Basic Allowance for Housing Resource Allocation: A Dependent-Based Model

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Abstract:

Basic Allowance for Housing (BAH) is intended to cover 95 percent of a service member's housing costs, including rent and utilities. However, our research indicates that the assigned BAH at 35 percent of military sites is below the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) standards for adequacy. Furthermore, we found that the shortages and surpluses are normally distributed with a mean above zero. This finding implies that most sites experience a surplus, and that by bringing the tails closer to the mean, the problem could be alleviated. In this work, we focus on E4-and-below service members and wedevelop a dependent-based model to optimize BAH, maximizing the BAH over the rates set by HUD as standards of adequacy. The basic assertion is that service members should be able to afford housing at a standard that meets at least HUD levels of adequacy, and exceeds those standards if budgetary constraints allow for it. The data leveraged in this research suggests that this is very attainable, given some reasonable changes to the current BAH calculation methodology.

Author(s):
Chamberlain, Aaron J
Author Organization(s):
NAVAL POSTGRADUATE SCHOOL MONTEREY CA
Funding Organization(s):
NAVAL POSTGRADUATE SCHOOL MONTEREY CA, MONTEREY, CA
Document Type:
Technical Report/Master's Thesis
Publication Date:
2023 Jun 01
Pagination:
70

Security Markings

DOCUMENT & CONTEXTUAL SUMMARY

Distribution Code:
A - Approved For Public Release
Distribution Statement: Public Release.
Copyright: Not Copyrighted

RECORD

Collection: TRECMS
Subject Terms
Descriptor(s):
military families, united states, spreadsheet software, united states naval academy, california, classification, data sets, department of defense, families (human), operations research, students, active duty, geographic regions, geometry, military personnel, standards, governments
Keyword(s):
bah(basic allowance for housing), servicemember finances, housing, retention
Subject Categories:
Behavioral and Social Sciences; Military Sciences
Communities of Interest:
; ;
Descriptor(s):
united states, military families, california, data sets, department of defense, families (human), operations research, military personnel, spreadsheet software, governments, marine corps, standards, students, community relations, cost reductions, costs, head of household
Creation Date:
2023 Oct 18
Update Date:
2023 Oct 30