Throughout the myriad of narratives expertly woven together in Matthew Desmond’s ethnographic research work, Evicted, a common theme throughout Milwaukee residents’ stories is the severe psychological toll that chronic financial instability takes on an individual.

“Larraine imagined she would be poor and rent-strapped forever.” (Desmond) Larraine, Arlene, Lamar, and the countless others who are profiled struggle to make rent every month. They are conditioned by their circumstances to become accustomed to living in an increasingly expensive world, immersed in the fatalist perspective that they will never escape the cycle of debt, evictions, poverty, and above all uncertainty.

Before exploring the psychological effects that more macro economic trends have had on individuals, a proper understanding of how the United States, the richest country in the world, has developed such a severe affordable housing crisis requires some historical context aided by some simple math.

From 1978 to 2014, the U.S. GDP grew by a magnitude of just over two and a half times. In that same thirty-six-year period the average CEO’s compensation increased by 997% while median wages rose only 10.9%. From 1979 to 2007, the top 1% and top 0.1% of U.S. households doubled their overall shares of the country’s annual income.

Not only did the economic gains of the past four decades shift almost exclusively to the top of the income ladder, costs of living have gone up significantly for working middle class and poor residents. In 1980, the median rent in the U.S. (adjusted for inflation) was $481 a month.

By 2000 the median rent was $602, and as Desmond notes the share of peoples’ income they’re spending on rent is worth observing, “For almost a century, there has been broad consensus in America that families should spend no more than 30% of their income on housing.”

In 2000 at $602 a month, the average American household was spending 25.5% of their income on rent. By 2010, the median rent in the country was $855, bringing the average household’s share of income spent on rent above the recommended level to 31.6%.

It’s also important to note that this means the majority of people were spending more than 31.6% of their income on rent, many of them spending a significantly larger share, compensating for the lucky people who spent less.

When people are forced to exchange more than half, or in some extreme cases like Arlene’s, almost all of their income for a place to live they can no longer be thought of as rational actors operating with complete autonomy, making logical decisions in a system of free markets.

They become caught in a cycle of debt, bouncing aimlessly between slumlords, social welfare programs, and prison, adopting a fatalist, short-term survivalist perspective along the way. “Under conditions of scarcity, people prioritize the now.” (Desmond, 115)

Larraine is perhaps one of the most striking examples of someone completely jaded by poverty, so resigned to her fate as she sees it that she makes no effort to save money or plan for the future.

To outsiders, it would appear that her poverty was likely somehow a product of her poor self-control. Looking deeper, however, things appear more complicated, “The distance between grinding poverty and even stable poverty could be so vast that those at the bottom had little hope of climbing out even I they pinched every penny. So they chose not to. Instead, they tried to survive in color, to season the suffering with pleasure.” (Desmond, 219)

This is why ethnographic research is imperative to studying poverty. Only by seeing Larraine’s rationalizations from her perspective can those accustomed to stability understand that what might appear to be impulsive actions are actually calculated attempts to pursue the most common human goal, an improved quality of life, despite having accepted constant, grinding poverty as an inescapable reality.

For the millions who suffer evictions and housing instability like Larraine, the American dream has become “a fantasy of making a good home for herself and her daughters.” (217)

Therefore, the question then becomes one of how to go about restoring the attainability of a dream that has slipped into the realm of fantasy. As Desmond succinctly notes, “There are two freedoms at odds with each other, the freedom to profit from rent and the freedom to live in a safe and affordable home.” (308)

While entrepreneurial landlords making a good living for themselves like Shareena shouldn’t be punished for their success, tenants are clearly in dire need of financial assistance. Desmond scratches at the surface of a mutually beneficial solution to the problem, advocating for what he calls a “universal voucher program”.

At a price tag of around $22.5 billion a year, a mere fraction of the $171 billion the federal government grants to homeowners in annual tax benefits, he argues that such a program could “change the face of poverty in this country” (308).

While I agree in principle, I would simply take things a step further, advocating for the complete elimination of welfare bureaucracies altogether in favor of a streamlined, direct-deposit universal basic income system. If there is any lesson to be extracted from the federal housing policies of the 20th century, it’s that warehousing people with no regard for the ownership individuals felt of their homes and communities doesn’t work.

This is evident in the demolition of failed housing projects and a shift towards voucher-based policies that rely on private housing markets. The problem is twofold, as these voucher programs are far too narrow and massively encumbered by an unnecessary bureaucracy — both problems solved by a universal basic income.

The fundamental idea behind a UBI is that it upholds “The values most of us support: security, fairness, and equal opportunity.” (Desmond, 308) By leveling the playing field for those who have fallen through various cracks in America’s complex web of half-shredded social safety nets and creating a clear-cut economic floor, a UBI would provide people used to merely surviving with the security and stability necessary to plan for the future.

Further, there is a case to be made that by eliminating the cumbersome network of bureaucracies through which trillions of dollars in social security, unemployment, retirement, tax credits, food stamps, and other welfare services flow every year the federal government would actually save money.

Charles Murray argued in the Wall Street Journal that “as of 2014, the annual cost of a UBI would have been about $200 billion cheaper than the current system. By 2020, it would be nearly a trillion dollars cheaper.” Additionally, direct-deposits would bypass the logistical hassle for individuals of interacting with state agencies and maintaining a consistent mailing address, eliminating any possibility of them not receiving their benefits.

Any issues of discrimination in housing markets against individuals relying on government subsidies would disappear, as landlords would no longer have to worry about what vouchers they do or do not accept, and the corresponding parallel inspection/oversight bureaucracies.

Ultimately, one of the last hurdles a UBI would have to overcome is the classic economic debate of incentives. Some will argue that simply handing out income to individuals will sap their incentive to work, just as free housing is thought by many to be a harmful handout, encouraging complacency and dependency.

Desmond might counter that the poor had largely already lost their incentives to thrive, not because of the meager handouts they received but because of the constant instability they had to grapple with — “in truth, the status quo was much more of a threat to self-sufficiency than any housing program could be.”

Under the status quo, Larraine could receive a month’s worth of food stamps and she’d always opt to blow the majority of them right away. That was the autonomy she got to express — her god-given right as an American to buy lobster one week and go hungry the next three.

A lingering question remains: would Larraine act differently if every month she received a direct deposit of $1,500 in her bank account? Would she still blow the majority of it the first day, only on more extravagant purchases?

Or would she spend roughly a third of it on rent, some of it on food, and actually make an effort to save some? What if she knew that the same amount would be deposited in her account every month indefinitely — would that be likely to affect her decision making?

Desmond’s take seems to be that subsidies could have a positive ripple effect, fundamentally reshaping poverty in America.

The effects he anticipates a universal voucher program would have are the same that proponents of a UBI claim providing an economic floor would have, “Evictions would plummet and become rare occurrences, homelessness would almost disappear.”

“Families would immediately feel the income gains and be able to buy enough food, invest in themselves and their children through schooling or job training, and start modest savings. They would find stability and have a sense of ownership over their home and community.”

Considering how much is at stake in testing these hypothetical policies, the research currently being conducted by Silicon Valley startup-incubator Y Combinator could be invaluable to shaping the future of welfare policy in the U.S.

Dr. Elizabeth Rhodes, who studied poverty in East Africa, is currently directing a study that is providing a sample of people with a basic income of between $1,000-$2,000 a month for up to five years. The study seeks to answer pressing questions about just how a steady, basic income affects peoples’ well-being, community engagement, and long-term planning.