Identifying Political Discourse in Social Welfare Policy: The Inaccessible Right to Affordable Housing in the United States

        In every state throughout the United States, full-time minimum wage workers do not earn enough to afford modest housing. For instance, Massachusetts, where the minimum wage worker earns 12 dollars an hour, requires 113-hours per week in order to afford fair market rent for a two-bedroom rental. Kentucky, where minimum wage remains 7.25 dollars, requires 82-hours per week. In terms of cost burden, extremely low-income renters (those at or below the poverty line or 30 percent of the area median income) experience the most acute struggle; however, broad gaps exist between income that exceeds minimum wage and housing cost demands. The problem with inadequate wages is compounded by the national shortage of more than seven million affordable homes.

            Various programs including public housing projects and tenant-based rental assistance, known as Section 8, attempt to combat the unaffordable housing problem. These programs are allocated funds predominately through the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and are administered by nearly 3,800 state and local public housing agencies who determine eligibility based on area median income. The assistance benefits approximately 10.4 million people within 5.2 million households; however, an additional 23 million qualifying people are unable to receive assistance due to limited funding.

Populations and Impact

            As a direct consequence to structural determinants including past and current discriminatory policies, people of color are more likely to fall into the category of extremely low-income renters. In comparison to six percent of White non-Hispanic households, 20 percent of Black households are extremely low-income renters. This is followed closely by 17 percent of American Indian or Alaska Native households, 15 percent of Hispanic households, and 10 percent of Asian households.                

            Among recipients of rental assistance, 68 percent are people with disabilities, children, or elders, and 60 percent of the remainder come from working households. For qualifying non-recipients, 75 percent pay more than half their overall income on rent, and more than 500,000 people experience homelessness. Moreover, an estimated 1.3 million children currently live in unstable housing situations including shelters, hotels and motels, as well as in combined family households.

            Families who lack access to decent, affordable housing are at increased risk of socioeconomic disparity by way of intermediary determinants, such as poor-quality education, reduced access to health care, limited employment opportunity, and increased exposure to crime. Affordable housing interest groups, led by the National Low Income Housing Coalition, insist that improved access to affordable housing will offset negative determinants, reduce intergenerational poverty, and increase economic mobility. However, on-going, conflicting political discourse, reflected by various political ideologies, disagree on the approach to take to resolve the affordable housing crisis.

Competing Sides: Neoliberalism and Social Democracy

            Perhaps the quintessential divide among neoliberal and social democratic thinking is in regard to what constitutes an inherent right of an individual. From the neoliberal perspective, the free market is the preferred method for establishing conditions necessary to meet society’s basic needs, namely by way of supply and demand. Therefore, it is the inherent right of the individual to enter into the free market with use of individual preferences as a tool for influencing consumer demand. In turn, the self-regulated free market meets the demand, undoing the need for government involvement. By neoliberal standards, the path to affordable housing can be met by appealing and adhering to market forces. Yet, neoliberal policy has been the dominant force since the 1970s and a national shortage of more than seven million affordable homes remains. So, why isn’t supply meeting demand?

        Current neoliberal policymakers point to government intrusion as the primary interference with the market’s ability to operate effectively. Specifically, strict government housing regulations are seen to drive home prices significantly above home production costs, leading to less, not more housing production. Were the market to be left to its own devices (unregulated) as neoliberal ideology intends for it to be, the individual freedoms, competition, and privatization that encompasses the free market would naturally prevail, and the gap between needs and resources would close, effectively eliminating the need for the welfare state.

        In stark contrast to the neoliberal agenda, social democracy deems it necessary that the government, not the market, promote the economic well-being of the people. Under social democracy, rights of the person include the right to a dignified standard of living that extends beyond basic need and allows for full participation in society. Affordable housing, therefore, is intrinsically linked to the social democratic belief in equal opportunity. Even further away from individual-minded neoliberal ideology, is the social democratic value in solidarity (i.e., the good of the community rather than the rights of the individual). Income inequality, for example, should be narrowed and introduced only when the collective population has established community-agreed upon standards of living.

        While current neoliberal paternalism treats society as individuals possessing an equal clean slate in the ability to achieve economic success, social democracy recognizes on-going and cumulative systemic disadvantages, which divide and maintain disparity among members of society. In order to shape a more equal society, social democracy proposes drastic changes to structural policy and vast expansion to the welfare state. This includes progressive taxation, government regulation of private ownership, increased affirmative action, and government redistribution of resources. These changes, in the social democratic view, are needed in order to more justly balance the distribution of power, unravel oppression, and further ensure that no group becomes dominant.

Conclusion: The Social Work Perspective

            The idea and benefit of the free market as presented by neoliberal ideology, is misleading at best. Capitalism takes an individual approach to economic enhancement and overtly appreciates that where there is demand, there is profit opportunity. Simultaneously, capitalism inherently understands that when demand crosses into the realm of need, what was once opportunity becomes power. In regard to affordable housing, this power includes the ability to reduce housing quality while increasing its cost, and to confine affordable housing to poorly resourced areas, effectively exacerbating conditions of oppression and domination. In short, need for affordable housing in an opportunistic, capitalist society places distributive power into the hands of those who seek to benefit the most: the owners of the means of production.

            Social work is anchored in an approach that seeks to preserve the common values of human rights and social justice in order to enhance power, experiences, and opportunities for all members of society. Housing is a fundamental human need, the quality of which shapes the education, safety, occupation, and health outcome of individuals and families. High cost of basic needs, like housing, coupled with structural low wages, forces consumers further into submission and perpetuates poverty. As neoliberal policymakers cling to an idealistic version of the free market, while simultaneously ignoring the reality and influence of capitalism, disparities among socioeconomic status continue to accumulate.

            Like other ideologies, social work is a system of ideas and ideals, one that encompasses a human right model. In order to advance basic rights including access to affordable housing, social work must openly join forces with progressive instruments of change and more deliberately incorporate the views of social democracy into its code of ethics. There is no magic policy design that alone can upend disparity within society until the underlying issues of multi-systemic privilege and oppression are dealt with. Social work must be leaders in movements aimed at changing the political discourse away from vilifying socialist values and toward embracing equality as a social goal. To do so will require a revolution in civil, political, and social rights.

Social Welfare: Perceptions & Attitudes

It is no secret that the term “welfare” ignites polarizing, emotional opinion within the United States. Since the New Deal emerged in 1935, conservatism and liberalism have experienced heated debate over government’s role in social welfare. Conservative views echo old American values of individualism and personal responsibility while support is for limited-temporary-government assistance. Liberalism, in turn, advocates for government, particularly federal government, to play a central role in supporting disadvantaged groups while monitoring the wealthiest-most-powerful influences on the economy. But, what is social welfare and what does it mean to the average American? Furthermore, how does personal experience influences one’s attitude toward welfare in the United States? While discussing social welfare with two individuals, one thing rang clear: welfare is very much a subject assigned to lower income, poor, and disadvantaged groups. As much as the middle and upper classes may feel involved in the discussions, welfare remains an “us and them” topic. 

“Lou” 

“Welfare is great, I think it’s great”, says Lou, a white 26-year-old male from an affluent community by the sea, who is about to embark on his graduate studies in “Theatre Directing” at the Yale School of Drama. This attitude is based on what he’s read in the newspaper, his parents, and what he observed throughout his many years of private schooling. Describing his family as the “lower part” of an upper-middle class, Lou qualified for financial aid throughout all of his schooling. He reflects on how remarkable it was that even his home owning, well-educated, working family couldn't afford the “sticker price of private education”. His father, a merchant-seaman / carpenter / nurse, and his mother, a master’s degree holding occupational therapist, supported his goals throughout his growing up by sending him to private high school and encouraging theatre as an activity. He went to school with students “a lot wealthier than I”, but never felt that his financial aid likened him to a welfare recipient. As someone privy to high quality education, Lou is strongly in favor of need based financial aid and affirmative action. Explaining, “affirmative action is so necessary to at the very least acknowledge how unfair the system is” and that diversity of various kinds is better for everybody – certainly in arts education. Pausing to think about his phrasing, he adds a little devilishly, “Also, you know... to pop a little pin in the balloon of white middle / upper class people’s idea that they did everything on their own because they worked hard”. He clarifies, “I’m not saying I didn’t work hard, I’m not saying my parents didn’t work hard, but I think in the grand scheme of things, the choices I’ve been able to make and my opportunities were because of what was happening for me before I was born”.

Lou notes that both his father and mother were the first of their family to attend college and while recognizing an underlying truth to the conservative philosophy that morality, hard work, and self-reliance will lead to great successes, while a lack of is the fault of one’s failures, Lou links his privilege of opportunity to a chain reaction beginning in the 1950’s. It was then that his mother, born in the Bronx, moved to a suburb in New Jersey just as her older brother began entering into street fights and general “trouble”. This participation in the “white flight” movement resulted in his mother growing up in a better community with more opportunity, better paying jobs, and a safer overall environment. His mother’s life after the move became very different from her remaining Irish immigrant family in the Bronx. Lou’s fathers’ side followed a similar route, but experienced a brief hold-up when Lou’s grandfather, named Max (and described as having a big nose), was attempting to buy a house in Weston, MA – a suburb of Boston – and couldn’t get a Realtor to get him an offer on a house for weeks and weeks. When finally it was revealed there was a mistaken assumption he was Jewish, the process moved along and he secured a house for his family. For Lou, this family story is both kind of funny and awful because it asks the question, “For how many people was this blockage more serious” and how might it have derailed generations of people from advancements in opportunity such as my own? 

Growing up, Lou’s exposure to welfare mainly came from what he caught wind of on the news or by overhearing adult-dinner-table discussions. He has memories of being a small child in public school and noticing that some kids got free lunch (because “you ALWAYS know”), but not recalling any direct feelings linked toward the idea of “free lunch”. He reflects, “I think kids have to be... kind-of... taught to look down on something like that and I wasn’t taught that”. Aside from his parent’s occasional gripe with “whoever turned the heat up”, Lou did not grow up feeling connected to financial burdens. Prior to his travels overseas, Lou felt “abstractly aware” of social welfare in the United States and distinctly unaware of America’s unfavorable views and resistance toward social welfare.

Then came European influence on his young developing mind. Part of Lou’s many years of private education involved spending substantial amount of time in Europe, predominantly France and England. There, he observed the overt criticism toward American’s “selfish and conservative” views on social welfare because “so many people from England and France love to discuss their distaste for America to Americans”. The overseas experiences, more than anything he had observed in America, “opened his eyes to how different things are in other countries”; how broader systems of welfare are so much more available in other countries – “certainly England and France” – and they seem to work and are respected by the people.

Now as an adult, Lou believes “we need more government welfare”, not private. This belief comes mainly from his life work in the Arts. His thinking is: there should be more government social welfare for the same reasons there should be more government sponsorship for the Arts, because private charity “doesn’t work”. With some exaggerated exhaustion he explains, “It becomes all about “people’s feelings and whether they feel good donating to ‘this’ cause, but better if their name was on something”. Lou’s concern of private money putting power into the hands of few is often echoed by numerous liberal voices in regards to social welfare and political control. For Lou, the Arts having to rely on private donors means those donors then have more sway in dictating product, their voice becomes more valuable than the experts creating the art and “everything gets wrapped up in rich people thinking they’re important because they have money to give”. 

“Jack”

For the most part, Jack grew up in the same affluent community as Lou, however his experience as a young adult wasn’t filled with privilege and security. Jack, now a mid-forties white male, has worked for the past eleven years “in a cubicle like the Dilbert comic strip” as an IT specialist for Fidelity Bank. It’s a “good job, the people are nice”, and he frequently travels for work to areas in North Carolina and India. He took over his grandmother’s mortgage when she died and lives there, the same house he spent the majority of his youth growing up in, and he rents part of the house in order to supplement his income. He isn’t married and doesn’t have any children, but he’s an avid dog lover and adopts from high kill shelters when he can.

Jack describes his current views on social welfare as “mixed”. He believes the idea of a “welfare mom” – someone without any interest in improving her life or the lives of her children, who actively tries to stay on welfare by “pumping out kids in order to collect a government check” – is a myth. He’s never seen personal evidence of that happening and frankly, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense; his experience being on welfare did not provide a comfortable life even with his grandmother working additionally to support the family. He feels welfare should be there for those who need it, but is deeply disturbed by the stories he garners from news shows about drug dealers who also collect government aid or commit welfare fraud. He describes such a story along the lines of “a dealer’s arrest reveals dozens of EBT (Electronic Benefit Transfer) cards in their possession”. Drug dealers especially incense Jack, “I don’t think having an addiction problem to drugs and alcohol should disqualify someone from receiving aid, but when I hear stories on the news about those dealing, my blood boils”. 

For years, Jack’s parents battled drug and alcohol abuse, which meant he and his sister were frequently forced to move, bouncing between their two parents while they transitioned in search of housing and jobs. Sometimes twice a year, Jack began at a new school, in a new town. He remembers his mother using food stamps at the grocery store and the strange apartments within vacant houses they sometimes lived in. He recollects the cruel comments older kids called through the windows of those apartments and his awareness – even as a child - that he had something to be ashamed of regarding his mother receiving welfare. It wasn’t until 1979 when he was ten years old, his mother was committed to a mental health facility, his father imprisoned, that he and his sister permanently moved in with his widowed grandmother. 

His grandmother supported Jack and his sister by working as a hairdresser out of their home and with help from Aid for Families and Dependent Children (AFDC). By then, the stability that came from living in the same house and attending the same school in a good neighborhood greatly lessened the stigma attached to being on welfare. After AFDC was succeeded by TANF - Temporary Aid to Needy Families – in 1996, Jack experienced a sense of loss for so many of the “deserving families” like his, who so dearly needed those funds in order to live a dignified life. 

“I do get angry at the government”, he says. Jack likes to think that those who need it the most are benefiting from welfare, such as the elderly, veterans, and kids because “that’s where the money should be going”, but he doubts money isn’t being wasted. He feels illegal immigration results in a lot of crime and a lot of drugs coming into the country, which greatly contributes to inefficiency and waste with government welfare funds. Even so, he realizes “if I don’t want someone, you know, crawling through my window at night trying to rob me” then there’s got to be some options for those in need. For Jack, his personal relationship with government welfare is over, “I don’t want to be like my parents and be on these programs. I want to give back and right now that takes the form of being a good citizen who pays my taxes”. He says with a grimace that he’d be open to paying higher taxes if he thought the money would be used for the greater good, but “it’s hard to trust that government will use the money wisely”. 

Conclusion

In the United States, “welfare” is a word that elicits general feelings of both compassion and resentment, all-the-while imposing distance with it; either you are on it or you aren’t. Certainly for Lou and Jack, but possibly the majority, “welfare” is synonymous with both “poverty” and “need” when in authenticity, the nature of the word itself, “to fare well”, is quite lovely and universal. Any group, no matter their socioeconomic status, can exact claim for their “happiness, well-being, and prosperity” through government aid. In actuality, it is the middle and upper classes, not the poor, who are most benefited by welfare, yet the language used to describe welfare changes. Lower income government aid such as TANF, food stamps, Medicaid, public housing have been categorized as “welfare” by the majority of the population, but aid such as tax exemptions, tuition reimbursement, pensions, and in-service training have not. 

Both Lou and Jack’s perceptions of welfare have been shaped by their life experiences, which have led them to feeling outside of, not part of, the system. Perhaps the first step to remove the stigma attached to the idea of “welfare” is to acknowledge that we all exist within a system providing us entitlements (as unequal as those entitlements may be). Maybe then, the conversation can shift from debating what is truly fair and just in terms of welfare distribution to “those” in a poor lower class to what is fair for “us”. Possibly then will resentments be redirected where they are actually needed, which most certainly aren’t at the “bottom”.