BLS – September 2014: Demtrio M.Scopelit – “Home ownership symbolizes the American dream. The home we live in often represents how we chose to live our lives. As Winston Churchill once said, “We shape our dwellings, and afterwards our dwellings shape us.” As the 2000s unfolded, economic growth and public policies designed to increase home ownership led to a housing boom. By 2006, the “housing bubble” began to burst. In late 2007, the economy fell into recession. The housing market continued to soften, people began to lose their jobs, and the banking industry was in crisis. This Spotlight on Statistics looks at consumer expenditures on household items, employment in residential construction and housing-related industries, prices for household items and commodities, and injuries in occupations involved in building and maintaining our homes….Household expenditures on housing vary by metropolitan area. In 2013, households in ares such as Washington D.C., San Franciso, California, and New York, New York, spent, on average, more on housing than the U.S. average of $16,87. Households in areas such as Cleveland, Ohio, Miami, Florida, and Detroit, Michigan, spent, on average, less on housing than the National average. Households in Washington D.C. ($17, 603) spent, on average, almost twice as much on shelter— a component of housing expenditures—than households in Cleveland, Ohio ($9,061).”