The Living Arrangements of SSI Recipients Across the Life Course

• In Event: The SSI Recipient Experience

Abstract

For years, the median monthly cost of rent has far exceeded the maximum monthly benefit for Supplemental Security Income (SSI). Additionally, SSI program rules reduce recipients’ monthly checks if they receive free or subsidized housing from family or friends. Qualitative data can help uncover the formal and informal living arrangements of SSI recipients and the strategies they use to find and maintain housing in light of SSI benefit levels and program rules. In this study, we use nationally representative interview data from the American Voices Project (AVP) (N = 111) to ask three questions: (1) How do SSI recipients describe their living situation?, (2) How do SSI recipients describe the extent to which SSI benefit levels and program rules affect their living situation?, and (3) How do SSI recipients’ descriptions and narratives of SSI’s role in their housing situation vary across the life course? Preliminary findings suggest that the living arrangements of SSi recipients tend to fall in one of three categories: publicly subsidized housing, privately subsidized housing, and private unsubsidized housing. Salience of SSI’s benefit amount and program rules varies across recipients. However, at least one recipient described in detail how the threat of SSI benefit reductions led them to live separately from their partner, causing them significant emotional and logistical distress.

Authors

• Pooja Paode, University of Wisconsin-Madison
  Presenting Author

• Callie Freitag, University of Wisconsin-Madison
  Non-Presenting Co-Author