Mobility

The low-income household survey found that female heads of household showed higher mobility rates than other kinds of household heads. This is, almost certainly. a reflection of their prevalence in the rental market and the contraction that has occured in that market. Boyd (1987) found that the price of housing (inclusive of rentals) in the KMA had risen more rapidly during the 1980s than it had during the latter part of the 1970s. Housing prices rose 91 per cent during the period January 1981 to June 1985, compared with 60 per cent between January 1977 and June 1980.

As the rental market has shrunk in the city with rapid commercialization of residential properties (often yards). little new investment in low-income housing and escalating rental prices, female heads of household have been forced to move out and search for any shelter options they can find. This has proved to be a particularly difficult task for women with children. Movement away from the traditional yards increases the burden for child care that individual women must shoulder and the space that is required to accomodate children increases the cost of household shelter. In addition, many private landlords prefer childless tenants. Residential movements also often increase expenditure on education. It can be very difficult to obtain a school place for a child in a new area and many children travel considerable distances by bus so that they can continue at their "old" school.

Another factor that has had a dramatic effect on mobility is politics. This has been particularly true in the core and western parts of the city where political violence in the late 1970s and particularly that in the period before the 1980 election, led to a net outward migration from the inner city. Two of the women who served as case studies lived through this experience of "political" migration. However, political migration has become far less important in recent years. Instead, women, and many men, seem to move in order to find any affordable shelter they can.

The survey found that 23 per cent of female heads of household had spent one year or less in their present accommodation compared with 14 per cent of male and 13 per cent of joint heads. In addition female heads were found to have made more moves in the time they had been in Kingston than other kinds of household heads. The number of moves in the time respondents have been in Kingston are shown in table 13.

Table 13. Percentage of different types of households by number of moves since coming to Kingston

Types of household	Number of moves
	0	1-2	3-5	6-10	10+
Female-headed	16	21	45	17	2
Male-headed	7	34	40	14	5
Joint-headed	13	44	27	13	3
Percentage total households	13	32	37	15	3

The lack of shelter choice available to female heads of households is revealed starkly in the figures given in table 14. Nearly 40 per cent of female heads of household moved to their present location because they had nowhere else to go. This was only true of 3 per cent of male heads and 27 per cent of joint heads.

Female-headed households appeared not only to have moved more often than other households in the past but also to be more interested in moving in the future. Some 63 per cent of female heads wanted to move from the community where they were currently located as opposed to 54 per cent of joint heads of household. Of those who wanted to move female heads were also twice as likely as joint heads to want to go "to foreign.- For many women the options for their survival in Jamaica are just too narrow and they hope that one day they will be able to travel to the United States or Canada where they hope to find a more prosperous and satisfactory existence.

Table 14. Percentage Or different types of households by reason for choosing present area

Reason for choosing area	Type of household
	Female-headed	Male-headed	Joint-headed
Proximity to family and relatives	17	19	10
setter atmosphere /facilities	8	9	10
Affordable	8	3	8
Only available place	37	3	27
Proximity to work place	1	2	2
Familiarity of area	4	2	6
Proximity to friends	4	3	2
Lease land available	3	1	1
Near former residence	2	0	2
Born and bred here	2	1	4
Recommendations	3	4	1
Other	11	53	27
Total	100	100	100