The amount of affordable housing in the US vulnerable to coastal flooding is set to triple over the next 30 years, a new study has found in a further sign of the escalating hardships faced by low-income Americans.
Affordable housing in New York, Massachusetts, New Jersey and California is at particular risk of flooding from worsening storms or even high tides pushed on by rising sea levels, according to research conducted by Climate Central, a New Jersey-based science organization.
Benjamin Strauss, chief executive and chief scientist of Climate Central, explained, “Low-income people don’t have the resources to respond or recover from these increasing floods. The impact upon their lives is far more severe than someone with a second home or a lot of disposable income.” The research helps outline the personal and economic consequences of flooding suffered by low-income people.
Andrea Dutton, a climate scientist at University of Wisconsin–Madison said, “Wealthy communities have the resources to undertake projects to adapt to sea-level rise and build new infrastructure. Furthermore, some of that infrastructure may in fact make the impacts of sea-level rise even worse for adjacent communities. For example, a sea wall that protects one community will just push even more water into the adjacent areas that cannot afford to build a sea wall.” Dutton said that adaptation to the rising seas needs to protect all communities, with the importance of low-paid but essential workers underlined by the Covid-19 pandemic. “Ensuring the health and wellbeing of essential workers is critical to maintaining a functioning economy,” she said. “In that sense, investing in the future security of affordable housing is of primary importance.”
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