Tighter housing markets and higher 

local wages have been shown to increase 

the costs per household in the HCV program 

(Finkel and Buron, 2001; Turnham et al., 2015). 

Additionally, many MTW agencies, such as 

the Housing Authority of the City of Pittsburgh 

and the Chicago Housing Authority, entered 

the demonstration with a large stock of aging 

public housing developments, which studies 

have shown are more expensive to maintain or 

repair (Stockard et al., 2003).

Limitations of Prior Research

Prior studies that examined the relationship 

between MTW status and cost effectiveness 

show that MTW agencies spend more per 

household than traditional PHAs. None 

of these studies, however, used data on 

MTW agencies before they joined the 

demonstration. Therefore, they were unable 

to identify the impact of MTW status on the 

agencies. The high-level findings presented 

in CBPP’s 2011 report (Fischer, 2011) did not 

control for local differences that influence 

the cost of housing assistance. The studies 

conducted by Abt Associates (Buron et al., 

2017) and GAO (2018) used sophisticated 

methods to identify a comparison group 

of traditional PHAs. These studies did not, 

however, control for unobserved differences 

that existed before MTW agencies joined the 

demonstration. They also did not examine how 

cost effectiveness or spending at agencies 

changed after they joined the demonstration. 

Additionally, these studies were unable 

to account for shifts in spending between 

public housing and HCVs or to LNT housing 

programs. The study described in this report 

overcomes these limitations, as described in 

the next section.
Research Questions and Research Design

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

13

Research Questions 

and Research Design

The existing research has shown that Moving 

to Work (MTW) agencies spend more per 

household than traditional public housing 

agencies (PHAs). The impact of MTW on the 

agencies, however, had not been determined. 

Our primary research question therefore 

asks: What is the effect of participating in the 

MTW demonstration on the per household 

cost of providing housing assistance? In this 

study, the per household cost of assistance, 

or “cost per household” is defined as the 

amount of funding a PHA receives from HUD 

divided by the number of households served 

by that PHA. Given the existing differences 

in spending per household, our hypothesis 

was that MTW status leads to higher costs 

per household. We tested this against the null 

hypothesis that there was no impact of MTW 

on costs per household.

If MTW status leads to higher per household 

costs, we want to understand why. Based on 

the prior research into MTW and the costs of 

assistance more generally, potential reasons 

for cost differences include the mix of types 

of housing assistance, the quality of public 

housing units, housing affordability, and the 

characteristics of households. Additionally, 

we want to find out which type of spending 

changes when agencies join MTW. Following 

the existing research, we examine changes 

in per household spending on program 

administration, resident services, and 

operating reserves.

This study is fundamentally different from 

earlier studies. The primary outcome 

variable covers all households assisted with 

MTW funds, including through local, nontraditional (LNT) programs. It is therefore 

22 GAO’s study covers only 2009 to 2015 (and treats the timespan as one time period) and the Abt Associates study (Buron et al., 2017) used only 1 year, 

2014.

not affected if an MTW agency shifts funds 

from one program to another. The analysis 

uses many more years of data than previous 

studies, tracking changes in MTW agencies 

and traditional PHAs from 2003 through 

2017.22 With this additional data, the analysis 

examines costs per household at MTW 

agencies before and after joining MTW. The 

analysis compares changes in costs that 

occur when agencies join MTW with changes 

at traditional PHAs over the same years. It 

separately examines trends in funding and in 

the number of assisted households at PHAs 

before and after they join MTW. The study also 

investigates whether changes in the mix of 

program types, housing quality, or affordability 

explain changes in the average cost per 

assisted household.

Research Design

The primary outcome measure in this analysis 

is the cost per household to the Federal 

government of providing housing assistance. 

The amount of funding received from HUD is 

calculated by summing amounts for the public 

housing operating fund, the public housing 

capital fund, and the Housing Choice Voucher 

(HCV) program. The funding amount is 

divided by the sum of the households served 

in the public housing and HCV programs to 

determine the federal cost per household of 

providing housing assistance. Special purpose 

vouchers such as HUD-Veterans Affairs 

Supportive Housing (HUD-VASH) and the 

Family Unification Program (FUP) are funded 

distinctly from the HCV program. This funding 

cannot be included as part of the MTW fund. 

Therefore, neither funding for special purpose 

vouchers nor households assisted with special 

purpose vouchers are included in this analysis. 

We also include households assisted through 

LNT programs, which are the unique programs 

MTW agencies can create to better meet local 

needs.
14

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Research Questions and Research Design

The cost per household measure was chosen 

because we believe this measure best 

captures MTW’s statutory objective of “cost 

effectiveness in Federal expenditures,”23

and it allows for a fair comparison of MTW 

with traditional PHAs.24 Cost reporting 

requirements differ between MTW and 

traditional PHAs and have changed over 

time. For example, traditional PHAs can only 

use their Housing Assistance Payment (HAP) 

budget to subsidize the rents of households in 

the HCV program, while MTW agencies can, 

and often do, use a portion of this funding 

for other purposes, which include public 

housing operations or acquiring or rehabbing 

affordable housing properties (Levy, Long and 

Edmonds, 2020). A comparison of average 

HAP costs per family in the HCV program will 

make MTW agencies appear less efficient, 

even if they are using HAP funding to increase 

the overall number of assisted households 

by preserving public housing. Furthermore, 

Financial Data Schedule (FDS) data on PHA 

expenditures are less complete than revenue 

data and more difficult to track, particularly for 

MTW agencies. To circumvent these problems, 

we define cost per household as the total 

amount of funding for public housing and HCV 

programs received from HUD divided by the 

total number of households served in these 

programs.

The second improvement over previous 

studies is that this study uses panel data to 

observe trends over time, rather than simply 

comparing MTW agencies with traditional 

PHAs at one point in time (or, as in the case 

of the GAO study, summed up over a 6-year 

period). The data used for this analysis 

23 Omnibus Consolidated Rescissions and Appropriations Act of 1996. Pub. L. No. 104-134, tit. II, § 204, 110 Stat. 1321, 1321-281 (codified as amended at 42 

U.S.C. § 1437f note). 24 We do not use HCV utilization rates as a key outcome metric as other studies have. Because MTW allows agencies to apply fungibility to public 

housing and HCV dollars, a metric designed for evaluation of HCVs is not ideal. More importantly, making comparisons between utilization rates 

at traditional and MTW agencies is problematic. To begin with, the baselines from which utilization is calculated are not equivalent. MTW agencies’ 

baselines are negotiated with HUD as part of their MTW agreement. In contrast, baselines at traditional PHAs are calculated by formula. Traditional 

PHAs can have their baselines reduced, which makes their utilization rates go up. MTW agencies do not have the same financial incentives to maximize 

their utilization rates. The demonstration is designed for them to shift funds in ways that meet local needs. If funds are shifted from HCVs, utilization 

rates will fall even if the quality or quantity of service increases. 25 Descriptive statistics for these PHAs appear in appendix exhibit C5. Housing Authority of the County of Santa Clara manages all housing programs for 

the Housing Authority of the City of San Jose; therefore, we treat them as a single agency in our analysis. 26 In the case of San Diego Housing Commission’s re-entry into MTW, we use the date that their 2008 MTW agreement was executed for re-entry.

include a data point for each variable for each 

PHA (both MTW agencies and comparison 

traditional PHAs) for each fiscal year from 

2003 through 2017. Using 15 years of historical 

data, we can observe trends over time and 

control statistically for differences between 

MTW agencies and traditional PHAs that predate entry into MTW. The statistical models 

control for characteristics of individual PHAs, 

such as size and location, and for national 

trends, such as changes in the Federal budget 

for the public housing and HCV programs. 

This allows us to quantify changes in variables 

of interest, such as cost per household, that 

occur after an agency enters or exits the MTW 

demonstration while controlling for differences 

between agencies.

We would ideally examine the full history of 

the MTW demonstration, but data limitations 

precluded this possibility. After extensive 

research and collaboration with HUD, we 

set 2003 as the initial year for analyzing 

administrative data. This was the first full 

calendar year for which HUD could provide 

voucher management data. This voucher 

data was needed to differentiate between 

HCV households and households assisted by 

special purpose vouchers.

Our statistical models, therefore, include 

the 15-year period from 2003 through 2017 

during which 17 new PHAs entered the 

demonstration, 2 PHAs left, and 1 PHA (the 

San Diego Housing Commission) exited and 

re-entered (exhibit 4).25 Each agency’s date 

of entry into MTW is defined as the date that 

their first MTW agreement was executed.26

Exits are defined based on the date on which 
Research Questions and Research Design

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

15

MTW agreement was terminated. Because 

our panel data begins with 2003, we do 

not estimate how MTW status affects cost 

per household for PHAs that joined prior to 

2003, which includes some of the largest 

MTW agencies such as the Chicago Housing 

Authority, the Cambridge Housing Authority, 

Home Forward (Portland, OR), the Housing 

Authority of the City of Pittsburgh, the 

Minneapolis Public Housing Authority, and the 

Seattle Housing Authority.

Exhibit 4: Timeline of Moving to Work Agreements and Evaluation Period (Evaluation Sample in Bold)

1999

Cambridge

Delaware

Greene

High Point

Keene

Lawrence-Douglas County

Lincoln

Louisville

Massachusetts

Portage

Portland

San Antonio

Tulare County

Vancouver

2000

Chicago*

Pittsburgh*

San Mateo

2008

Alaska*

Baltimore

San Bernardino*

San Jose*‡

Santa Clara County*‡

San Diego (reentered)

2010

Champaign County

Tacoma‡

2011

Boulder

LexingtonFayette

Orlando

2013

Columbus

Fairfax

Holyoke

1998 Reno

Minneapolis

San Diego

Seattle

2001

New Haven

Philadelphia

2004

Oakland‡

Greene and

High Point

left 

demonstration

2003

Atlanta

Washington, DC

King County

San Diego left 

demonstration

2007

Charlotte*

Evaluation Period

* PHAs selected by Congress, not through a competitive process.

‡Impact analyses do not include Oakland Housing Authority, Tacoma Housing Authority, Housing Authority of the County of Santa Clara, or Housing Authority of the 

City of San Jose because of incomplete data on households in public housing. The 18 public housing agencies included in the impact analyses are Alaska, Atlanta, 

Baltimore City, Boulder, Champaign, Charlotte, District of Columbia, Columbus (GA), Fairfax County, Greene, High Point (NC), Holyoke, King County, LexingtonFayette Urban County, Orlando, Reno, San Bernardino, and San Diego. The event study discussed in appendix B includes only 12 public housing agencies due to 

data limitations (see exhibit B5).

Note: The graphic shows the evaluation period and the year that agencies signed their Moving to Work (MTW) agreement.

Source: Documents retrieved from HUD’s MTW portal (https://www.hud.gov/mtw)

Research Questions

This study poses three research questions 

and eight associated sub-questions which are 

explained here and summarized in exhibit 5. 

The data and statistical models employed to 

answer these questions are described in the 

sections that follow.

Research Question 1: What is the 

effect of Moving to Work status on 

HUD cost per assisted household?

The first research question asks what effect 

participating in the MTW demonstration 

has on the per household cost of housing 

assistance. The answer quantifies the impact 

of MTW status on the number of dollars 

spent by HUD per household assisted by a 

PHA (1a). We then separately determine the 

impact of MTW status on HUD funding levels 

(1b), and the number of assisted households 

PHAs serve (1c), to understand why MTW 
16

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Research Questions and Research Design

status is having its observed effect on 

the cost per assisted household. Our null 

hypothesis is that MTW has no impact on cost 

per household, HUD funding levels, and the 

number of assisted households.

Research Question 2: Do changes 

in program mix, housing quality and 

affordability, or the characteristics 

of assisted households explain the 

effect of Moving to Work status on 

HUD costs per assisted household?

Research question 2 tests whether the 

estimated impact of MTW status on HUD 

funding, households served, and cost per 

household changes after controlling for 

differences between MTW and traditional 

PHAs in the mix of public housing, tenantbased, and project-based vouchers in their 

portfolio (2a); housing affordability and quality 

(2b); and targeting of assistance to households 

that may be costlier to serve (2c).27 Each of 

the three models tests a different mechanism 

through which cost per household could 

change. Each of these factors—housing 

mix, affordability and quality, and household 

type—are accounted for in separate models 

to avoid overlap. For example, PHAs with a 

greater proportion of public housing units 

may also serve a higher percentage of large 

households, increasing the costs of rental 

assistance.

27 Research question 1, in contrast, treats all housing assistance as equal and does not account for differences in the level of assistance PHAs provide or 

the types of households they serve.

Research Question 3: Does Moving 

to Work status affect agencies’ total 

per household operating and housing 

assistance spending, or per 

household spending on program 

administration, tenant services, or 

operating reserves?

Research question 3 examines how MTW 

status affects PHA spending per household 

on different components of providing housing 

assistance. This contrasts with research 

questions 1 and 2 which focus on HUD 

revenue per assisted household. Focusing on 

revenue from HUD provides a more holistic 

measure of cost effectiveness than examining 

expenditures. Differences in expenditure 

levels between MTW and traditional PHAs, 

however, have been well documented. 

Because this is the first study to examine how 

cost effectiveness changes when an agency 

joins the MTW demonstration, it also offers the 

opportunity to provide context to the spending 

differences described in prior research.

Total per household operating and housing 

assistance spending is calculated by adding 

total operating expenditures associated with 

public housing, the HCV program, or the MTW 

fund to total housing assistance payments 

associated with the HCV program or the MTW 

fund and dividing by the number of assisted 

households (3a). It includes all reported 

public housing operations, maintenance and 

administration spending, and all reported 

spending on the administration of HCVs and 

LNT vouchers and units. It does not include 

capital expenditures, transfers, depreciation, 

or accounting costs such as bad debts. The 

measure was defined to provide a point 

of comparison with prior studies that have 

examined the impact of MTW status on cost 

effectiveness.
Research Questions and Research Design

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

17

We also estimate how MTW status affects 

spending on administration, tenant services, 

and operating reserves per household (3b). 

These three categories of expenditures were 

identified based on a review of existing literature, 

conversations with PHA and HUD officials, and 

available data as areas where MTW status could 

produce measurable differences in PHA spending 

or saving.

Exhibit 5: Research Questions

Research Question 1: What is the effect of Moving to Work status on cost per assisted household?

1a. How does MTW status affect the average cost per assisted household?

1b. How does MTW status affect the annual amount of funding PHAs receive from HUD?

1c. How does MTW status affect the annual number of households receiving housing assistance?

Research Question 2: Do changes in program mix, housing quality and affordability, or the characteristics of assisted households 

explain the effect of Moving to Work status on HUD costs per assisted household?

2a. Do changes in the mix of public housing, tenant-based vouchers, and project-based vouchers in public housing agencies’ portfolios explain the relationship between MTW status and cost per assisted household?

2b. Do changes in housing affordability and housing quality explain the relationship between MTW status and cost per assisted 

household?

2c. Do changes in the proportion of assisted households that may be costlier to serve explain the relationship between MTW status 

and cost per assisted household?

Research Question 3: Does Moving to Work status affect agencies’ total per household operating and housing assistance spending, or per household spending on program administration, tenant services, or operating reserves? 

3a. How does MTW status affect PHAs’ per household agency expenditures?

3b. How does MTW status affect PHAs’ annual per household spending on program administration, tenant services, and operating 

reserves?
18

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Data Collection and Assembly

Data Collection and 

Assembly

This study relies on three HUD administrative 

datasets: (1) the Financial Data Schedule (FDS) 

to track HUD funding and public housing 

agency (PHA) costs, (2) the Office of Public 

and Indian Housing Information Center (PIC) 

to track the number of households in public 

housing, and the characteristics of households 

in public housing and the voucher program, 

and (3) the Voucher Management System 

(VMS) data to track the number of households 

with vouchers. Data from the Decennial 

Census (Census), American Community 

Surveys (ACS), and the Bureau of Labor 

Statistics (BLS) provide information such as 

local wages and housing and utility costs. The 

Public Housing Assessment System (PHAS) 

provides data on public housing quality. 

We also include HUD data on the number 

of households assisted by Moving to Work 

(MTW) agencies through local, non-traditional 

(LNT) programs that are not captured in PIC 

data (a summary of these datasets can be 

found in exhibit C1 in appendix C). Exhibit 6 

summarizes the datasets and variables used in 

this study.

Exhibit 6: Variables for Analysis and Data Sources

Variable Description Data Source Definition / Notes

Outcome Measures

HUD Funding FDS

HUD PHA operating grants and capital grants for public capital 

funds, plus HUD PHA operating grants for public housing operating funds, plus HUD PHA operating grants for the HCV fund

Assisted Households PIC, VMS, LNT data Total households assisted through public housing, the HCV program (excluding special purpose vouchers), and LNT programs

Cost per Assisted Household FDS, PIC, VMS, LNT data HUD funding/assisted households

Treatment Variable

 MTW Status Annual Reports, MTW 

agreements

The treatment variable is equal to one for agencies for years in 

which they are a part of the MTW demonstration and zero for 

years in which they are not. If an agency has MTW status for part 

of a year, the value is a fraction based on the number of months 

remaining in the calendar year when the agency’s MTW agreement is executed. For example, if an agency signs the MTW 

agreement in September, then MTW status = .25 in the year 

the agreement was signed because 3 months, or .25 of a year, 

remain in the calendar year.

Cost Components

Administrative Costs FDS Total operating administrative expenses

Tenant Services Spending FDS Total tenant services expenses

Operating Reserves FDS Following the formulaa outlined in PIH notice 2011-055

Total Operating and Housing 

Assistance Spending FDS

Total operating expenditures from the public housing, HCV, or 

the MTW funds plus total housing assistance payments from the 

HCV and MTW funds

Internal (Endogenous) Cost Drivers

Percent of Households Using 

TBVs VMS Number of assisted households with TBVs/total assisted households 

Percent of Households Using PBV VMS, PIC Number of assisted households with PBVs/total assisted households 

Percent of Households in Public 

Housing VMS, PIC Number of assisted households in PH/total assisted households

(continued) 
Data Collection and Assembly

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

19

Variable Description Data Source Definition / Notes

Quality of Public Housing PHAS Physical Assessment Subsystem (PASS) score

Affordability (Median Rent Burden) PIC Median of (total family contributionb

 x 12/total annual income) for 

new households

Household Size PIC Average number of individuals in new households 

Median Income PIC Median annual total income of new households

High Need Households PIC

Percent of new, assisted households in which the household 

head is 62 or older, the household head is disabled, or any 

other member of the household is disabled

External Cost Drivers 

PHA Fixed Effects — PHA dummy variables 

Year Fixed Effects — Year dummy variables 

Average Wage of Local Government Employees BLS

Average wage of local government employees in the county 

with the most households assisted by a given MTW agency or 

traditional PHA reported in PIC in 2003

Median Rent in Service Area ACS Population weighted median rent in each year based on the 

census tracts of residents reported in PIC

ACS = American Community Survey. BLS = Bureau of Labor Statistics. FDS = Financial Data Schedule. LNT = local, non-traditional. MTW = Moving to Work. PBV = 

project-based voucher. PH = public housing. PHA = public housing agency. PHAS = Public Housing Assessment System. PIC = Office of Public and Indian Housing 

Information Center. TBV = tenant-based voucher. VMS = Voucher Management System.

a

 The sum of FDS line items 111 Cash Unrestricted, 114 Cash Tenant Security Deposits, 120 Total Receivables, 131 Investments Unrestricted, 142 Prepaid Expenses 

and Other Assets, 144 Inter-program – due from, and 145 Assets Held for Sale, minus the difference between line 310 Total Current Liabilities and line 343 Current 

Portion of Long-term Debt-capital Projects.

b For MTW agencies, the family contribution toward rent variable is constructed by HUD and includes the family’s contribution toward utilities when applicable. This 

variable is not included in the standard PIC data and was provided by HUD for the purposes of this study. To calculate the annual family contribution toward rent 

for non-MTW agencies, we multiply the monthly contribution toward rent as reported in PIC by 12 and divide this by the total household adjusted income in PIC.

Sources: Administrative data from HUD include FDS, PIC, VMS, and PHAS; Public use data include the Decennial Census (Census), ACS, and BLS Quarterly Census 

of Employment and Wages; LNT data was provided by the HUD MTW office and calculated based on data reported by agencies on form 50900; New households 

are identified using action code flags in PIC

Variable Calculations

HUD Cost per Assisted Household

We calculate cost per assisted household 

by dividing HUD funding by the number of 

assisted households. To focus on the impact 

of MTW, we identify funding sources that 

are eligible for MTW fund flexibility and the 

households assisted with those funds. These 

funding sources and households go into 

the calculation of cost per household; other 

funding sources, such as special purpose 

voucher funding, and the households 

supported by them, are excluded.

HUD Funding

Our measure of HUD funding, therefore, 

includes HUD PHA operating grants and 

capital grants for public capital funds, HUD 

PHA operating grants for public housing 

operating funds, and HUD PHA operating 

grants for the Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) 

program. All funding data is collected from 

the FDS, adjusted from fiscal year to calendar 

year, and converted from nominal dollars to 

2015 dollars using the Consumer Price Index 

for all Urban Consumers (CPI-U). (See exhibit 

C2 for details on calculations using FDS data.) 

Number of Assisted Households

We count the number of assisted households 

Exhibit 6: Variables for Analysis and Data Sources (continued) 
20

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Data Collection and Assembly

as the sum of those served through public 

housing, HCVs, and, for MTW agencies, 

LNT programs. To do so, we combine public 

housing data from PIC and voucher data 

from VMS. Voucher-assisted households 

appear in PIC as well, but it is not possible 

to exclude households assisted by special 

purpose vouchers using PIC data. We solved 

this problem by using VMS data, which 

does allow us to exclude special purpose 

vouchers, to count the number of households 

assisted through the HCV program. We add 

the number of households assisted in public 

housing to the number in the HCV program 

to get the total for traditional PHAs. As noted 

below, for MTW agencies, we also include the 

households served in LNT programs in the 

total.

To count the number of households in public 

housing, we first classified each household 

in the annual PIC based on their assistance 

program and action code. We then removed 

records that appear in multiple annual files but 

have the same effective date for the action 

code. Next, we weighted households by the 

number of months in which they received 

assistance using the dates associated with 

new admissions and exits. To count the 

number of households using VMS, we sum 

monthly voucher counts for voucher types 

funded through the HCV funding stream and 

then divide by 12 to get an annualized number 

of voucher households.

For MTW agencies, we add the number of 

households served through LNT programs. 

These LNT data were aggregated by HUD 

from MTW annual reports and HUD Form 

50900. The data include households 

served through rental subsidies, housing 

development programs, and homeownership 

assistance. The data do not include 

households receiving services only. Per the 

instructions for HUD Form 50900, households 

served are calculated by dividing the number 

of unit months leased by the number of 

months in the “Plan Year.” According to 

instructions on the 50900, the definition 

of MTW households served includes all 

households that receive housing assistance, 

directly or indirectly, using any amount of 

MTW funds. Further, the 50900 instructs 

MTW agencies to estimate the number of 

households served in “instances when a local, 

non-traditional program provides a certain 

subsidy level but does not specify a number 

of units/households to be served.” We display 

the number of households assisted by MTW 

agencies, through public housing, tenantbased vouchers, project-based vouchers, and 

LNT assistance in exhibit C3.

In this way, we include households assisted 

through LNT programs that are funded using 

MTW fund flexibility and exclude households 

assisted through HUD special purpose 

voucher programs (such as the Family 

Unification Program or HUD-Department of 

Veterans Affairs [VA] Supportive Housing 

[HUD-VASH]) that are not covered by MTW 

agreements and not funded through public 

housing operating, public housing capital, or 

the traditional HCV funding streams.

Measures of the Type and Quality of 

Housing Assistance

To find out whether changes in the mix of 

program types, housing affordability, and 

housing quality explain the relationship 

between MTW status and cost per assisted 

household, we use data from PIC, VMS, and 

PHAS.

Type of Housing Assistance

Type of housing assistance is measured as the 

mix of program types, that is, the percent of 

assisted households in (1) public housing, (2) 

tenant-based vouchers, and (3) project-based 

vouchers.
Data Collection and Assembly

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

21

Housing Affordability

Housing affordability is measured as the 

percent of household income that the median 

assisted household spends on housing. 

We calculate this from PIC, using the total 

contribution that a household puts toward 

rent and utilities on an annual basis divided 

by its annual household income. This metric is 

calculated using both public housing residents 

and HCV-assisted households. 

Housing Quality

Housing quality is measured by the most 

recent physical assessment subsystem (PASS) 

score from PHAS. This score measures the 

housing quality of all the public housing units 

that the PHA manages.28 We do not have a 

comparable measure of housing quality in the 

HCV program.

Costliness of Households Served

To assess whether MTW agencies are 

assisting households that are costlier to serve, 

we use three metrics: (1) the median income, 

as a percent of the area median income 

(AMI), of newly admitted households,29 (2) the 

percent of newly admitted households with an 

elderly head of household, disabled head of 

household, or disabled family member, and (3) 

average household size.30 We calculate these 

variables directly from PIC data using all public 

housing and voucher households that are 

identified as new admissions based on their 

action code.

Measures of Public Housing Agency 

Spending 

Given available data, we determined that 

it is not advisable to construct a primary 

28 The Real Estate Assessment Center (REAC) determines PASS scores for both individual developments and PHAs as a whole. Neither score is available 

every year. We use the most recent PHA-wide PASS score in our analysis. 29 For this metric, we divide the household income reported in PIC by the area median income reported in PIC and take the median value for newly 

admitted households. 30 We focus on newly admitted households so that households admitted prior to a PHA joining MTW do not bias our results because those could be 

endogenous to MTW status and other variables in our model. 31 Revenue data in FDS appear to be more complete than spending data; moreover, it is not possible to track expenditures transferred out of the MTW 

fund to an MTW agency’s other lines of business but still spent to benefit assisted households.

cost-efficiency measure using expenditure 

data.31 Nevertheless, important questions 

remain about whether and how MTW status is 

associated with agency spending.

Total Expenditure

We calculate total expenditure by summing 

total operating expenditures from the public 

housing, HCV, or the MTW funds plus total 

housing assistance payments from the HCV 

and MTW funds in FDS.

Administrative Costs and Tenant 

Services Spending

We calculate administrative costs and tenant 

services by totaling these spending categories 

from the funds associated with HCV and 

public housing operations for traditional 

agencies, and for MTW agencies with the 

MTW funds.

Operating Reserves

Additionally, we calculate operating reserves 

based upon the guidance provided in PIH 

notice 2011-055. The specific FDS line items 

we use appear in appendix C (exhibit C2). 

External Cost Drivers

Several demographic and area characteristics 

influence the costs of providing housing 

assistance. To control for variables that are 

constant over time, such as where the PHA is 

located, our statistical models include PHAlevel dummy variables. To control for external 

cost drivers that change over time and are 

likely to differ among PHAs, we include the 

following variables in our statistical models.
22

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Data Collection and Assembly

• Median rent, as reported in the Census/ACS,

to control for varying housing market trends 

that affect the overall cost of assistance. We 

retrieved Census and ACS data from the 

National Historical Geographic Information 

System (NHGIS) at the census tract level for 

the years 2000, 2010 (Census), and 2011–

2015 (ACS 5-year average).

• We control for differing trends in wages 

across PHA service areas using the BLSreported, county-level annual average pay 

in local government (all industries). Counties 

are mapped to PHAs based on householdlevel county variables in the PIC. Each 

county in the United States is assigned to 

the PHA that serves the most households 

in the area. State-level data are used where 

county-level data are incomplete or missing.

Sample Construction

We merged data from PIC, VMS, LNT, and FDS 

with regional wage data from BLS and regional 

demographic data from the census and ACS 

to construct a balanced panel dataset—a 

dataset with every PHA in every year—of 

3,726 PHAs and 55,890 observations. PHAs 

that do not appear at least once in PIC and at 

least once in FDS are excluded, as are PHAs 

for which either county wage or local rent data 

were unavailable.32

After constructing this initial dataset, we made 

several adjustments to account for missing or 

incomplete data. Data issues were present in 

both MTW and traditional PHAs, particularly 

in the early years of our analysis and may 

represent early challenges PHAs faced in 

capturing administrative data and reporting 

it to HUD. There are 8,338 observations 

in which total reported funding is zero. We 

assume that all instances of missing or zero 

reported funding are in error. We assume 

32 PHAs only appear in PIC or VMS when public housing or HCV households are reported. PHAs may appear in FDS to report funding streams other than 

those for public housing operations, public housing capital improvements, and HCVs. 33 Linear interpolation produced less plausible values including some negative values in the earlier part of the sample period.

that year-over-year changes in total funding 

of more than 50 percent are evidence of 

bad data and we treat this data as missing, 

increasing the number of observations with 

missing funding data to 14,589. Using the 

same criteria for the household data from 

PIC and VMS, there are 29,684 observations 

with zero, “bad,” or missing household counts 

in either PIC or VMS. In most cases, this is 

because the PHA does not provide both 

public housing and HCVs.

Our primary analysis focuses only on agencies 

that served at least 750 households in 2003. 

This subset includes 756 agencies and 11,340 

observations. In this group, there were 1,376 

observations of missing or bad funding data 

and 1,844 observations with zero, bad, or 

missing household counts in either PIC or 

VMS. Among the 21 PHAs that joined MTW 

during the analysis period, representing 315 

observations, 50 observations had bad or 

missing funding data and 96 observations had 

bad” or missing PIC or VMS data.

We filled in for missing, zero revenue, and 

bad data points from PIC, VMS, and FDS 

using nearest neighbor interpolation and 

extrapolation.33 Aside from the robustness 

checks described in appendix C, no 

adjustments were made to the LNT data. We 

flagged 130 PHAs, including 6 MTW agencies, 

for which only 1 year of either public housing, 

voucher, or revenue data was available. We 

assumed that if either public housing or 

voucher data are missing in every year, the 

PHA does not provide that form of assistance. 

Because interpolation and extrapolation can 

induce additional error to the statistical model, 

we check the robustness of our results using 

multiple imputation (see appendix B for a 

detailed description of this method and the 

results).
Data Collection and Assembly

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

23

After interpolating missing values from PIC, 

VMS, and FDS, we constructed the measures 

of number of assisted households, total HUD 

funding, and cost per assisted household as 

described in exhibit 6. For consistency, we 

converted the FDS data from fiscal to calendar 

year by using a weighted average of the 2 

fiscal years that overlap each calendar year. 

Because data from the 2018 fiscal year were 

not available for all agencies, we used 2017 

fiscal year data for calendar year 2017.

Finally, we excluded the 19 PHAs that 

entered the MTW demonstration before 

2003 and remained in the program through 

the observation period. The resulting 

dataset includes 3,695 PHAs and 55,425 

observations. For all our analyses, we 

compare MTW agencies only with traditional 

PHAs that had at least 750 assisted 

households in 2003. Excluding smaller 

agencies and those with only 1 year of reliable 

public housing, voucher, or revenue data 

reduces the sample to 727 PHAs—18 MTW 

agencies and 709 traditional PHAs—and 

10,905 observations.

Identifying the Comparison 

Group

Our statistical model is based on a comparison 

of trends between MTW and traditional 

PHAs. In this section, we provide descriptive 

analysis of trends in costs per household 

among traditional PHAs and MTW agencies, 

which provides context for the results from the 

statistical models.

The analysis period for our study, 2003 to 

2017, includes both the increases in annual 

appropriations from the 2009 stimulus 

package and the decreases in appropriations 

from sequestration. During this period, MTW 

agencies received an increasing proportion of 

HUD funding and served a higher proportion 

of assisted households relative to traditional 

PHAs.

Our analysis of agency-reported data in FDS 

shows the average level of HUD funding for 

traditional PHAs rose from $5.8 million in 

2003 to a peak of $6.2 million in 2010 before 

declining to $5.6 million in 2014. As of 2017, 

average annual funding for traditional PHAs 

was almost exactly the same as it was in 

2003. Analysis of PIC and VMS data show 

that the number of assisted households 

generally increased over this time (exhibit 7), 

with a slight decline in the number of assisted 

households between 2011 and 2014.
24

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Data Collection and Assembly

Exhibit 7: Average Levels of HUD Funding and Assisted Households at Traditional Public Housing Agencies (2003–2017)

$5,000,000

$5,200,000

$5,400,000

$5,600,000

$5,800,000

$6,000,000

$6,200,000

2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017

HUD Funding

700

720

740

760

780

800

820

840

2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017

Year

Assisted Households

PHA = public housing agency.

Notes: Traditional PHAs include all 3,674 PHAs that never joined the Moving to Work demonstration. Values displayed are constant 2015 dollars adjusted using 

Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Price Index for all Urban Consumers.

Sources: Urban Institute analysis of HUD Financial Data Schedule and Public and Indian Housing Information Center datasets

Comparing Moving to Work 

Agencies with Traditional 

Public Housing Agencies

This analysis assumes that MTW agencies 

were similar to traditional agencies, or at least 

followed similar trends, prior to joining the 

demonstration. Even before joining, however, 

future MTW agencies tended to be larger 

and have higher costs per household than 

other traditional PHAs (see exhibit 8). In 2003, 

these pre-MTW agencies were more than 

10 times larger than the average traditional 

PHA and received $8,500 in HUD funding 

for each household they served, compared 

with $5,925 in HUD cost per assisted 

household for PHAs that never became MTW 

agencies. The smallest agency that would 

join MTW after 2003 assisted an average of 

938 households before joining. The average 

traditional PHA, however, assisted only 772 

households in 2003. 

MTW agencies are more similar to large 

traditional PHAs—those with more than 750 

assisted households—than to small traditional 

PHAs (exhibit 8). Large traditional PHAs that 

never became MTW agencies served an 

average of 3,020 assisted households in 2003 
Data Collection and Assembly

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

25

and received $7,148 in HUD funding for each 

assisted household compared with $8,500 

received by future MTW agencies. MTW 

agencies’ mix of housing assistance provided 

34 The decline in cost per assisted household among small PHAs is a noteworthy trend that is outside the scope of our research questions. A HUD study 

on administrative fees in the HCV program suggests that many of these smaller agencies are receiving additional subsidies from local government that 

allowed them to keep serving a similar number of assisted households despite cuts in funding from HUD (Turnham et al., 2015).

to households also more closely aligns with 

the larger traditional PHAs than with smaller 

traditional PHAs, which can be seen in exhibit 

C7 in appendix C.

Exhibit 8: Number of Assisted Households, HUD Funding, and HUD Cost per Household by Public Housing Agencies’ Future 

Moving to Work Status, 2003

Future MTW 

Agencies 

All Traditional PHAs Large Traditional 

PHAs

12 PHAs 3,547 PHAs 709 PHAs

Average Number of Assisted Households 7,168 772 3,020

Average HUD Funding $47,639,566 $5,968,952 $25,046,414

Average HUD Cost per Assisted Household $8,500 $5,925 $7,148

MTW = Moving to Work. PHA = public housing agency.

Notes: Dollar values are constant 2015 dollars adjusted using Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Price Index for all Urban Consumers. Traditional PHAs include 

3,547 PHAs that never joined the MTW demonstration. Large traditional PHAs include only traditional PHAs that had more than 750 assisted households in 2003. 

Analysis excludes agencies that joined MTW before 2003. Analysis also excludes Oakland Housing Authority, Tacoma Housing Authority, Housing Authority of the 

County of Santa Clara, and Housing Authority of the City of San Jose because of incomplete data on households in public housing. Future MTW agencies further 

exclude Atlanta Housing Authority, District of Columbia Housing Authority, and King County Housing Authority who joined MTW in 2003 and therefore do not have 

a full year of pre-MTW data.

Sources: Urban Institute analysis of HUD Public and Indian Housing Information Center dataset; HUD Financial Data Schedule dataset; U.S. Census Bureau Data

MTW agencies are also more like large 

traditional PHAs than small ones in terms of 

trends in cost per assisted household (exhibit 

9). During the analysis period, there was a 

large divergence in trends between large 

and small traditional PHAs. For traditional 

PHAs assisting at least 750 households in 

2003, HUD cost per assisted household was 

mostly flat, decreasing slightly from $7,148 to 

$6,906 or 3.4 percent. For traditional PHAs 

assisting fewer than 750 households in 2003, 

cost per assisted household decreased much 

more drastically, from $5,619 to $4,436, a 

21-percent decline. It appears that smaller 

traditional PHAs received less funding during 

this period, but still served the same number 

of households.34
26

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Data Collection and Assembly

Exhibit 9: HUD Cost per Assisted Household in 2003 and 2017, by Public Housing Agency Size

$5,619

$7,148

$4,436

$6,906

$0

$1,000

$2,000

$3,000

$4,000

$5,000

$6,000

$7,000

$8,000

Traditional PHAs with fewer than 750 assisted

households

Traditional PHAs with at least 750 assisted

households

2003 2017

HUD funding per assisted household

PHA = public housing agency.

Notes: Traditional PHAs include 3,547 PHAs that never joined the Moving to Work demonstration. PHAs are classified as having over or under 750 assisted 

households based on the number of households served in 2003. Values displayed are constant 2015 dollars adjusted using Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer 

Price Index for all Urban Consumers. 

Sources: Urban Institute analysis of HUD Financial Data Schedule and Public and Indian Housing Information Center datasets
Estimation Methods

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

27

Estimation Methods

To show the impact of participating in the 

Moving to Work (MTW) demonstration on cost 

per household and other outcomes, we used a 

statistical model that accounted for differences 

between agencies at baseline.35 This model 

captures how receiving MTW status changed 

each outcome measure relative to what would 

have happened if the public housing agency 

(PHA) had not joined the MTW demonstration. 

The models use a PHA’s fixed effects to 

control for urbanity, rurality, and other timeinvariant characteristics of the PHA, including 

factors that may make a PHA more or less 

likely to join the MTW demonstration. These 

fixed effects also control for the average mix 

of tenant-based vouchers, project-based 

vouchers, and public housing administered by 

the PHA.

The models also include year fixed effects to 

control for national-level trends that may affect 

how much funding PHAs get from HUD and 

how much it costs to provide rental assistance. 

Because the period of study includes times 

of economic expansion and contraction as 

well as periods of more and less generous 

government funding, it is important that the 

regression model does not assume that 

national trends are static, smooth, or linear.

In addition to controlling for national trends, 

the models include two control variables to 

capture factors that change over time that 

may affect the costs of providing housing 

assistance: (1) median rent, and (2) the local 

public sector wages in each PHA’s service 

area. Including these variables allowed us to 

control for whether MTW agencies operated in 

areas where external cost drivers (such as the 

price of housing) were rising or falling faster 

than at the average PHA. These variables 

35 See appendix C (exhibit C4) for a list of the research questions and which regression model was used to answer it. 36 See appendix B for sensitivity analyses showing that the model estimates do not change when the comparison group includes PHAs with more than 

150 units ; however, if the smallest PHAs (fewer than 150 units) are included in the comparison group, the results do change.

were chosen because prior research has 

shown that an area’s median rent and local 

public sector wages impact per household 

costs of providing housing assistance (Finkel 

and Buron, 2001; Turnham et al., 2015).

Because MTW agencies are more similar to 

large traditional PHAs than to small ones, as 

shown in the previous section “Comparing 

MTW Agencies with Traditional PHAs,” we 

included in the sample only those traditional 

PHAs that had at least 750 assisted 

households in 2003.36

Estimation Method for 

Research Question 1: 

What is the effect of 

Moving to Work status on 

cost per assisted household?

To determine the impact of the MTW 

demonstration on cost per household, we 

estimate the following fixed effects panel 

regression including MTW agencies and 

traditional PHAs with 750 households or more 

in 2003:

Outcomeit= β*MTWit+γ* 

ExternalCostDriversit+λt+αi+εit (1)

That is, each of our outcome variables for PHA 

i in year t (the natural log of HUD funding, 

the natural log of assisted households, the 

natural log of cost per assisted household) 

is a function of MTW status, external drivers 

of cost—median rent and local public sector 

wages (ExternalCostDriversit), year fixed 

effects (λt), PHA fixed effects (αi), and an 

idiosyncratic residual (εit), clustered at the 

PHA level and robust to arbitrary forms of 

misspecification. MTWit equals 1 for PHA i

in year t if the agency is an MTW agency 

in that year as defined by having a signed 

agreement; in the year that the agreement is 
28

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Estimation Methods

signed, we set MTWit equal to the fraction of 

the year remaining at the date of the second 

(HUD or PHA) signature. Variables measured 

in dollars and households are log-transformed 

before they enter the equation; this accounts 

for the skewness of their distributions and 

produces estimates of the MTW effect in 

percentage terms. The measure of cost per 

household is also log-transformed before 

entering the equation.

The coefficient β approximates the 

percentage change in average cost per 

household associated with entering the MTW 

demonstration (a coefficient of 0.1 indicates a 

10-percent change). A positive and significant 

estimated value for β implies higher cost per 

household. We also use equation 1 to estimate 

the impact of MTW status on the amount of 

funding a PHA gets from HUD and on the 

number of assisted households it serves.

Understanding the Timing of Changes 

in Cost per Household

To better understand the timing of MTW’s 

impact on cost per assisted household, we 

use an event-study regression to isolate the 

impact of the MTW demonstration the year in 

which the MTW agreement was executed, 1 

year after joining the demonstration, 2 years 

after, and then all other years after joining the 

demonstration. In this model, we also estimate 

whether the trends at MTW agencies were 

diverging from trends in traditional PHAs in the 

years before they signed the MTW agreement. 

The event study model takes the following 

form:

Outcomeit= δ1 Di(t+2)+δ2 Di(t+1)+δ3 Dit+δ4 Di(t-1)+δ5 

Di(t-2)+ δ6 MTWi(t+3)+γ*Controlsit+λt+αi+εit (2)

Here, we replace the indicator for MTW status 

with a series of dummy variables Di(t+2) to 

Di(t-2) indicating 2 years before, 1 year before, 

the year of, the year after, and 2 years or 

more after a PHA’s first MTW agreement is 

executed. The variable MTWi(t+3) is equal to 1 

for MTW agencies beginning in the third year 

after entry into the demonstration. That is, it 

estimates long term effects. Again, the model 

includes external drivers of cost (Controlsit), 

year fixed effects (λt), PHA fixed effects (αi), 

and an idiosyncratic residual (εit) clustered at 

the PHA level and robust to arbitrary forms of 

misspecification.

Estimation Method for 

Research Question 2: 

Do changes in program 

mix, housing quality 

and affordability, or the 

characteristics of assisted 

households explain the 

effect of Moving to Work 

status on HUD costs per 

assisted household?

To explore whether internal cost drivers, 

including program mix, housing quality and 

affordability, and the characteristics of assisted 

households, explain the relationship between 

MTW status and per household cost, we add 

the following variables for these measures to 

the main model shown previously: 

Outcomeit= β'*MTWit+δ1 * InternalCostDriversit + 

γ*ExternalCostDriversit+λt+αi+εit (3)

where the outcome measure is the natural 

log of cost per assisted household. Here, 

the primary outcome measure is a function 

of a set of PHA factors, external cost drivers, 

year fixed effects (λt), PHA fixed effects (αi), 

and an idiosyncratic residual (εit) clustered 

at the PHA level and robust to arbitrary 

forms of misspecification. Of interest here 

is whether and how the coefficient on MTW 

status changes once these endogenous 

characteristics are included. If the effect 

disappears, this suggests that changes in cost 

per household related to MTW status may 

be due to changes in program mix, housing 

quality and affordability, and household 
Estimation Methods

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

29

characteristics rather than simply due to 

serving fewer or more of the same households 

at the same quality level.

Question 2a asks about the influence of 

program mix on cost per household. To 

answer this question, the PHA factors are 

the percent of total households funded with 

tenant-based vouchers and the percent of 

total households funded with project-based 

vouchers (omitting the percent of households 

in public housing as the reference group). 

Question 2b asks about housing affordability 

and housing quality. We include the median 

rent burden of households in the Office of 

Public and Indian Housing Information Center 

(PIC) as a measure of affordability, and public 

housing physical inspection scores from the 

Public Housing Assessment System (PHAS) 

as a measure of housing quality. Finally, for 

question 2c, we look at three factors related 

to the ability of PHAs to reach households 

that may require more resources to serve: 

(1) the median income as a percent of the 

area median income (AMI) of newly admitted 

households (those entering the public 

housing or voucher program each year), (2) 

average household size for newly admitted 

households, and (3) the percent of newly 

admitted households with an elderly head of 

household, disabled head of household, or 

disabled family member. Each of these sets of 

cost drivers is associated with a mechanism 

through which MTW could affect cost per 

household. At the same time, these measures 

are interrelated. For example, the percent of 

households with an elderly or disabled head 

of household or a disabled family member 

could affect the decisions an agency makes 

about its mix of public housing and the 

Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) program as 

well as its spending on administration and 

tenant services, which would also have an 

impact on overall cost per household. To 

explore each mechanism separately, we 

isolate each set of cost drivers in a distinct 

model. 

The MTW effect (β’) estimated in this way 

can be interpreted as the change in cost per 

household beyond or that is not driven by 

changes in the internal cost drivers included 

in the regression. We then test whether the 

estimated impact of MTW has changed when 

these factors are added to the model (whether 

β’ = β). For example, if the value of coefficient 

β is not the same for research question 2a, as 

it is for our primary research question, 1a, we 

can conclude that changes in program mix 

explain at least some of the differences, or the 

lack of a difference between MTW agencies 

and traditional PHAs, in cost per household. 

Estimation Method for 

Research Question 3: Does 

Moving to Work status 

affect agencies’ total per 

household operating and 

housing assistance spending, 

or per household spending 

on program administration, 

tenant services, or operating 

reserves?

To better understand how MTW status affects 

per household spending on specific spending 

categories, we estimate equation 1 with four 

left-hand-side measures: (1) total expenditures 

per assisted household, (2) spending on 

tenant services per assisted household, (3) 

administrative costs per assisted household, 

and (4) changes in operating reserves per 

assisted household. We take the natural log 

of total per household operating and housing 

assistance and per household spending on 

program administration before they enter 

the model. Because tenant services are 

frequently zero, and reserve balances can be 

negative, we do not take the natural log of 

these measures and instead estimate a linear 

relationship on dollars per household.
30

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Estimation Methods

Robustness Checks

We undertook several robustness checks 

where we altered our regression choices to 

ensure that none of these choices is driving 

our results. First, as an alternative to dropping 

PHAs that serve fewer households, we used 

propensity score matching to limit the size 

of our comparison group. We estimated 

effects using a five-to-one match and using 

all large PHAs with propensity scores within 

the range calculated for MTW PHAs (that is, 

with common support). Second, we tested 

the sensitivity of our results to an alternative 

methodology for addressing the large amount 

of missing data. We undertook multiple 

imputation (rather than nearest-neighbor 

interpolation and extrapolation) to be sure 

that our interpolation assumptions were not 

creating errors in our estimates. Third, we 

tested whether removing or discounting 

local, non-traditional units from our count of 

assisted households impacts our estimates. 

Fourth, we relaxed the model to allow each 

PHA to follow a unique linear time trend. 

We also conducted a sensitivity analysis to 

test whether our results change when using 

different size cutoffs for defining the group 

of comparison traditional PHAs. Results are 

generally consistent with the primary models 

and confirm the findings reported here. Details 

on these methods and the results of these 

analyses can be found in appendix B.
Findings

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

31

Findings

Moving to Work (MTW) status has no impact 

on overall cost effectiveness, as agencies 

receive more HUD funding but use that 

funding to assist more households. MTW 

status is accompanied by increased reserve 

balances.

MTW status is associated with a small increase 

in cost per assisted household that is not 

statistically significant, suggesting that there 

is no overall impact of MTW status on cost 

effectiveness. MTW agencies experience 

an increase in HUD funding after joining the 

demonstration, but also a commensurate 

increase in the number of assisted 

households. These results do not change 

after controlling for program mix, housing 

quality and affordability, or the characteristics 

of assisted households. MTW status is not 

associated with a statistically significant 

change in per household expenditures overall 

or spending on administrative costs or tenant 

services. MTW status is, however, associated 

with a large, statistically significant increase in 

the amount per household held in reserves. 

This section first displays descriptive statistics 

for MTW and traditional public housing 

agencies (PHAs) and then shows the results 

from the statistical models that formally test 

our hypotheses.

Public Housing Agency 

Trends Before and After 

Joining Moving to Work

The following three exhibits show trends 

within MTW agencies—before controlling 

for baseline characteristics, national trends, 

or exogenous cost drivers—in HUD funding, 

assisted households, and HUD costs per 

assisted household before and after joining 

the MTW demonstration. The year before 

each agency joined the demonstration is the 

baseline year and the trendline measures 

percent change from the prior year and over 

the 3 subsequent years. Exhibit 10 shows 

that annual HUD funding begins to increase 

in the year prior to joining, then continues 

to increase until 1 year after joining before 

declining slightly 2 years after joining.
32

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Findings

Exhibit 10: Moving to Work Agencies’ Average HUD Funding Before and After Joining Moving to Work

90%

95%

100%

105%

110%

2 years before 1 year before Joined MTW 1 year after 2 years after

Average Annual HUD Funding as a Percent 

of Funding 1 Year Before Joining

MTW

MTW = Moving to Work.

Notes: Vertical dotted line and “year joined MTW’’ represent the year in which public housing agencies (PHAs) execute their first MTW contract. This figure 

includes only agencies with at least 750 households and excludes agencies that joined MTW before 2005 or after 2015, because they need to have 2 years of data 

before joining MTW and 2 years of data after joining MTW to enter this equation. Exhibit C5 in appendix C displays the average number of assisted households, 

HUD funding, and cost per household before and after MTW status for each of the 17 PHAs that joined MTW between 2003 and 2013.

Sources: Urban Institute Analysis of HUD Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center, Financial Data Schedule, and Voucher Management System data

The annual number of assisted households 

also increases the year that an agency joins 

MTW, then continues to increase 1 and 2 years 

after (exhibit 11).
Findings

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

33

Exhibit 11: Moving to Work Agencies’ Average Number of Assisted Households Before and After Joining Moving to Work Average Number of Assisted Households 1 Year Before Joining

MTW as a Percent of 

Assisted Households

Year Joined MTW

90%

95%

100%

105%

110%

2 years before 1 year before 1 year after 2 years after

MTW = Moving to Work.

Notes: Vertical dotted line and “year joined MTW’’ represent the year in which public housing agencies execute their first MTW contract. This figure includes only 

agencies with at least 750 households and excludes agencies that joined MTW before 2005 or after 2015, because they need to have 2 years of data before 

joining MTW and 2 years of data after joining MTW to enter this equation.

Sources: Urban Institute analysis of HUD Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center and Voucher Management System data

Exhibit 12 shows changes in average cost per 

assisted households before and after joining 

the MTW demonstration. MTW agencies 

experience an increase in cost per household 

the year before they join the demonstration, 

a slight dip the year that they join, a slight 

increase the next year, and then a decrease to 

below pre-MTW levels 2 years after joining the 

demonstration.
34

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Findings

Exhibit 12: Moving to Work Agencies’ Average HUD Cost per Household Before and After Joining Moving to Work Average Annual HUD Cost per Assisted 1 Year Before Joining the MTW Demonstration Household as a Percent of Cost per Household 

Year Joined MTW

90%

95%

100%

105%

110%

2 years before 1 year before 1 year after 2 years after

MTW = Moving to Work.

Notes: Vertical dotted line and “year joined MTW’’ represent the year in which public housing agencies execute their first MTW contract. This figure includes 

only agencies with at least 750 households and excludes agencies that joined MTW before 2005 or after 2015, because they need to have 2 years of data before 

joining MTW and 2 years of data after joining MTW to enter this equation.

Sources: Urban Institute Analysis of HUD Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center, Financial Data Schedule, and Voucher Management System data

These findings suggest that MTW status 

is correlated with increased funding levels 

and number of assisted households. It also 

suggests there is a short adjustment period 

where cost per household increases the first 

year after joining MTW and then declines. 

The extent to which these trends are driven 

by MTW status, contemporaneous changes, 

or national trends and the timing of agency 

entry into the demonstration is less clear. The 

statistical analyses shown in the following 

section disentangle the impact of the MTW 

demonstration from these other factors.

Effect of the Moving to Work 

Demonstration on HUD Cost 

per Assisted Household

Controlling for baseline characteristics, 

national trends, and exogenous cost drivers, 

we find no statistically significant relationship 

between MTW status and cost per assisted 

household. Results from our statistical analysis 

show that MTW status is associated with a 

small and statistically insignificant increase 

in cost per assisted household of 1.3 percent 

(exhibit 13).
Findings

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

35

Exhibit 13: The Effect of Moving to Work on HUD Cost per Assisted Household, HUD Funding, and Number of 

Assisted Households

Cost per Assisted 

Household

HUD Funding Assisted Households

Impact of MTW

0.013 0.106*** 0.092***

(0.030) (0.024) (0.028)

Control Variables

Area Median Rent

0.298*** 0.144** -0.154***

(0.071) (0.060) (0.047)

Government Wage

0.048* 0.023 -0.025

(0.026) (0.026) (0.020)

Number of PHAs 727 727 727

Adjusted Within R-Squared 0.096 0.083 0.039

Observations 10,905 10,905 10,905

 * p<0.10, ** p<0.05, *** p<0.01.

MTW = Moving to Work. PHA = public housing agency.

Notes: Standard errors (listed in parentheses) are heteroskedastic robust and clustered at the PHA level. Data cover 2003–2017. Regressions include only 

agencies with at least 750 households and exclude agencies that joined MTW before 2003. Impact analyses do not include Oakland Housing Authority, Tacoma 

Housing Authority, Housing Authority of the County of Santa Clara, and Housing Authority of the City of San Jose because of incomplete data on households 

in public housing. Regression includes year and PHA fixed effects. Cost per assisted household, HUD funding, assisted households, area median rent, and 

government wages enter the regression in logged form.

Sources: Urban Institute Analysis of HUD’s Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center, Financial Data Schedule, and Voucher Management 

System data 

37 Because outcome measures entered the regression in log form, percentage change is calculated by exponentiating the coefficient and subtracting 1. 

For example, the coefficient for HUD funding is 0.106 and the estimated percentage change is (e^0.106)-1=0.112 or 11 percent.

This lack of impact on cost per household 

is a result of increases in both the level of 

HUD funding and the number of assisted 

households for agencies after they join MTW. 

PHAs receive, on average, 11 percent more 

funding from HUD after joining the MTW 

demonstration and assist 10 percent more 

households (exhibit 13).37 Because these 

effects are of similar size, they have offsetting 

impacts on our primary outcome variable of 

cost per assisted household.

These findings are strong and robust. We 

conducted several analyses to determine 

if different, but potentially defensible, 

methodological choices for the statistical 

models would change the results. These 

statistical analyses produced the same results 

even under the following conditions:

• Instead of using all larger traditional 

agencies for the comparison group, we 

used both propensity score matching and 

trimming to common propensity score 

support to create comparison groups.

• Instead of using linear interpolation to fill 

in bad and missing data, we used multiple 

imputation.

• Instead of including local, non-traditional 

(LNT) households as a full household, we 

weighted them to 50 percent and removed 

them altogether.

• Instead of including controls for median rent 

in the service area and government wages 

in the county, we used no control variables.

Two additional analyses supported the 

primary finding that there is no statistically 
36

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Findings

significant relationship between MTW status 

and cost per household, but also found no 

relationship between MTW status and either 

HUD funding or the number of assisted 

households:

• Instead of assuming that all agencies follow 

parallel trends over time, we relaxed the 

statistical model to allow each agency its 

own unique linear trend over time.

• Instead of including all years, we used a 

smaller sample period, from 2009 to 2017.

All of these robustness checks confirm that 

MTW status does not affect agencies’ cost 

effectiveness. (See appendix B for all of these 

results). That is, the estimated relationship 

shown in exhibit 13 stays the same when the 

data are analyzed in different ways.

We also used an event study framework 

to estimate the effect of MTW status for 

each year relative to when agencies joined 

the demonstration. We find no significant 

differences in cost effectiveness in any year 

before or after joining the MTW demonstration 

(exhibit 14). Exhibit 15 shows the effects of 

MTW status, by year, on HUD revenue and 

households assisted. Consistent with the 

trends section (exhibits 9, 10, and 11), HUD 

funding begins to rise the year before PHAs 

officially enter the MTW demonstration 

(although this effect is not statistically 

significant at α=0.1), and continues to rise 

after the agency joins MTW, with the largest 

increase 1 year after joining (exhibit 15). The 

number of assisted households served by the 

PHA also increases 1 year before joining the 

demonstration (statistically significant at α=0.1) 

and continues to rise after joining but more 

smoothly than funding, which peaks the year 

after joining. Full results from this model can 

be found in appendix B, exhibit B5.
Findings

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

37

Exhibit 14: The Effect of Moving to Work on HUD Cost per Household Over Time, Using Public Housing Agencies With at Least 

750 Assisted Households (2003) as a Comparison Group (Percent Change)

-10%

-5%

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

-2 -1 Joined MTW +1 +2 +3

Estimated effect 90% confidence interval

Year Relative to Joining MTW

HUD Funding per 

Asssited Household

MTW = Moving to Work. PHA = public housing agency.

Notes: Vertical dotted line and “Year joined MTW” represent the year in which PHAs execute their first MTW contract. The solid line represents the point estimate 

and the dashed lines on either side of this estimate represent the 90-percent confidence interval. Estimates are converted from log form to percent change. 

Regressions include only agencies with at least 750 households and exclude agencies that joined MTW before 2005 or after 2015, because they need to have 

2 years of data prior to joining MTW and 3 years of data after joining enter this equation. Impact analyses do not include Oakland Housing Authority, Tacoma 

Housing Authority, Housing Authority of the County of Santa Clara, and Housing Authority of the City of San Jose because of incomplete data on households in 

public housing. All regressions include year and PHA fixed effects. Median rent and government wages are included as control variables. HUD cost per household, 

area median rent, and government wages enter the regression in logged form. 

Sources: Urban Institute Analysis of HUD Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center, Financial Data Schedule, and Voucher Management System data 
38

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Findings

Exhibit 15: The Effect of Moving to Work on HUD Funding and Number of Assisted Households (Percent Change)

MTW = Moving to Work.

Notes: Vertical dotted line and “Year joined MTW” represent the year in which public housing agencies execute their first MTW contract. The solid line represents 

the point estimate and the dashed lines on either side of this estimate represent the 90-percent confidence interval. Estimates are converted from log form to 

percent change. Regressions include only agencies with at least 750 households and exclude agencies that joined MTW before 2005 or after 2015, because 

they need to have 2 years of data prior to joining MTW and 3 years of data after joining enter this equation. Impact analyses do not include Oakland Housing 

Authority, Tacoma Housing Authority, Housing Authority of the County of Santa Clara, and Housing Authority of the City of San Jose because of incomplete data on 

households in public housing. All regressions include year and PHA fixed effects. Median rent and government wages are included as control variables. HUD cost 

per household, area median rent, and government wages enter the regression in logged form. 

Sources: Urban Institute Analysis of HUD Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center, Financial Data Schedule, and Voucher Management System data

The increase in the number of assisted 

households the year before PHAs sign 

their MTW agreement is both a surprising 

empirical fact and a potential cause of bias 

to our main regression model. If the changes 

in HUD revenue and assisted households 

are part of longer-term trends within future 

MTW agencies that pre-date joining the 

demonstration, the alternative model in 

which we allow each agency its own unique 

linear trend over time would provide the 

better approximation of the impact of MTW 

on agencies. As described above, this PHAspecific time trend model also finds no 

relationship between MTW status and cost per 

assisted household (exhibit B4).

Effect of the Moving to Work 

Demonstration Controlling 

for Program Mix, Housing 

Quality and Affordability, and 

Household Characteristics

To better understand the mechanisms 

through which MTW status may impact 

cost effectiveness, we ran three additional 

regression models, accounting for, 

respectively, (1) changes in program mix, 

(2) housing quality and affordability, and 

(3) household characteristics. Because our 

primary finding was of no impact, this analysis 

tests whether MTW agencies maintain their 

cost effectiveness by altering their portfolio 

Year Relative to Joining MTW

HUD Funding

-10%

-5%

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

-2 -1 Joined 

MTW

+1 +2 +3

Assisted Households

Year Relative to Joining MTW

-10%

-5%

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

-2 -1 Joined 

MTW

+1 +2 +3

Estimated Effect 90% Confidence Interval
Findings

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

39

of assisted units, the quality or affordability 

of the housing they provide, or the types of 

households they assist. We determine that 

accounting for these factors does not alter our 

primary finding of no significant relationship 

between MTW status and cost per assisted 

household. In other words, MTW agencies are 

not maintaining their cost effectiveness by 

shifting their portfolio to lower-cost assistance 

programs, offering lower quality or less 

affordable housing assistance, or providing 

assistance to lower need households.

Exhibit 16 displays the results of our main 

model from equation 1 (column 1), followed by 

38 Coefficients on these control variables should not be interpreted as causal impacts. Additional research is needed to determine the true causal impact 

of each variable on costs per household.

the same model plus additional variables that 

control for:

• the percent of households assisted through 

tenant-based and project-based HCVs 

rather than through public housing 

(column 2),

• public housing Physical Assessment 

Subsystem (PASS) inspection scores and 

affordability (column 3), and

• characteristics that define whether residents 

may be more expensive to serve 

(column 4).38

Exhibit 16: The Effect of Moving to Work on HUD Cost per Assisted Household Controlling for Program Mix, Quality and 

Affordability, and Household Characteristics

(1)

Main Regression

(2)

Controlling for Program 

Mix

(3)

Controlling for Housing 

Quality and Affordability

(4)

Controlling 

for Household 

Characteristics

Impact of MTW

0.013 0.008 0.015 0.014

(0.030) (0.025) (0.031) (0.029)

Percent tenant-based HCV holder - 0.613*** - -

(0.075)

Percent project-based HCV holder - 0.643*** - -

(0.107)

Quality of public housing - - -0.001 -

(0.001)

Affordability (median rent burden) - - -0.007** -

(0.003)

Median income (new residents) - - - -0.040***

(0.011)

High need households (new 

residents)

- - - 0.000

(0.000)

Household size (new residents) - - - 0.018**

(0.008)

Observations 10,905 10,905 8,775 10,905

 * p<0.10, ** p<0.05, *** p<0.01. 

HCV = Housing Choice Voucher. MTV = Moving to Work.

Notes: There is no statistically significant difference between the four coefficients for the impact of MTW status on cost per household. Standard errors (listed in 

parentheses) are heteroskedastic robust and clustered at the public housing agency (PHA) level. Regressions include only agencies with at least 750 households 

and exclude agencies that joined MTW before 2003. Impact analyses do not include Oakland Housing Authority, Tacoma Housing Authority, Housing Authority of 

the County of Santa Clara, and Housing Authority of the City of San Jose because of incomplete data on households in public housing. Regression includes year 

and PHA fixed effects. Median rent and government wages are included as control variables. Cost per assisted household, HUD funding, assisted households, 

area median rent, and government wages enter the regression in logged form. Regression (3) only includes PHAs with public housing units.

Sources: Urban Institute analysis of HUD Financial Data Schedule (FDS) and the Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center (PIC) datasets
40

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Findings

To understand the influence of each of these 

additional variables on cost effectiveness, 

readers should compare the numbers in the 

top row (Impact of MTW) in columns 2, 3, and 

4 with the number in column 1. For example, 

column 2 (Controlling for Program Mix), shows 

that, controlling for changes in the percentage 

of assisted households in tenant-based 

vouchers, project-based vouchers, and public 

housing, joining the MTW demonstration is 

associated with a 0.8-percent increase in 

costs per assisted household. This slightly 

decreases the impact of MTW on cost per 

household from our original model (column 

1), which shows an increase in costs per 

household of 1.3 percent. This indicates that 

accounting for shifts in agencies’ portfolio 

of assisted units after joining MTW slightly 

reduces the estimated impact of MTW status 

on costs per household. Conversely, columns 

3 and 4 show that accounting for housing 

affordability and quality (column 3) and the 

characteristics of assisted households (column 

4) slightly increases the effect of MTW status 

on costs per household. The differences in 

all cases, however, are very small and are not 

statistically significant. From this we conclude 

that the relationship between MTW status 

and cost effectiveness is not being driven 

by changes that occur after they join the 

demonstration to PHAs’ program mix, the 

quality or affordability of housing assistance, 

or the types of households served.

Effect of the Moving to 

Work Demonstration on per 

Household Spending by 

Public Housing Agencies

Exhibit 17 shows descriptive statistics for 

MTW and traditional PHAs of similar size in 

total per household spending, spending on 

administrative costs, spending on tenant 

services, and operating reserves in 2003, 

prior to when agencies in our sample joined 

the demonstration. It reveals that, compared 

with traditional PHAs, MTW agencies spent 

more per assisted household and stored 

more dollars in reserves before joining the 

demonstration.

Exhibit 17: Per Household Total Expenditure, Administrative Costs, Tenant Services Spending, and Operating Reserves, 2003

Total Expenditure 

(Operating and Housing 

Assistance) per Assisted 

Household

Administrative 

Costs per Assisted 

Household

Tenant Services 

Spending per Assisted 

Household

Operating Reserves per 

Assisted Household

MTW PHAs Included in 

Regression Analysis $6,639 $1,337 $109 $473

Traditional PHAs That 

Served at Least 750 

Households in 2003

$5,574 $985 $64 $396

MTW = Moving to Work. PHA = public housing agency.

Notes: Values displayed are constant 2015 dollars adjusted using Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Price Index for all Urban Consumers. Regressions include 

only agencies with at least 750 households and exclude agencies that joined MTW before 2003. Analyses do not include Oakland Housing Authority, Tacoma 

Housing Authority, Housing Authority of the County of Santa Clara, and Housing Authority of the City of San Jose because of incomplete data on households in 

public housing. Regression includes year and public housing agency fixed effects. Cost per assisted household, HUD funding, assisted households, area median 

rent, and government wages enter the regression in logged form.

Sources: Urban Institute analysis of HUD’s Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center dataset; HUD Financial Data Schedule (FDS dataset); and U.S. 

Census Bureau Data
Findings

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

41

Exhibit 18 shows estimates of the impact of 

Moving to Work status on public housing 

authorities’ total operating and housing 

assistance spending per assisted household, 

administrative costs per household, tenant 

services per household, and operating 

reserves per household, accounting for the 

baseline differences displayed in exhibit 

17. The model uses the natural log of total 

expenditures and administrative costs to 

estimate the impact in terms of percentage 

change. Because tenant services spending 

is often zero and operating reserves can 

be negative, the model estimates a linear 

relationship for these variables.

Results of the model of MTW’s impact on total 

expenditures per household are consistent 

with findings of cost per household discussed 

previously. MTW status is not associated 

with an increase in PHAs’ total operating and 

housing assistance spending per assisted 

household. Statistical models are unable to 

determine the relationship between MTW 

status and either administrative costs per 

household or tenant services spending per 

household because the standard errors are 

very large. The standard estimating error 

for the tenant services model is about $25 

per household, more than one-fourth of the 

average spending level. This is probably 

because most PHAs spend nothing on tenant 

services and a small number of agencies 

spend a lot on tenant services.

In contrast, the analysis also shows that MTW 

status increases the funds that agencies 

hold in operating reserves by about $840 

per assisted household. This increase is 

statistically significant at the .01 level. This 

finding suggests that MTW agencies are 

able to find some efficiencies that allow 

them to build up their operating reserves 

while serving roughly the same number 

of assisted households per dollar of HUD 

funding as they did before. It is unclear from 

our analysis, however, what those efficiencies 

are since they are not spending less on other 

components of providing rental assistance.
42

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Findings

Exhibit 18: The Effect of Moving to Work on per Household Total Expenditures, Administrative Costs, Tenant Services 

Spending, and Operating Reserves

Total Expenditures (Operating 

and Housing Assistance) per 

Assisted Household

Administrative Costs per 

Assisted Household

Tenant Services 

Spending per 

Assisted Household

Operating Reserves 

per Assisted 

Household

Impact of MTW

0.003 0.137 22.4 839***

(0.048) (0.098) (25.0) (197)

Median Rent

0.061 0.073 17.3 96.9

(0.146) (0.091) (24.7) (170)

Government Wage

0.111 0.060 -21.5 114

(0.080) (0.048) (18.8) (119)

Observations 10,905 10,905 10,905 10,905

 * p<0.10, ** p<0.05, *** p<0.01.

MTW = Moving to Work.

Notes: Standard errors are heteroskedastic robust and clustered at the public housing agency (PHA) level and listed in parentheses. Regressions exclude agencies 

that joined MTW before 2003 and agencies that had fewer than 750 assisted households in 2003. Impact analyses do not include Oakland Housing Authority, 

Tacoma Housing Authority, Housing Authority of the County of Santa Clara, or Housing Authority of the City of San Jose because of incomplete data on households 

in public housing. All regressions include year and PHA fixed effects. Total expenditures per assisted household, administrative costs per assisted household, 

median rent, and government wage enter our regression equation in natural log form, tenant services spending per assisted households and operating reserves 

enter our regression equation non-transformed. We turn all zero values to 0.0001 before taking the natural log. The natural logs of median rent and government 

wages are included as control variables.

Sources: Urban Institute Analysis of HUD’s Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center, Financial Data Schedule, and Voucher Management 

System data

Discussion

This study provides new insights into the 

relationship between MTW status and cost 

effectiveness and opens doors for other 

avenues of research. First, it shows that MTW 

agencies had higher costs, as measured 

by HUD revenue per assisted household, 

than traditional PHAs before they joined 

the demonstration. Thus, the higher costs 

observed at MTW agencies in prior studies are 

probably because MTW agencies tend to be 

located in large urban areas with higher labor 

and housing costs and not because of the 

regulatory or financial flexibility offered by the 

demonstration.

Second, although MTW status is not 

associated with a change in the per household 

costs of rental assistance, it is associated 

with both an increase in HUD revenue 

and an increase in assisted households. 

Surprisingly, agencies began assisting more 

households the year before they joined the 

demonstration. This may be part of a longerterm trend at agencies that would go on to join 

the MTW demonstration. Or, agencies may 

have changed their behavior in anticipation 

of MTW status. There is often a lag between 

when agencies are selected into MTW and 

when they execute their agreements. During 

this time, agencies may have adjusted their 

actions in response to the MTW funding 

formula. Generally, MTW agencies are funded 

in the HCV program based on the number of 

households they were assisting when they 

joined the demonstration, with an adjustment 

for inflation and changes in housing costs. 

Thus, agencies could increase the base 

funding in their MTW contracts by increasing 

the number of assisted households they 

served when they joined MTW. Additional 

qualitative data collection with MTW agency 

staff would be useful to determine if they 

were intentionally serving more households 

in anticipation of their MTW contracts. In 
Findings

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

43

addition, we find evidence of an adjustment 

period where cost per assisted household 

increases slightly 1 year after PHAs join the 

demonstration, although the trend is not 

statistically significant.

Third, although MTW status did not affect 

the overall costs to HUD of providing rental 

assistance, it has allowed agencies to 

significantly increase the amount of money 

held in reserves. The Financial Data Schedule 

(FDS) system is not set up to track how PHAs 

spend their reserves, so we were not able to 

track this spending for this study. Interviews 

with a convenience sample of MTW agencies 

suggest that these reserves can be useful 

in financing the construction or preservation 

of affordable housing. Furthermore, holding 

additional reserves may allow MTW agencies 

greater access to financing or lower interest 

rates when they seek to acquire or develop 

additional housing units. The increase in 

reserves could be a sign that MTW agencies 

are reducing their capital outlays in the short 

term and building reserves to fund larger 

capital projects in later years. Supporters of 

MTW may cite this as evidence that MTW 

improves agencies’ financial position and 

thereby helps them to preserve or increase 

the community’s stock of affordable housing 

while maintaining the same level of cost per 

household. Detractors may argue that the 

money MTW agencies hold in reserves would 

be better spent assisting more households 

through rental subsidies.

It is important to note that we only examine 

MTW-eligible funding and therefore do not 

assess whether MTW status affects how 

much funding PHAs receive from other 

programs. For example, MTW status might 

help PHAs receive more funding because they 

can use their flexibility to hire grant writers 

or because they can leverage funding to 

receive additional loans or grants from public 

or private funders. This may be what allows 

them to build their operating reserves without 

reducing their cost-effectiveness. Conversely, 

traditional PHAs may be able to use other 

funding opportunities to pay for the enhanced 

services or development activities that MTW 

agencies pay for with their funding flexibility.

Finally, our findings may inform thinking about 

how to strike the right balance between 

federal regulation and local control. The 

finding that MTW status does not significantly 

impact cost effectiveness could be taken as 

evidence that strict regulation of PHAs is not 

necessary to manage costs, at least among 

high performing agencies. Conversely, our 

finding of no impact of MTW may reflect a 

lack of contrast in the regulatory environment 

between MTW and traditional PHAs. During 

our analysis period, HUD was establishing 

more uniform standards and monitoring for 

MTW agencies while also relaxing certain 

regulatory requirements for traditional PHAs.

Limitations

The analysis reported here is limited by the 

non-experimental process through which 

agencies join MTW, a lack of data on behavior 

within each agency, and the exclusion of 

agencies that entered MTW prior to 2003. 

It also does not address the relationship 

between cost-effectiveness and the MTW 

demonstration’s other goals.

Lack of random assignment to MTW status 

limits our ability to estimate the causal impact 

of the demonstration. PHAs were chosen 

for MTW through selection processes that 

shifted from year-to-year before becoming 

more standardized in the later years of the 

demonstration. In some years, PHAs selfselected into the demonstration by applying 

to join. PHAs that applied for the MTW 

demonstration may be systematically different 

in unobservable and unaccounted for ways 

from agencies that did not try to join the 

demonstration. For instance, they may have 

leadership with high levels of motivation to 
44

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Findings

improve their agencies.

Data availability constrains the analysis in 

three important ways. First, the analysis 

only includes agencies that joined or exited 

the MTW demonstration since 2003, and for 

whom there are enough years of accurate 

data. It therefore excludes the first agencies 

to join MTW, some of which have been 

singled out by critics of the demonstration 

for not using enough of their budget on 

housing assistance (Fischer, 2015). It also 

excludes some of the largest MTW agencies 

and agencies with the most ambitious MTW 

activities, such as the Chicago Housing 

Authority, Home Forward (Portland, OR), 

and the Cambridge Housing Authority. We 

do not know how including these agencies 

would affect our results. Second, inconsistent 

data reduces the accuracy and precision of 

our estimates. Reliance on imputing missing 

and incomplete data adds uncertainty to 

our estimates. Third, FDS data do not fully 

differentiate between spending on public 

housing, vouchers, or local, non-traditional 

(LNT) assistance at MTW agencies and do 

not allow us to track the flow of funds across 

accounts. It is not possible to examine shifts 

in spending that could make agencies more 

or less cost-effective, the sources of funding 

used to increase operating reserves, or the 

expenditures associated with the draw-down 

of reserves.

Finally, the study focuses only on cost 

effectiveness and defines cost effectiveness 

based on number of households served. This 

measure is not the only possible measure of 

cost effectiveness, but we chose it because it 

reflects federal costs and includes all funding 

sources and all households served with 

this funding and allows for fair comparison 

between MTW agencies and traditional PHAs. 

A further limitation is that this measure of cost 

effectiveness does not take into account the 

other two statutory objectives, which are (1) 

promoting employment and economic selfsufficiency, and (2) increasing housing choices 

for low-income families. MTW agencies are not 

required to pursue cost effectiveness over and 

above the other objectives.

Conclusion

The MTW agencies included in our analysis 

received higher levels of HUD funding after 

joining the demonstration and also were 

able to increase the total number of assisted 

households served, resulting in no significant 

change in overall cost per household. These 

agencies also experienced a large increase 

in dollars per household held in reserves, 

suggesting that they were able to increase 

their savings while still serving roughly the 

same number of assisted households per 

dollar of HUD funding as before joining the 

demonstration.

Future studies should examine cost 

effectiveness in tandem with self-sufficiency 

or housing choice to determine the overall 

effect of the MTW demonstration on its three 

statutory objectives. Future studies should 

also estimate the relationship between MTW 

status and the number of affordable units 

within the PHA’s service area to determine 

whether MTW agencies use their reserves 

to increase the supply of affordable housing 

more than other similar agencies.

The findings in this study do not contradict 

prior studies showing that MTW agencies 

spend more per household, but rather 

show that this higher level of cost per 

household existed prior to entering the MTW 

demonstration and that the demonstration 

itself was not the cause.
Appendix A: History of the Moving to Work Demonstration

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

A-1

Appendix A: History 

of the Moving to Work 

Demonstration

Most Moving to Work (MTW) public housing 

agencies (PHAs) entered the demonstration 

through a competitive application process. 

The initial 1996 applicant pool was scored 

based on a number of characteristics, 

including the housing agency’s performance, 

capability, and proposed MTW plan. A cohort 

of 24 PHAs was selected from that group 

to join the MTW demonstration, and 19 

PHAs ultimately signed agreements.39 That 

process, however, involved some ambiguity; 

not all high-scoring PHAs were selected to 

join and three PHAs were chosen based on 

their proposed activities, despite not being 

amongst the highest performing applicants: 

the San Diego Housing Commission, the 

Vancouver Housing Authority, and the 

Minneapolis Public Housing Authority (Cadik 

and Nogic, 2010).

In 2000, a second invitation to apply 

was issued to fill six open spots in the 

demonstration.40 Most of the PHAs from the 

initial cohort were small- or medium-sized 

PHAs; however, the second round targeted 

applications from large PHAs with more 

than 2,500 units “that [were] undertaking 

or plan[ned] to undertake a substantial 

transformation of their public housing stock 

and management systems” (2000-52 [HA]).41

This cohort was not scored based on the 

housing agency’s performance.

39 See HUD’s “History of Moving to Work (MTW)” for more information: www.hud.gov/program_offices/public_indian_housing/programs/ph/mtw/history. 40 The original MTW demonstration included 24 spots for MTW agencies and 6 spots for Jobs-Plus agencies. Five of the selected MTW agencies and 

one selected Jobs-Plus agency did not ultimately join the demonstration: Birmingham, Cherokee Nation, Los Angeles County, Stevens Point, Tampa, 

and the Utah Consortium. The five Jobs Plus agencies were Housing Authority of Baltimore City, Chattanooga, Cuyahoga, Dayton, and the City of Los 

Angeles. See HUD’s “History of Moving to Work (MTW)” for more information: www.hud.gov/program_offices/public_indian_housing/programs/ph/

mtw/history. For more information on HUD’s Jobs-Plus initiative, see: https://www.hud.gov/program_offices/public_indian_housing/jpi. 41 The six PHAs chosen in 2000 were Atlanta Housing Authority, District of Columbia, King County Housing Authority, Housing Authority of the City of 

New Haven, Oakland Housing Authority, and Philadelphia Housing Authority.

Three MTW agencies left the original 

demonstration in late 2003 and early 

2004—the Greene Metropolitan Housing 

Authority; the High Point Housing Authority, 

North Carolina; and the San Diego Housing 

Commission. In 2008, the San Diego Housing 

Commission returned to the demonstration. 

Also, in 2008, the Housing Authority of 

Baltimore City transitioned from the Jobs 

Plus demonstration to be a full MTW agency. 

Nine PHAs were selected during the three 

subsequent application periods—2009, 

2010, and 2012—and all were required to be 

designated High Performing PHAs with no 

more than 5,000 units (Office of Public and 

Indian Housing [PIH] Notices 2009-29 (HA), 

2010-29 (HA), PIH-2012-16).

In addition to the competitive selection 

process, PHAs could be named by Congress 

and invited to join the demonstration through 

an Appropriations Act. This occurred with 

seven PHAs: the Charlotte Housing Authority 

and the Housing Authority of the City of 

Pittsburgh in 1999; the Chicago Housing 

Authority in 2000; and the Alaska Housing 

Finance Corporation, Housing Authority of 

the County of San Bernardino, and Housing 

Authority of the County of Santa Clara/

Housing Authority of the City of San Jose in 

2008.

When the demonstration began, each 

agency worked with HUD to create a unique 

MTW agreement that specified the tasks 

and activities that the agency planned to 

implement and the waivers from regulations 

and statutes that they needed to carry 

out those activities. As the demonstration 

progressed, however, HUD recognized the 

need for standardization and developed and 

executed the “MTW Standard Agreement” 
A-2

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Appendix A: History of the Moving to Work Demonstration

in 2008. Starting that year, any agency 

that joined the demonstration signed this 

agreement, which allows for waivers from 

a common set of rules and regulations. 

Amendments to the standard agreement may 

nevertheless vary across agencies, including 

the Community-Specific Attachment D 

amendments. A full list of MTW agencies, the 

dates in which they joined the demonstration, 

and the authorization information, appear in 

exhibit A1.

Exhibit A1: History of Moving to Work Agency Involvement

MTW Agency Year Accepted MTW Active Date Date 

Terminated Authorization Information

Alaska Housing Finance Corporation 2008 6/24/2008 - Appropriations Act (2008)

Atlanta Housing Authority 2000 9/25/2003 - PIH Notice 2000-52

Housing Authority of Baltimore City 2008 12/24/2008 - Appropriations Act (1996)

Boulder Housing Partners 2010 11/10/2011 - PIH Notice 2009-29

Cambridge Housing Authority 1996 4/9/1999 - Appropriations Act (1996)

Housing Authority of Champaign County 2009 10/17/2010 - PIH Notice 2009-29

Charlotte Housing Authority 1999 12/21/2007 - Appropriation Act (1999)

Chicago Housing Authority 2000 2/6/2000 - PIH Notice 2000-52

Housing Authority of Columbus, Georgia 2012 7/3/2013 - PIH Notice 2012-16

Delaware State Housing Authority 1996 5/14/1999 - Appropriations Act (1996)

District of Columbia Housing Authority 2000 7/25/2003 - PIH Notice 2000-52

Fairfax County Redevelopment and Housing 

Authority 2012 11/7/2013 - PIH Notice 2012-16

Greene Metropolitan Housing Authority 1996 3/3/1999 3/3/2004 Appropriations Act (1996)

High Point Housing Authority 1996 3/29/1999 3/29/2004 Appropriations Act (1996)

Holyoke Housing Authority 2012 9/6/2013 - PIH Notice 2012-16

Keene Housing 1996 4/21/1999 - Appropriations Act (1996)

King County Housing Authority 2000 9/8/2003 - PIH Notice 2000-52

Lawrence-Douglas County Housing Authority 1996 3/30/1999 - Appropriations Act (1996)

Lexington-Fayette Urban County Housing 

Authority 2010 11/10/2011 - PIH Notice 2009-29

Lincoln Housing Authority 1996 5/21/1999 - Appropriations Act (1996)

Louisville Metropolitan Housing Authority 1996 8/2/1999 - Appropriations Act (1996)

Massachusetts Department of Housing and 

Community Development 1996 4/21/1999 - Appropriations Act (1996)

Minneapolis Public Housing Authority 1996 8/27/1998 - Appropriations Act (1996)

Housing Authority of the City of New Haven 2000 9/28/2001 - PIH Notice 2000-52

Oakland Housing Authority 2000 3/31/2004 - PIH Notice 2000-52

Orlando Housing Authority 2009 1/7/2011 - PIH Notice 2009-29

Philadelphia Housing Authority 2000 2/14/2001 - PIH Notice 2000-52

Housing Authority of the City of Pittsburgh 1999 11/17/2000 - Appropriation Act (1999)

Portage Metropolitan Housing Authority 1996 3/15/1999 - Appropriations Act (1996)

Home Forward (formerly Housing Authority of 

Portland) 1996 1/13/1999 - Appropriations Act (1996)

(continued) 
Appendix A: History of the Moving to Work Demonstration

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

A-3

MTW Agency Year Accepted MTW Active Date Date 

Terminated Authorization Information

Reno Housing Authority 2012 6/27/2013 - PIH Notice 2012-16

San Antonio Housing Authority 1996 8/25/1999 - Appropriations Act (1996)

Housing Authority of the County of San 

Bernardino 2008 3/14/2008 - Appropriations Act (2008)

San Diego Housing Commission 1996 12/8/1998; 

1/14/2009 12/8/2003 Appropriations Act (1996); 

Appropriations Act (2008)

Housing Authority of the City of San Jose 2008 2/26/2008 - Appropriations Act (2008)

Housing Authority of the County of San Mateo 1996 5/1/2000 - Appropriations Act (1996)

Housing Authority of the County of Santa Clara 2008 2/26/2008 - Appropriations Act (2008)

Seattle Housing Authority 1996 12/30/1998 - Appropriations Act (1996)

Tacoma Housing Authority 2009 8/23/2010 - PIH Notice 2009-29

Tulare County Housing Authority 1996 4/5/1999 - Appropriations Act (1996)

Vancouver Housing Authority 1996 4/21/1999 - Appropriations Act (1996)

MTW = Moving to Work. PIH = Office of Public and Indian Housing.

Notes: San Antonio Housing Authority originally implemented a small demonstration at one public housing site, and later expanded to the entire public housing 

agency. Housing Authority of Baltimore City was originally part of the Jobs Plus demonstration and transitioned to the MTW demonstration in 2008. San Diego 

completed their original demonstration in 2003 and rejoined in 2008.

Source: Documents retrieved from HUD’s MTW portal (www.hud.gov/program_offices/public_indian_housing/programs/ph/mtw)

Exhibit A1: History of Moving to Work Agency Involvement (continued)
Appendix B: Additional Analyses

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

B-1

Appendix B: 

Additional Analyses

This section describes additional analyses that 

support or provide additional context to those 

included in the body of this report. We first 

describe the analysis used to understand the 

ramifications of choosing a size threshold for 

the comparison with traditional public housing 

agencies (PHAs). Next, we describe the 

analyses used to examine the robustness of 

our results. We then provide the full results of 

the event study analysis. Finally, we show how 

results would differ if we had used a repeated 

cross-section design that did not account for 

unobservable differences between PHAs. 

Alternate Size Thresholds for 

Comparison Traditional Public 

Housing Agencies

To better understand how the population of 

traditional PHAs in our sample impacts our 

estimates, we performed a sensitivity analysis 

using alternative thresholds for the minimum 

number of assisted households that we 

required of PHAs in our comparison group. 

Specifically, we re-estimated equation 1 with 

progressively smaller samples of traditional 

PHAs, dropping agencies with fewer than n

households in 2001 with n ranging from 0 

to 1,000 in increments of 50. As soon as the 

smallest agencies were removed from the 

sample, the relationship between Moving to 

Work (MTW) status and cost per household 

became statistically insignificant at the α=0.1 

level. The results of this analysis are shown in 

exhibits B1 and B2.

Exhibit B1: Sensitivity of Estimates to Alternative Comparison Groups

-0.06

-0.04

-0.02

0

0.02

0.04

0.06

0.08

0.1

0.12

0.14

0.16

0

50

100150200250300350400450500550600650700750800850900950

10001050110011501200

1250

Estimated Effect of MTW Status on the Log 

of HUD Revenue per Assisted Household 

Estimated effect

Minimum Number of Households (2001) in Comparison Group

90% confidence interval

MTW = Moving to Work.

Notes: Standard errors are heteroskedastic robust and clustered at the public housing agency (PHA) level. The solid blue line represents the point estimate 

and the dotted lines on either side of this estimate represent the 90-percent confidence interval. Regressions exclude agencies that joined MTW before 2003. 

Comparison groups were determined using the number of assisted households in 2003. Impact analyses do not include Oakland Housing Authority, Tacoma 

Housing Authority, Housing Authority of the County of Santa Clara, or Housing Authority of the City of San Jose because of incomplete data on households in 

public housing. All regressions include year and PHA fixed effects. Median rent and government wages are included as control variables.

Sources: Urban Institute analysis of HUD Financial Data Schedule, and the Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center datasets
B-2

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Appendix B: Additional Analyses

Exhibit B2: Sensitivity of Estimates to Alternative Comparison Groups

Minimum Number 

of Households

Cost per Assisted Household HUD Funding Assisted Households Observations

Coefficient Std. Error Coefficient Std. Error Coefficient Std. Error

No Minimum 0.084*** (0.031) 0.167*** (0.026) 0.083*** (0.027) 53,475

50 0.068** (0.031) 0.161*** (0.025) 0.093*** (0.027) 44,085

100 0.052* (0.030) 0.153*** (0.025) 0.101*** (0.027) 36,705

150 0.041 (0.030) 0.145*** (0.025) 0.104*** (0.027) 31,260

200 0.034 (0.030) 0.139*** (0.025) 0.105*** (0.027) 27,690

250 0.031 (0.030) 0.135*** (0.025) 0.104*** (0.027) 24,810

300 0.027 (0.030) 0.131*** (0.026) 0.104*** (0.027) 22,350

350 0.025 (0.030) 0.128*** (0.025) 0.103*** (0.027) 20,325

400 0.022 (0.030) 0.126*** (0.025) 0.104*** (0.027) 18,435

450 0.021 (0.030) 0.122*** (0.025) 0.101*** (0.028) 17,070

500 0.018 (0.030) 0.117*** (0.025) 0.099*** (0.028) 15,840

550 0.018 (0.030) 0.113*** (0.025) 0.095*** (0.028) 14,445

600 0.017 (0.030) 0.111*** (0.025) 0.094*** (0.028) 13,350

650 0.016 (0.030) 0.109*** (0.024) 0.093*** (0.028) 12,495

700 0.016 (0.030) 0.108*** (0.024) 0.092*** (0.028) 11,715

750 0.013 (0.030) 0.106*** (0.024) 0.093*** (0.028) 10,905

800 0.015 (0.030) 0.107*** (0.024) 0.092*** (0.028) 10,380

850 0.015 (0.030) 0.106*** (0.024) 0.092*** (0.028) 9,780

900 0.013 (0.030) 0.105*** (0.024) 0.091*** (0.028) 9,360

950 0 (0.030) 0.096*** (0.024) 0.096*** (0.030) 8,865

1000 0 (0.030) 0.095*** (0.024) 0.095*** (0.030) 8,445

 * p<0.10, ** p<0.05, *** p<0.01.

 Notes: Standard errors (listed in parentheses) are heteroskedastic robust and clustered at the public housing agency (PHA) level. Regressions include only 

agencies with at least 750 households and exclude agencies that joined Moving to Work before 2003. Impact analyses do not include Oakland Housing Authority, 

Tacoma Housing Authority, Housing Authority of the County of Santa Clara, or Housing Authority of the City of San Jose because of incomplete data on households 

in public housing. Regression includes year and PHA fixed effects. Median rent and government wages are included as control variables and logged as well. Cost 

per assisted household, HUD funding, assisted households, area median rent, and government wages enter the regression in logged form.

Sources: Urban Institute analysis of HUD Financial Data Schedule, and the Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center datasets

Robustness Checks

Using Propensity Score Matching

Because MTW PHAs were not chosen at 

random, any analysis is at risk of selection 

bias. This difficulty is because characteristics 

that make an agency more likely to become 

an MTW agency might be correlated with 

outcomes of interest, such as cost per 

household. In other words, PHAs that already 

are making changes to increase effectiveness 

may be the ones that choose to become 

MTW PHAs. If we compare MTW PHAs with 

traditional PHAs without correcting for this, the 

former may appear to be more cost-effective 

not because of MTW, but because those PHAs 

already were improving cost effectiveness.

The fixed-effects model controlled for the 

possibility that MTW PHAs systematically 

were more or less efficient than the average 

PHA prior to joining the demonstration. It did 
Appendix B: Additional Analyses

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

B-3

not control for the possibility that some of the 

MTW PHAs are fundamentally different from 

the traditional PHAs, however, and would 

not have been expected to follow parallel 

trends in the absence of MTW flexibility. This 

issue could arise not only if there is selection 

bias, but also if some of the MTW PHAs (and 

traditional PHAs) simply do not have good 

comparisons in the other group.

We used propensity scores in two ways to 

ensure that the MTW and traditional PHAs 

used in our robustness checking statistical 

models were similar. The propensity score 

refers to the probability that a PHA is an 

MTW agency. First, we created a matched 

comparison group and, second, we trimmed 

the data to ensure common support. In both 

instances, we estimate the probability of MTW 

status using the Public Housing Assessment 

System (PHAS) public housing scores and 

demographic characteristics of the PHA 

service area. A full list of variables used to 

determine the propensity score appear in 

exhibit B3. We then assigned each agency a 

propensity score representing the estimated 

probability that the agency might have 

been an MTW agency. To create a matched 

dataset, we assigned each MTW PHA the five 

traditional PHAs with the closest propensity 

scores. We then limited the dataset to the 

MTW PHAs and each PHA’s five “nearest 

neighbors.’’ We allowed traditional PHAs to 

appear more than once if they are the nearest 

neighbor to more than one MTW PHA. To 

trim the dataset, we excluded PHAs from the 

analysis if they are MTW agencies with higher 

propensity scores than any traditional PHAs 

or are traditional PHAs with lower propensity 

scores than any MTW agency. Dropping these 

PHAs from the analysis limits the precision of 

estimates but better addresses the concern of 

selection bias.

Exhibit B3: Variables Used to Determine the Propensity Score

Data Source Definition/Notes

Housing Quality SEMAP and 

PHAS

Average of FASS score and SEMAP scores 5, 6, 9, 11, and 12, 

weighted by assisted households in public housing and HCV

Average wage in the construction industry BLS Average across counties in the service area

Average wage of local government employees BLS Average across counties in the service area

Median income of service area ACS Population weighted based on residents in PIC

Median rent in service area ACS Population weighted based on residents in PIC

Poverty rate of service area ACS Population weighted based on residents in PIC

Percent of service area population over age 60 ACS Population weighted based on residents in PIC

Population of service area ACS Average census tract population for census tracts served by 

the PHA (census tracts served defined by PIC data)

Population density of service area ACS Average census tract population density for census tracts 

served by the PHA

Rental vacancy rate of service area ACS Population weighted based on residents in PIC

ACS =American Community Survey. BLS = Bureau of Labor Statistics. FASS = Financial Assessment. HCV = Housing Choice Voucher. PHA = public housing agency. 

PHAS = Public Housing Assessment System. PIC = Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center. SEMAP = Section Eight Management Assessment 

Program.

Estimating equation 1 using these two, 

alternative comparison group, reaffirms 

the results shown in exhibit 12. There is no 

statistically significant relationship between 

MTW status and cost per household (exhibit 

B4). MTW status is associated with an 

increase in HUD funding and the number of 

assisted households (exhibit B4). Increases in 
B-4

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Appendix B: Additional Analyses

funding and assisted households are around 

the same size, leaving cost per assisted 

household unaffected.

Exhibit B4: Robustness Check Results

Cost per Assisted 

Household

HUD Funding Assisted Households Number of 

Observations

Pscore Matching

-0.001 0.100*** 0.101*** 1,800

(0.031) (0.024) (0.030)

Pscore Trimming

0.010 0.095*** 0.085*** 10,710

(0.032) (0.024) (0.029)

Multiple Imputation

0.021 0.106*** 0.085*** 10,965

(0.031) (0.024) (0.029)

Excluding LNT Households

0.041 0.106*** 0.065** 10,905

(0.027) (0.024) (0.026)

Weighting LNT Households at 50%

0.026 0.106*** 0.080*** 10,905

(0.028) (0.024) (0.026)

PHA-Specific Time Trends

0.009 0.015 0.006 10,905

(0.049) (0.034) (0.029)

Excluding Controls for Median Rent 

and Government Wage

0.019 0.108*** 0.090*** 10,905

(0.031) (0.026) (0.027)

Excluding Observation of 2008 or 

Earlier

0.020 0.017 -0.003 6,543

(0.051) (0.053) (0.026)

* p<0.10, ** p<0.05, *** p<0.01.

LNT = local, non-traditional. PHA = public housing agency.

Notes: Standard errors (listed in parentheses) are heteroskedastic robust and clustered at the PHA level. Regressions include only agencies with at least 750 

households and exclude agencies that joined Moving to Work before 2003. Impact analyses do not include Oakland Housing Authority, Tacoma Housing Authority, 

Housing Authority of the County of Santa Clara, or Housing Authority of the City of San Jose because of incomplete data on households in public housing. 

Regressions include year and PHA fixed effects. Median rent and government wages are included as control variables. Cost per assisted household, HUD funding, 

assisted households, area median rent, and government wages enter the regression in logged form.

Source: Urban Institute analysis

Multiple Imputation

The analysis described in this report 

used nearest-neighbor interpolation and 

extrapolation to address the issue of missing 

data. In the estimates displayed in exhibit 

12, we take these imputed values as given. 

This assumption may lead to underestimates 

of standard errors, however, therefore 

overstating the precision of our results. As a 

robustness check, we use multiple imputation 

to re-estimate any results that are found to 

be statistically significant in the base model. 

Multiple imputation iterates the imputation 

process to provide a more reliable estimate of 

a model’s precision (Raghunathan et al., 2001).

Multiple imputation involves threes steps. 

First, where data are missing, multiple sets 

of potential values are imputed for each 

observation. Second, the analysis is repeated 

over each set of potential values. Third, 

the estimates are pooled to create a single 

estimate of coefficients and their standard 

errors. Because our estimates are based 

on panel data, we used chained equations 
Appendix B: Additional Analyses

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

B-5

to impute missing values. We iterated our 

analysis, estimating each equation 10 times, 

then employed a two-stage estimator (von 

Hippel, 2018) to determine the minimum 

number of imputations needed for replicable 

estimates of standard errors. Following the 

estimator, we then iterated the analysis 48 

times.

Estimating equation 1 using multiple 

imputation, also reaffirms the results shown in 

exhibit 12. There is no statistically significant 

relationship between MTW status and cost 

per household (exhibit B4). MTW status is 

associated with an increase in HUD funding 

and the number of assisted households 

(exhibit B4). Increases in funding and assisted 

households are around the same size, leaving 

cost per assisted household unaffected.

Weighting Counts of Local, NonTraditional Housing

The data described in this report include 

families served through local, non-traditional 

(LNT) rental subsidies, LNT development 

programs, and LNT homeownership 

assistance. Because these activities are 

funded with MTW funds, excluding them 

from the analysis would make it appear that 

MTW PHAs used their HUD funding less 

efficiently. It is also important to consider, 

however, that LNT assistance may be 

shallower than traditional housing assistance. 

It is possible that MTW PHAs that engage 

in many LNT activities could appear more 

cost-effective, simply by providing a smaller 

subsidy or shorter-term housing assistance. 

By performing robustness checks with LNT 

households weighted at 50 percent and 

excluded entirely, we confirm that these issues 

do not affect our results. These robustness 

checks show that MTW status corresponds 

to an increase in the number of assisted 

households even before counting households 

assisted through LNT programs (exhibit B4). 

Moreover, our main finding, that there is no 

statistically significant impact on cost per 

household associated with MTW, holds even 

with LNT households excluded.

Public Housing Agency-Specific Time 

Trends

We relaxed the assumption of parallel trends 

for MTW and traditional PHAs and allowed 

each PHA its own specific, long-term, linear 

time trend. To do this we updated equation 1 

as follows:

Outcomeit= β*MTWit+γ* 

Controlsit+λt+(αi*(Yeart-2000))+εit (1) 

That is, we allowed each agency to follow a 

linear path through time and allow individual 

year effects to perturb this path. This allows 

each agency its own long-term trajectory and 

allows us to control for national economic and 

policy changes.

Estimates from the model with PHA-specific 

time trends reaffirm that MTW-status is not 

associated with cost per assisted household. 

The inclusion of PHA-specific time trends, 

however, reduces the estimated relationships 

between MTW status and both funding and 

the number of assisted households to near 

zero (exhibit B4).

Excluding Controls for Median Rent 

and Government Wage

To fully understand the relationship 

between MTW status and cost effectiveness 

we want to control for any differences 

between agencies that could affect both 

per household costs and MTW status. We 

do not want to control for factors that could 

affect per household costs, however, and 

are, themselves, affected by MTW status. 

Our approach was to use fixed effects to 

control for differences between agencies 

that do not change over time and also 

to control for changes in local rents and 

wages that change each year and affect 
B-6

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Appendix B: Additional Analyses

per household costs. These variables are 

appropriate controls under the assumption 

that PHAs do not have enough influence to 

affect the median price of rent in their service 

area or the average wage of a public-sector 

employee in their county. To ensure that the 

results in this report were not reliant on this 

assumption, we also estimated an alternative 

version of equation 1 without these two 

control variables.

The estimates from the model without these 

controls are very similar to those shown in 

exhibit 12. That is, they reaffirm the finding 

that MTW status is not associated with per 

household costs and the findings that MTW 

status is associated with an increase in both 

revenue from HUD and households assisted 

(exhibit B4).

Excluding Observation of 2008 or 

Earlier

Our analysis of the Office of Public and Indian 

Housing Information Center (PIC), the Voucher 

Management System (VMS), and the Financial 

Data Schedule (FDS) datasets, described in 

the data collection and assembly section, 

revealed many instances in which agencies 

did not report some household, voucher, or 

financial data which led to missing or bad 

observations in our analytic dataset. This was 

particularly an issue for data in PIC and FDS 

prior to 2009. We, therefore, repeated the 

analysis described in the body of this report 

using only data from 2009 onward.

Results of this analysis reaffirm that MTWstatus is not associated with cost per assisted 

household. Using this shorter time period, 

however, reduces the estimated relationships 

between MTW status and both funding and 

the number of assisted households to near 

zero (exhibit B4).

Event Study

Exhibit B5 displays the coefficients for the 

event study described in the findings section 

of this report and displayed graphically in 

exhibits 13 and 14.

Exhibit B5: Event Study Results for RQ1 Using Public Housing Agencies With at Least 750 Assisted Households (2003) as a 

Comparison Group

Cost per Assisted 

Households

HUD Funding Assisted Households

2 Years Before

-0.007 0.016 0.023

(0.037) (0.035) (0.020)

1 Year Before

0.031 0.088* 0.058**

(0.040) (0.050) (0.026)

Year Joined MTW

0.039 0.130*** 0.092***

(0.044) (0.049) (0.033)

1 Year After

0.05 0.149*** 0.099**

(0.040) (0.048) (0.042)

2 Years After 0.021 0.121*** 0.100**

(0.043) (0.023) (0.047)

3 Years and More After 0.009 0.138*** 0.130***

(0.042) (0.039) (0.039)

Median Rent 0.292*** 0.137** -0.154***

(continued) 
Appendix B: Additional Analyses

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

B-7

Cost per Assisted 

Households

HUD Funding Assisted Households

(0.072) (0.060) (0.048)

Government Wage 0.043* 0.02 -0.023

(0.026) (0.026) (0.020)

Adjusted R-Squared 0.096 0.084 0.040

 * p<0.10, ** p<0.05, *** p<0.01.

MTW = Moving to Work.

Notes: Standard errors (listed in parentheses) are heteroskedastic robust and clustered at the public housing agency (PHA) level. Regressions include only 

agencies with at least 750 households and exclude agencies that joined MTW before 2005 or after 2015, because they need to have 2 years of data prior to 

joining MTW and 3 years of data after joining enter this equation. Impact analyses do not include Oakland Housing Authority, Tacoma Housing Authority, Housing 

Authority of the County of Santa Clara, or Housing Authority of the City of San Jose because of incomplete data on households in public housing. All regressions 

include year and PHA fixed effects. Median rent and government wages are included as control variables. HUD cost per household, area median rent, and 

government wages enter the regression in logged form.

Sources: Urban Institute Analysis of HUD’s Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center, Financial Data Schedule, and Voucher Management System data

Repeated Cross Sectional 

Estimates

The fixed-effects model presented in this 

report accounts for pre-existing differences 

between MTW and traditional PHAs in both 

internal and external factors affecting the 

costs of providing housing assistance. This 

is a primary contribution of this study and 

differentiates it from the existing literature. 

This approach is not the only difference 

between this and prior studies, however. To 

better understand why the findings in this 

study differ from those in prior studies, we 

estimated the relationship between MTW 

status and cost per assisted household, 

HUD funding, and the number of assisted 

households in a repeated cross-section 

model without fixed effects. We estimate this 

cross-sectional model both with the sample 

described in the body of this report and with 

the propensity matched sample described 

earlier in this appendix.

These results show that, on average, after 

controlling for local rents and wages, the cost 

to HUD of providing rental assistance is 20 to 

25 percent higher at MTW agencies than at 

comparison traditional PHAs (exhibit B6). The 

results align with prior research and highlight 

the importance of accounting for pre-existing, 

unobservable differences between MTW 

agencies and traditional PHAs.

Exhibit B5: Event Study Results for RQ1 Using Public Housing Agencies With at Least 750 Assisted Households (2003) 

as a Comparison Group (continued) 
B-8

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Appendix B: Additional Analyses

Exhibit B6: Repeated Cross-Sectional Estimation

Cost per Assisted 

Households HUD Funding Assisted Households

Number of 

Observations

Cross-Sectional Estimate 

(No Fixed Effects) 

0.197*** 1.498*** 1.301***

10,905

(0.067) (0.224) (0.177)

Pscore Cross-Sectional

0.233*** 1.381*** 1.148***

1,800

(0.066) (0.024) (0.021)

* p<0.10, ** p<0.05, *** p<0.01

Notes: Standard errors (listed in parentheses) are heteroskedastic robust and clustered at the public housing agency level. Regressions include only on 

households in public housing. Median rent and government wages are included as control variables. 

Cost per assisted household, HUD funding, assisted households, area median rent, and government wages enter the regression in logged form.

Source: Urban Institute analysis
Appendix C: Supplemental Exhibits

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

C-1

Appendix C: Supplemental Exhibits

Exhibit C1: Data Sources

Source Years Geographic Level of Aggregation Description

FDS 2000–2017* PHA Financial data for all PHAs

PIC 1995–2017 Household Level

Public housing household counts, characteristics of residents in HCV-assisted 

housing and public housing

VMS 2003–2017 Household Level HCV household counts

Decennial Census/ACS

1990, 2000, 

2010, 2011–

2016**

Census Tract Demographic and housing data

BLS 2000–2017

County (Wages) Annual wages for employees in construction and local government

National (CPI) CPI-U

PHAS 1999–2016 PHA Public Housing Quality Measures

LNT Household Counts 2009–2017 PHA

Number of households assisted through 

local, non-traditional rental subsidy, homeownership, and housing development 

programs aggregated by the MTW office 

from Form 50900

 *FDS data was available through the 2016 fiscal year. We used weighted averages to adjust fiscal year data for 2001 to 2016 to calendar year data for 2003 to 

2016. We used FY2017 as calendar year 2017.

**ACS data at the census tract level is only available until 2013 because these data come in the 5-year estimates and are most accurate for the middle year, for 

which 2011–2016 was the latest dataset available.

ACS = American Community Survey. BLS = Bureau of Labor Statistics. CPI = Consumer Price Index. CPI-U = CPI all urban consumers. FDS = Financial Data Schedule. 

HCV = Housing Choice Voucher. LNT = local, non-traditional. MTV = Moving to Work. PHA = public housing agency. PHAS = Public Housing Assessment System. 

PIC = Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center. PIH = Office of Public and Indian Housing. VMS = Voucher Management System.
C-2

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Appendix C: Supplemental Exhibits

Exhibit C2: Variable Calculations From Financial Data Schedule Data

Variable Calculations Form Item 

Number(s)

Form Item Description Program IDs

(MTW) (Traditional)

Funding Received 

from HUD

70600

70610

HUD PHA 

Operating Grants

Capital Grants

14.OPS

14.CFP

14.HCV

14.850

14.872

14.871

Total Operating 

Expenditures 96900 Total Operating Expenses

14.OPS

14.850

14.871

14.872

14.881

14.850

14.871

14.872

HAP Expenditures 97300 Housing 

Assistance Payments

14.HCV

14.871

14.881

14.871

Administrative Costs 91000 Total 

Operating - Administrative 14.850

14.871

14.850

14.871

Tenant Services 

Spending 92500 Total Tenant Services

14.881

14.850

14.871

14.881

14.850

14.871

Operating Reserves

security deposits

net of allowance for 

doubtful accounts

111 Cash – unrestricted

14.OPS

14.CFP

14.HCV

14.850

14.871

14.872

14.850

14.871

14.872

14.850

114 Cash – tenant 

security deposits

120

Total receivables, 

net of allowance for 

doubtful accounts

131 Investments - unrestricted

142 Prepaid expenses and other assets

144 Inter-program - due from

145 Assets held for sale

-310 Total current liabilities

343 Current portion of long-term debt - capital 

projects/mortgage revenue bonds

MTW = Moving to Work. HAP = housing assistance payments.

Notes: Form Items refer to cost and revenue line-items listed in the Financial Data Schedule Line Definition Guide. Each cost or revenue line-item is associated with a 

specific program. 14.OPS is the public housing operations fund for MTW agencies; 14.CFP is the public housing capital fund for MTW agencies; 14.HCV is the HCV fund for 

MTW agencies; 14.850 is the code for public housing funds associated with specific developments, at MTW agencies and traditional PHAs; 14.872 is the public housing 

capital fund, associated with specific developments, at MTW agencies and traditional PHAs; 14.871 is the HCV fund at traditional PHAs and a fund specifically for the HCV 

program at MTW agencies; 14.881 is the MTW fund.

Source: Author Selections from Financial Assessment Subsystem – Public Housing; “Financial Data Schedule Line Definition Guide” Office of Public and Indian Housing, 

Real Estate Assessment Center: Washington, D.C.
Appendix C: Supplemental Exhibits

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

C-3

Exhibit C3: Analysis of Assisted Households

Assisted 

Household 

Subgroup

Definition Included When Calculating 

Number of Assisted 

Households?

Included When 

Calculating 

Characteristics?

New Households 

in Public Housing 

(PIC)

Households with action codes identifying them as 

“New Admission” or “Historical Adjustment” and program type is “Public Housing”

Yes, weighted by months following the effective date of the 

admission action

Yes, unweighted

Households Exiting 

from Public Housing (PIC)

Households with action codes identifying them as “End 

Participation” and program type is “Public Housing”

Yes, weighted by the number of 

months preceding the effective 

date of the exit action

No

Households in Public Housing (PIC)

Households with any action codes except those that 

signify a new or existing household that have the program type “Public Housing”. Yes, unweighted No

New Households in 

Voucher Programs 

(PIC)

Households with action codes identifying them as 

“New Admission” or “Historical Adjustment” and program type is “Project Based Vouchers”, “Tenant Based 

Vouchers”, “Section 8 Certificates”, “Home Ownership 

Vouchers”, or “Section 8 Vouchers”

No Yes, unweighted

Housing Choice 

Voucher Households (VMS)

Sum of the following VMS fields: “fldAOV”, “fldLIT”, 

“fldHOV”, “fldPVP”, “fldH6S8”V, “fldRad1”, “fldRad2”0, 

“fldTenPro”, and “fldThu2HcvLsd”. For MTW PHAs also 

include “fldMTW”.

Yes, unit months leased divide 

by 12 No

Number of Local, 

Non-Traditional 

Households

Unadjusted data from the MTW office Yes No

MTW = Moving to Work. PHA = public housing agency. PIC = Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center. VMS = Voucher Management System.

Note: Household characteristics include rent burden, household size, income, and an indicator for high needs households.

Exhibit C4: Research Question and Regression Specifications

Research Question Specification

1a. How does Moving to Work (MTW) status affect the average cost per assisted household? 1

1b. How does MTW status affect the amount of funding PHAs receive from HUD? 1

1c. How does MTW status affect the number of households receiving housing assistance? 1

2a. Do changes in the mix of public housing, tenant-based HCVs, and project-based HCVs in PHAs’ 

portfolios explain the relationship between MTW status and cost per assisted household?

2

2b. Do changes in housing affordability and housing quality explain the relationship between MTW 

status and cost per assisted household?

2

2c. Do changes in the proportion of assisted households that may be costlier to serve explain the 

relationship between MTW status and cost per assisted household?

2

3a. How does MTW status affect per household spending of HUD funds? 1

3b. How does MTW status affect administrative costs, tenant services spending, and operating 

reserves?

1

HCVs = Housing Choice Vouchers. MTW = Moving to Work. PHA = public housing agency.
C-4

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Appendix C: Supplemental Exhibits

Exhibit C5: Number of Assisted Households, HUD Funding, HUD Cost per Assisted Household, Operating Reserves per Assisted Household, and NTraditional Units, by Moving to Work Agency (Agencies That Joined Moving to Work After 2003)

Average Over Years Before or After Joining the Moving to Work Demonstration

MTW PHA

Assisted Households HUD Funding HUD Cost per Assisted Household

Operating Res

per Assist

Househo

Before After Before After Before After Before 

Alaska Housing Finance Corporation 5,859 6,926 $45,768,704 $48,778,172 $7,829 $7,120 $27 Boulder Housing Partners (formerly Boulder Housing Authority)

938 973 $6,916,967 $8,746,265 $7,383 $9,020 $183 $

Reno Housing Authority 3,386 3,157 $21,089,224 $19,053,016 $6,233 $6,042 $295 Fairfax County Redevelopment & Housing Authority 4,217 4,466 $48,755,804 $55,649,592 $11,547 $12,465 $869 Holyoke Housing Authority 1,910 2,253 $13,110,089 $14,631,226 $6,888 $6,496 $216 Housing Authority of Baltimore City 19,513 25,517 $219,493,120 $287,322,752 $11,247 $11,264 $947 $Housing Authority of Champaign County 1,787 2,242 $16,447,823 $17,553,896 $9,103 $7,840 $792 $Lexington-Fayette Urban County Housing Authority 3,321 4,063 $21,658,528 $22,267,436 $6,531 $5,566 $302 Housing Authority of the City of Charlotte 6,715 8,309 $58,935,520 $78,364,464 $8,799 $9,654 $786 $
C-5

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Appendix C: Supplemental Exhibits

Average Over Years Before or After Joining the Moving to Work Demonstration

MTW PHA

Assisted Households HUD Funding HUD Cost per Assisted Household

Operating Res

per Assiste

Househol

Before After Before After Before After Before A

Housing Authority of the City of Columbus 3,831 3,838 $24,018,726 $26,630,692 $6,271 $7,006 $70 $Housing Authority of the County of San Bernardino 10,310 9,860 $77,639,200 $87,146,208 $7,540 $8,869 $161 $Orlando Housing Authority 4,174 5,084 $31,832,704 $32,149,234 $7,624 $6,777 $283 $San Diego Housing Commission 14,494 15,635 $150,974,704 $163,972,448 $10,428 $10,489 $415 $

MTW = Moving to Work. PHA = public housing agency.Notes: Calculations are based on data from 2003 to 2017. This exhibit includes only MTW PHAs who joined the demonstration after 2003. Atlanta Housing Authority, District of Columbia HouHousing Authority joined MTW in 2003 and therefore do not have a full year of pre-MTW data. This exhibit does not include Oakland Housing Authority, Tacoma Housing Authority, Housing Aor Housing Authority of the City of San Jose because of incomplete data on households in public housing. This exhibit only includes the San Diego Housing Commission’s second entrance inexhibit C6 for descriptives for PHAs who left the MTW demonstration after 2003.Sources: Urban Institute analysis of HUD Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center dataset; Urban Institute analysis of HUD Financial Data Schedule dataset

Exhibit C5: Number of Assisted Households, HUD Funding, HUD Cost per Assisted Household, Operating Reserves per Assisted Household, and NLocal, Non-Traditional Units, by Moving to Work Agency (Agencies That Joined Moving to Work After 2003)(continued) 
C-6

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

Appendix C: Supplemental Exhibits

Exhibit C6: Number of Assisted Households, HUD Funding, HUD Cost per Assisted Household, Operating Reserves per 

Assisted Household, and Number of Local, Non-Traditional Units, by Moving to Work Agency (Agencies That Left Moving to 

Work After 2003)

Average Over Years Before or After Leaving the Moving to Work Demonstration

MTW PHA Assisted 

Households

HUD Funding HUD Cost per 

Assisted Household

Operating 

Reserves 

per Assisted 

Household

Local, NonTraditional

Before After Before After Before After Before After Before After

Greene Metropolitan Housing 

Authority

1,851 1,924 $10,532,833 $9,730,697 $5,692 $5,068 $154 $232 0 0

High Point Housing Authority 2,444 2,531 $14,599,260 $14,737,273 $5,973 $5,837 $742 $282 0 0

San Diego Housing Commission 13,540 14,815 $144,973,984 $152,892,864 $10,707 $10,329 $248 $457 0 0

MTW = Moving to Work. PHA = public housing agency.

Notes: This exhibit only includes the three PHAs that exited the MTW demonstration between 2003 and 2015. The San Diego Housing Commission later reentered the MTW demonstration, and the years after reentering the demonstration are excluded in the exhibit above.

Sources: Urban Institute analysis of HUD Office of Public and Indian Housing Information Center dataset; Urban Institute analysis of HUD Financial Data Schedule 

dataset

Exhibit C7: Households Assisted by Moving to Work Agencies, by Program, 2003 to 2017

50,000

0

100,000

150,000

200,000

250,000

300,000

350,000

400,000

450,000

500,000

2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017

Tenant-based Vouchers Project-based Vouchers Public Housing Local, Non-Traditional

Year

Households

Notes: The number of Moving to Work (MTW) public housing agencies increased from 25 in 2003 to 39 in 2017, driving the increase in the total number of 

households assisted by MTW agencies. Nearest neighbor interpolation was used to impute household counts for voucher and public housing assistance for years 

in which data in the Public and Indian Housing Information Center (PIC) or the Voucher Management System (VMS) were missing or under-reported assistance. 

Local, non-traditional (LNT) data, which were not adjusted, were available from 2009 to 2017. 

Sources: Urban Institute analysis of HUD PIC dataset; HUD VMS dataset; HUD LNT data
Appendix C: Supplemental Exhibits

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

C-7

Exhibit C8: Moving to Work Agency Characteristics Compared with All Traditional Public Housing Agencies and Traditional 

Public Housing Agencies with More Than 750 Assisted Households, 2003

MTW Agencies 

Included in 

Analysis, 2003

Traditional PHAs, 

2003

Traditional PHAs 

With More Than 

750 Assisted 

Households, 2003

N=18 N=3,547 N=707

Average Number of Assisted households 6,843 772*** 3,020***

Average HUD Revenue $69,376,573 $5,968,952*** $25,046,414*** 

Average Cost per Assisted Household $8,824 $5,925*** $7,148***

Average % in Public Housing 36% 62%*** 34%

Average % in Housing Choice Vouchers 64% 38%*** 66%

Average % in Tenant Based Vouchers 64% 38%*** 66%

Average % in Project Based Vouchers 0% 0% 0%

Average Family Size 2.6 2.2*** 2.4

Average Share of “Hard to Serve” Households 38% 45% 40%

Average Total Operating and Housing Assistance Spending per 

Assisted Household $6,639 $3,518*** $5,574 

Average Tenant Services Expenditures per Household Served $109 $63 $64*

Average Admin Expenses per Household Served $1,337 $1,237 $985*** 

Average Reserves Balance per Household Served $473 $307 $396 

Average Population Density 5,999 2,237*** 5,236

Average Median Rent Burden 28% 27%* 28%

Average Median Income of New Residents 14% 18%** 15%

Average PASS Score 25 27 26

* p<0.10, ** p<0.05, *** p<0.01

MTW = Moving to Work. PASS = Physical Assessment Subsystem. PHA = public housing agency.

Notes: Traditional PHAs include 3,547 PHAs that never joined the MTW demonstration. Large traditional PHAs include only traditional PHAs that had more than 

750 assisted households in 2003. Analysis excludes agencies that joined MTW before 2003. Analysis also excludes Oakland Housing Authority, Tacoma Housing 

Authority, Housing Authority of the County of Santa Clara, or Housing Authority of the City of San Jose because of incomplete data on households in public 

housing. Not all of the PHAs are represented in the average median rent burden, average median income of new residents, and average Physical Assessment 

Subsystem, or PASS, score measures due to data availability. Dollar values are constant 2015 dollars adjusted using Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Price 

Index for all Urban Consumers. T-tests were performed on sample means, comparing traditional PHAs with MTW agencies. As in the regression analysis, T-tests 

were performed on the natural log of the following: number of assisted households, HUD revenue, cost per assisted household, total operating and housing 

assistance spending per assisted household, and administrative costs per assisted household. 

Sources: Urban Institute analysis of HUD Public and Indian Housing Information Center dataset; HUD Financial Data Schedule dataset; U.S. Census Bureau data
Appendix D: References

The Impact of the Moving to Work Demonstration on the Per Household Costs of Federal Housing Assistance

D-1

Appendix D: References

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Cove, Laura Harris, and Carlos Manjarrez. 2004. Testing 

Public Housing Deregulation: A Summary Assessment of 

HUD’s ‘Moving to Work’ Demonstration. Washington, DC: 

The Urban Institute. 

Buron, Larry, Melissa Vandawalker, Tyler Morrill, Jill 

Khadduri, and Jeffrey Lubel. 2017. Testing Performance

Measures for the MTW Program. Cambridge, MA and 

Bethesda, MD: Abt Associates.

Cadik, Emily, and Amanda Nogic. 2010. Moving to Work: 

Interim Policy Applications and the Future of the

Demonstration.” In Report to Congress. Washington, 

DC: U.S. Department of Housing and Urban 

Development (HUD), Office of Policy Development and 

Research. https://www.huduser.gov/portal/publications/

MTW_Report_to_Congress_08_2010.pdf.

Finkel, Meryl, and Larry Buron. 2001. Study on Section 8 

HCV Success Rates: Volume I: Quantitative Study of 

Success Rates in Metropolitan Areas. Cambridge, MA: 

Abt Associates.

Fischer, Will. 2011. Expansion of HUD’s ‘Moving-to-Work’ 

Demonstration is Not Justified: Other Approaches 

Would Promote Demonstration’s Goals More 

Effectively. Washington, DC: Center on Budget and 

Policy Priorities.

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“Moving to Work” Demonstration, But Additional 

Changes Needed. Washington, DC: Center on Budget 

and Policy Priorities.

Galvez, Martha, Jasmine Simington, and Mark Treskon. 

2017. Moving to Work and Neighborhood Opportunity: 

A scan of mobility initiatives by Moving to Work 

public housing authorities. Metropolitan Housing 

and Communities Brief. Washington, DC: The Urban 

Institute.

Galvez, Martha, Ruth Gourevitch, and Benny Docter. 

2020. A Picture of Moving to Work Agencies’ Housing 

Assistance. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of 

Housing and Urban Development, Office of Policy 

Development and Research.

von Hippel, P.T. 2018. “How Many Imputations Do You 

Need? A Two-stage Calculation Using a Quadratic 

Rule.” Sociological Methods & Research.

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Lubell, Larry Buron, Lesley Freiman, and Eliza Kean. 

2014. Innovations in the Moving to Work Program. 

Cambridge, MA: Abt Associates. December. https://

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files/b8bd4434-4303-408e-b696-874f821e66ea.pdf.

Levy, Diane, David Long, and Leiha Edmonds. 2020. MTW 

Agencies’ Use of Funding Flexibility. Washington, DC: 

U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, 

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Manson, Steven, Jonathan Schroeder, David Van Riper, 

and Steven Ruggles. 2018. “IPUMS National Historical 

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and Chris Kubacki. 2015. Housing Choice HCV 

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pdf.
June 2020

U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development

Office of Policy Development and Research

Washington, DC 20410-6000