78. The department has always had some difficulty in maintaining a reasonable balance between the need to keep detailed statistics about its tenants in a form which would meet some of the needs of sociological researchers and of general public interest, while preserving the privacy of the tenants and enabling the staff to concentrate on its essential duties. There is, for example, little reliable overall information about the patterns of employment and incomes enjoyed by those who live in resettlement accommodation, although a small-scale departmental survey carried out in March 1967 and limited to people resettled from Hong Kong to two new estates in Kowloon in 1964 and 1966, indicates that the largest groups consist of semi-skilled factory workers, followed by casual workers, skilled workers, shop employees, office workers and hawkers. This survey showed that the commonest monthly household income group was in the $300-$500 range, followed almost equally by the $500-$700 and under $300 brackets, and then equally by the $700-$900 and over $900 groups. Another departmental survey later in the year and confined to Wong Tai Sin estate confirmed this order but showed a much higher percentage of household incomes in the $300-$500 range-56.7% as against 32.8%. This gain was mainly at the expense of the under $300 group, though to a lesser extent at the expense of the brackets over $500 a month. One of the features that distinguish the resettlement population from the residents of other public housing in Hong Kong is that there is no upper limit (or indeed any limit) to the qualifying income. Most of those with higher incomes prefer to live in better accommodation, but there have always been some comparatively well-off people who have chosen to remain in squatter areas or have otherwise become eligible for resettlement, and who elect to accept resettlement when it is offered. The surveys quoted above, for example, indicated that 10.4% and 7.8% respectively of the families surveyed enjoyed household incomes of over $900 a month.
79. It is also evident to the casual observer, and tentatively borne out by the March 1967 survey referred to in the previous paragraphs, that a substantial number of tenants are achieving a rising standard of living in common with other sections of the community. Domestic rooms when handed over to tenants are no more than roughly finished concrete shells, but practically no tenant ever moves straight in. He engages one of the many small contractors who earn their living by decorating and equipping rooms during the period of initial occupation of estate blocks. These decorators install various kinds of burglar-proof doors, they plaster and distemper the walls, lay various kinds of floor surfacing, install glazed
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