Housing and Asset Based Stratification in the Enrichment Economy

This paper explores the ways in which housing wealth is producing new forms of differentiation among households. In doing so, it will argue that ‘asset based welfare’ is now better conceived as ‘asset based social stratification’ and that social class rather than generation remains the primary social divide. However, these class divides are increasingly shaped by the differential ability to accumulate and deploy primarily housing-based assets. These new forms of social (re) stratification will vary societally, temporally and spatially and are currently most evident in what can be described as older, mature home ownership societies. But similar developments and emerging fissures can be observed in newer, ultra home-ownership societies such as China and in the broader interconnections between the mobilization of family assets and the shift from consumer to market societies.