An essential and clear-eyed analysis of nearly fifty years of federal housing policy, where housing economist John C. Weicher cuts through the bewildering maze of HUD programs, subsidies, and legislation to tackle the two questions at the heart of American housing debates: how to secure decent housing for the poor and how to expand homeownership for lower- and middle-income families, offering readers a data-driven history of public housing, urban renewal, housing allowances, and mortgage subsidy programs essential to understanding today's affordability crisis.