Trångboddhet i samhället

Sammanfattning: For a long time crowded living has been a well-known topic in Swedish housing policy. In 1946, as a result of bad housing conditions in Sweden, the first actions were taken to fight against crowded living. One of the actions was establishing a housing standard, today known as the housing standard 1, which contained guidelines on how many people should live at the same residence. The purpose of establishing the housing standard was to guide the existing and future housing stock. According to the housing standard 1, no more than two persons should live in the same room, not including the kitchen. As the living conditions in Sweden improved and developed, the housing standard was also renewed and updated. In today’s society, crowded living has become a debated issue and is often presented as a problematic housing situation. However, crowded living doesn’t always present a problem in all situations, since it can be self-selected. A self-selected crowded living is, according to the National Board of Housing, Building and Planning, named voluntary crowded living and the opposite is named non-voluntary crowded living. Today, there is no established system for separating voluntary crowded living from the non-voluntary crowded living which makes it difficult to identify the problematic crowded living. The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the expanse of crowded living. Furthermore, the households that are deemed crowded according to the current living standard will be analyzed and differentiated as either voluntary or non-voluntary crowded living based on their living situation and individual preferences. At last, an investigation of the current living standard in comparison with households’ perception of crowded living will be made. The study is based on a quantitative analysis of survey results, the survey participants were Malmö residents, with a focus on crowded people. The aim of this research is to provide insights into the difference between the crowded households as per the living standard and the crowded households by their own view, by taking into account various backgrounds of the households. This way, different backgrounds in households have been able to describe which households that are living crowded by the housing standard and which households who find themselves living crowded. The results show that the expense of crowded living varies between different household backgrounds. The groups that are most affected by crowded living are, for example, those who were born abroad, those who live in an apartment, those who have lived in Sweden for less than a year and those with low income. On the other hand, it is less likely that a household is a crowded living household if it sees its housing as long-term and does not want to move from its current housing. It has also been found that if a household was been able to choose the size of its housing when moving in, it is less likely that the household is a crowded living household. Another part of the study was to investigate which households are voluntarily and which are non-voluntarily crowded living by the housing standard. This is carried out by designing a model where households that are crowded living by the housing standard can be assessed based on income and preferences for their home and residential area. Based on these aspects, households can be applied in the model as either voluntary or non-voluntary crowded living. The result of the model shows that many households that are living crowded according to the housing standard are voluntarily living crowded and therefore do not fall within the problematic crowded living. In view of the results, there should therefore be a system that enables partition between voluntary and non-voluntary crowded living households. In this way, it is easier to identify the problematic crowded living and the households that are in need of support. Furthermore, the results from the survey show that what individual households perceive as crowded living does not correspond to what the National Board of Housing, Building and Planning, defines as crowded living. Therefore, the authors either advocate an update of the current housing standard with clarification of purpose and function or remove the housing standard for crowded living and focus on the housing allowance (which partly focus on crowded living) and in international comparisons use the EU’s guideline for crowded living.