It was always baffling to me that we allow any sort of poverty in the most advanced country in the world. What’s more baffling is that we, as a culture, are more concerned with telling people how to live their lives than we are with guaranteeing basic survival resources, free from coercion and conditions.

In this piece I will be focusing almost solely on Bernie’s Housing for All plan because it most effectively illustrates his misunderstandings of why people lack basic resources, like housing, and how we ought to get it to them. Many of Bernie’s policies appear to be crafted by someone who has never utilized nor attempted to implement government-run social services. Sure, not all government-run services are bad, but when basic survival resources are on the line, I’d prefer they not be doled out by the likes of the DMV.

I have witnessed welfare workers, housing authority administrators, community mental health providers, to name just a few, treat poor people like scum. Why does this happen? Because Economics 101. Poor people have no other option but to use government-funded services because they have no money to get services like the rest of us. Why does this happen, you ask? Victim blaming — the old “we can’t give them money because they screwed up their own lives, so they will screw it up again” trick. The catch, which most middle and upper class people don’t know, is that there are so few of these services in any given area, that these government-funded providers have a monopoly on serving the poor. In basically every city I’m aware of, the poor have a handful of mental health, primary care, housing, addiction, childcare, etc. places to choose from, if they even have more than one option. Because the recipients don’t actually choose where they get services (they can’t choose with with their dollars because they have no dollars) they are not the financial stakeholders, therefore they are not the ones calling the shots if these service providers screw up. And trust me, they screw up. Nor do the recipients have the resources or mental bandwidth to fight back, organize, or do anything but continue to try to survive. If I don’t like the services my bank provides, I open an account at another bank. If I don’t like my cell service provider, I switch to another one. I have said in the past: it’s astounding that I get better customer service at a bank than my clients get from the people who dole out life-and-death services and resources.

Senator Sanders’ policies, if enacted, would perpetuate the deep seated belief that poor people are not capable of making decisions about where they live and what they buy. Over the summer, I was standing in line at Target while someone checked out ahead of me. The cashier saw my Andrew Yang shirt and asked what it was all about, so I told her the ten-second version. The person checking out ahead of me said, “I got WIC when I had my kids. I couldn’t buy the things I needed or wanted. The $1,000 would make way more sense.” I did not count her in my survey of welfare recipients, who answered the question “Which would you prefer: access to current benefits or $1,000 per month from 18 until you die? And if you care to elaborate, why?” You can find their jarring answers here.

We as a culture are obsessed with making sure poor people don’t spend money the “wrong way.” Middle and upper class families pressure their own children to take out tens of thousands of dollars in student loan debt to acquire an education they will likely not need in the current job market. Wealthy people are free to make their own financial decisions without judgment from onlookers. They are generally not shamed for “wasting” money on a liberal arts education, while poor people are shamed if they buy a flat screen TV or a pack of cigarettes.

Our tax dollars are wasted on these misguided, haphazard solutions to problems that were neither designed nor implemented by the people receiving the services. We don’t ask them what they need — we tell them what they need. We could guarantee everyone a modest income so that when these situations arise, they can make decisions quickly, as they see fit — that is, if we trusted them to make their own decisions. Instead we pay billions every year, only to have half that money end up in the hands of recipients.

Blaming the Victim

Building and funding public housing for the masses is similar to carpeting the world rather than giving people shoes. I remember sitting in my internship at Rhode Island Coalition for the Homeless and thinking: the problem is not just that housing is too expensive, it’s that people don’t make enough money. If the minimum wage had kept up with inflation for the last forty years, housing prices would not seem so outrageous and people would have buying power to become landlords, rather than be beholden to them. With enough money comes flexibility — flexibility to move fifteen minutes outside the city because you have a car and can easily afford an apartment. Money acts as our shoes. We can put on our shoes and walk anywhere we see fit. If we had no shoes and could only walk on a carpet, so as not to hurt our feet, we would be stuck in one place while the government mass produces one-size-fits-all carpets for each person’s unique needs. This is what public housing does.

Before the phrase “victim blaming” was commonly used to describe the way our culture treats survivors of sexual assault, William Ryan wrote a book called Blaming the Victim. It refuted the Moynihan Report, which was used by the Reagan administration to call out and target the mythical “welfare queen.” Historically we’ve tended to blame the individual entirely for the outcomes of their lives. Only recently has the broader culture highlighted the systemic nature of our societal problems. But we still have a ways to go. We still identify problems as caused by, or formed within, the individual who suffers from the problem. We see it because our (Senator Sanders’ and others’) solutions are to treat universal needs as if they were individual needs. A lack of affordable child care is seen as a need for government-run universal child care. A lack of affordable housing is seen as a need for government housing projects. A lack of access to high quality food — wait a second — we should build government grocery stores too! I can see it now: A huge government housing complex, with a mental health center built into the first floor, right next to the government-funded child care facility and the soup kitchen.

All these problems have all been treated as separate, isolated needs that require separate, individualized solutions. This implies that, given the cash, not everyone can choose what is best for them. When middle and upper class people need food, transportation, or child care, they use money, not government vouchers. They don’t have to prove to anyone why they don’t have enough money. But we should already know why poor people don’t have enough money — Bernie says it himself! One minute he preaches about the systemic nature of these problems, and that too many people have been left behind by this system, not by their own individual failures. The next minute he offers solutions that force the individual to explain exactly why it is they are poor, so that the government can decide whether or not they deserve housing, food, childcare, etc.: What’s your problem? Do you have a disability? Are you not earning enough? Are you a single parent? Show us how much you have in your account. The government needs receipts. Write down every asset you have, so the government can determine whether or not you deserve a few hundred dollars (in voucher form) a month. Remember, you can only come to the welfare office during work hours, so you may have to take half a day off work. This is how these precious benefits work in real life; people in poverty are forced not only to struggle to meet their basic needs, but they are expected to explain why they need resources in the first place. Because these resources are means-tested, this is the nature of these programs. The government systematically left certain people out of the economy, and now those same people are supposed to beg that same government for resources. Fool me once, right?

We assume that somehow it is the individual’s shortcoming that has prevented them from obtaining basic survival resources. We offer people free career training programs, even though they have no transportation to get there or child care while they go out to receive the training. No, they would have to fill out several more forms, to prove their need and worthiness, to get those resources. Then when they miss one class, they are kicked out. These are piecemeal solutions to very straightforward problems, that would effectively, efficiently, and ethically be solved with a universal solution.

To be clear, there are some problems that need to be addressed based on the unique needs of a much smaller percentage of the population. As people with intellectual and physical disabilities have been (somewhat) welcomed into the whole of our society rather than remaining on the fringes, we have needed to make adjustments and changes to accommodate different, unique needs. There is nothing wrong with that. Unique solutions are needed for unique problems. When individual solutions are offered to address universal problems, it is accompanied by restrictions to ensure that the target programs reach the targeted populations. The difference is that we should not treat all poor people as if there is something unique about their needs. If cash solves the average person’s problems, why not make sure everyone has cash? Then, once everyone’s basic needs are met, more targeted resources can be funneled to the people who actually have these unique needs for supportive housing, specialized child care for kids with disabilities, and nutritional guidance. Right now those resources are getting scooped up by people who are more able to fill out the right forms. It’s social darwinism at its finest. The most vulnerable are out-competed for resources by the less vulnerable because the process is overly bureaucratic and cumbersome. We end up spending more money on programs for people who just need cash, while the people who really need those targeted programs don’t get anything because they are much less likely to beat out someone with average and above-average abilities.

Instead we choose a more restrictive, cumbersome process to address these universal, basic needs, while we leave the people with unique needs in the cold. This solves no problem for someone whose only issue is a lack of money and it solves no problem for people who need more help filling out the paperwork. We leave out the most vulnerable completely, while recipients receive lifelong monitoring of their income and house guests to ensure they stay poor enough to receive basic survival resources. Does this sound like the American dream to you?

The Two-Tiered Economy

There are two sets of rules for two classes of Americans. Some Americans are allowed financial freedom. They can comfortably move to whatever city or state they desire. They are allowed to carefully decide where their children go to school. They have no issue traveling to the higher quality grocery store to buy better produce. They have books, magazines, art, and movies in their homes, which they have chosen for themselves, with their own money. They spend more time with their kids. They are less stressed out and depressed. They can find and pay for childcare without a struggle and without restriction. They can make financial mistakes or fall on hard times without going bankrupt. It is virtually guaranteed that no matter what happens, they will have the resources to live a life enviable by most of the rest of the world.

Then there is another class of Americans. They live where they were raised and/or are unable to relocate unless they sacrifice paying other bills or cramming into a small apartment with multiple family members. They have little, if any, choice as to where their kids attend school. Traveling to one grocery store, let alone a better quality store, is often dependent on the bus schedule, or if they can afford a bus pass, or if they can afford to put gas in the car. Books, art, and movies in the home are strictly limited to what little they can afford or what they have been given by social service agencies. If child care is paid for by the state, there are limited hours and locations. If the family earns too much money to qualify for free child care, they will likely struggle to afford it on their own. If anything goes wrong (an abusive partner, an illness, a layoff, hours cut at work, a car breaking down) they will either accrue debt or, more likely, lose some basic necessity that most of us take for granted — electricity, housing, hot water, food. They may even lose their children for being “neglectful” parents.

Wealthy people are incentivized and subsidized through mortgage interest tax deductions and other structural systems that allow them to accrue wealth. These are the fruits of capitalism. They are not evil, it’s just that too many people don’t have boots, and therefore have no bootstraps with which to pull themselves up. They are not free to make financial decisions. They don’t have access to the valuable experiences that result from making all kinds of financial decisions. They are not able to access the systems that allowed some of us financial freedom and security. If they had a floor on which to stand, they could make those decisions, practice investing (in education, a home, a business), make mistakes, and learn how to reap the economic gains of our economy.

Many have been barred from the unconditional resources that families with generational wealth have access to through cash. Senator Sanders has proposed policies that perpetuate this two-tiered system. If his policies were passed, the people lucky enough to be born into families with stable, renewable wealth will continue to benefit from the fruits of capitalism and they will not need to rely on the government. They will see themselves as responsible for funding the less fortunate through their tax dollars. The people born without generational wealth will be swept into the welfare industrial complex and remain there until they get kicked out for violating a rule or making too much money. They will be subjected to assessments of their income and wealth. They will be surveilled so that family members are prevented from staying with them. They will have an incentive to stay below the line at which they no longer qualify for housing and other services. They are not trusted to make their own decisions as to where they live or if they should own a home. They must ask permission to receive safe, affordable housing. It cannot happen organically, as they forge their own way forward, like it happens for the rest of us who can afford to make mistakes and learn from them. They are made to beg the government to live in housing projects that often breed crime and drug use. These projects are segregated from the rest of the community, and they concentrate poverty within a few blocks of any given city. The buildings may as well have barbed wire fencing around it, because they surely don’t look like the rest of the community. Yes, Bernie’s plan proposes a “mixed-income” solution, but this is somehow supposed to happen from the top down, rather than organically, from the bottom up. This means municipal laws will likely have to be changed to accommodate new zoning laws and permission will have to be given to build this social housing in high income areas. Have you ever seen a fight between a group that wants low-income housing and a neighborhood organization? It’s not pretty, and it’s not quick.

Then there’s the corruption that goes on in the programs we already have to incentivize top-down solutions. Check out this piece NPR did on the Low Income Housing Tax Credit.

Sometimes tenants are given “Housing Choice Vouchers” and they have to find a landlord who is willing to jump through the bureaucratic hoops. In New York, where I live now, I attempted to accept rental assistance from the local Department of Social Services (DSS) on behalf of one of my tenants. With no warning, I stopped receiving payments for three months. Neither the tenant nor I knew what happened, until she called one day stating she was supposed to fill out a form, but they sent it to her old address, so she never received it. Why on earth would a landlord want to work with the Department of Social Services again?

Rich people have mixed use buildings for residential/commercial space, like apartments with a coffee shop and hair salon on the ground floor. But poor people obviously can’t create these institutions for themselves in their own communities. No, we must build it for them, so we can tell them how much rent should cost, and we can tell them how many nights a guest should stay in their home. Instead of letting everyone have what middle and upper class people have (money), we will give poor people everything they need, in the form of in-kind services and resources, not in cash. That way they don’t have to bother with those annoying decisions about where to live or send their kids to school and childcare. Of course, we wouldn’t want them to decide for themselves what neighborhood suits them. That would be much too direct, cost-efficient, and humane. I know we’ve been through separate but equal before — we just didn’t do it right the first time! Now we don’t even have to put up signs that say “whites only.” Depriving people of money and then giving them a voucher to use separate (and not so equal) resources acts the lever and the authority that says, “excuse me ma’am, you can’t sit here.”

One might say that these vouchers and rent subsidies are better than nothing. I say that the further we separate poor people from the rest of the community (and pay out the nose for it), the further we move from true economic justice. The recipients cannot choose the way the rest of us choose. They are not trusted with cash. They must use vouchers and their apartments must be inspected by government officials because, after all, it is not their money to spend — it is the government’s money and the government must protect its investments. Once we scratch the surface of the welfare machine, it all starts looking like a paternalistic, albeit unintentional, way to imprison people in poverty.

Implementation and Macro Consequences

Sanders wants to dump trillions into these systems, despite his supposed knowledge of systemic economic injustice. Does he really think government employees don’t make bad policies? The policy makers blame the victims of economic injustice the same way the rest of our culture does. I recall having to explain to the head of a local Housing Authority why it’s not practical to motivate someone to continue mental health treatment by threatening to take away their housing subsidy. Their strategy, after more than a decade of HUD encouraging Housing First policies, was to threaten someone with homelessness if they did not attend mental health treatment. We used to hear that Rhode Island was the Appalachia (no offense Appalachia) of the Northeast, but in that instance I was shocked to find the “Liberal” state of New York punishing people for having mental health problems. Not to mention, those same tenants become very expensive once they are homeless and suffering with the same symptoms. But we progressives would rather spend more to punish our fellow humans than provide cost-effective, humane solutions to the same problems. In many of the cities in which I work, shelters receive anywhere from $1,000 to over $2,000 per month for a single cot, a couple of subpar meals (if that), and alleged case management. In the same city, an individual could find a one bedroom apartment for $600-$700 per month.

Just like in these instances, I’ve seen hundreds of similar situations in which the people running these programs create policies that are less efficient, less effective, and barely ethical. Humans are humans, whether they work for corporations or government programs. When one group of people has power over another, the only solution is for the people to take their power back, if they had any to start. The solution is not to simply transfer the power from one concentrated, powerful group (the rich) to a different concentrated, powerful group (the government). Giving the government power is not the same thing as giving power to the people. If we really wanted to give people power, we would give them money.

Senator Sanders wants to use our tax dollars to expand and strengthen a system that incentivizes, segregates, and concentrates poverty. We will then be charged with a demand (mostly from people who don’t actually live in government housing or use government welfare) to continue funding these structures for decades to come. For the reasons I put forth here, they are easy to criticize by all sides of the political spectrum, which then puts the funding on a chopping block in more conservative administrations. I’m not arguing that they shouldn’t be ended if they were to be enacted. I’m saying we shouldn’t expand, nor should we have created these failed structures in the first place. If we start and continue to spend trillions on haphazard solutions that provide no real evidence of success (true economic autonomy), we must expect that fiscal and social conservatives will say, “See! I told you these programs don’t work. We need to stop giving money to the poor altogether.”

That’s not what any of us want.