12The
Population and Housing Survey questionnaire covers only the first of the
four levels mentioned above. Accordingly, three indicators were selected
to measure the satisfaction of the need for housing, namely: the share
of the individual in rooms; its share in the built area; and the
principal means of heating. The two variables, rent and common services
were excluded, being more relevant to the measurement of income and
expenditure and influenced by a large number of factors that make it
tenuous to establish a link between them and the characteristics and
level of the subsistence household. As is known, the cost of dwelling,
including payments for rent and common services, is mainly a function of
the effective date of the rent and subsequent increases to it, and the
geographic location of the dwelling. These are elements that vary
strongly over time and place and, hence, are not suitable in the context
of this study for the construction of a simple indicator to measure the
level of satisfaction of the housing need. Indicators of ownership and
type of dwelling were also excluded, as these two aspects do not reflect
the characteristics of the dwelling, or concern a specific population or
social category to the exclusion of others. Independent housing units,
for example, could indicate a villa or a mansion, or the kind of simple
dwellings common in Lebanese villages. Moreover, their ownership is not
confined to any social category in particular. Hence, the ability to
derive measurement indicators, based on these two features, depends on
the availability of detailed information on the state of the dwelling,
its age and furnishings, etc - information not covered by the Population
and Housing Survey.
It should be noted, however, that the data from the Population and
Housing Survey indicate a positive correlation between ownership and the
housing index level. Thus, 53.3 percent of those who own their house
belong to the high category in the housing index, compared to 20.3
percent in the low category; whereas 39.9 percent of tenants belong to
the high category and 33.4 percent to the low category. The distribution
of households according to the housing index and its component
indicators is given in tables 64 and 65 below. It shows that the
proportion of households having a high degree of satisfaction is more
important than that of households in the intermediate and low degrees of
satisfaction.
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