Housing. That's another kettle of fish. Being poor to some people has its benefits, but what the many who don't have to endure the endless red tape for the little things we get, are oblivious to the painful invasions of our privacy, even of things that have nothing to do with being poor and or the need we may have at the time; the sea of paper work; signatures until your fingers bleed; the sneers and ignorant hoity toity attitudes we get from the proud and dangerous of all walks of life including the case workers themselves; the anarchy of the general public, being subjected to their dictation of how we should live, and if we fail to abide by their guidelines we are then harassed by visits from child welfare, false reports to public welfare agencies of all departments, ie...Social Security, Public Aid, even Animal Welfare if you have a pet. Most people see the poor as uneducated nymphs from some unnamed planet of another galaxy. Well, enough of this rant.
I have whats called a housing voucher. Its a program that assists in paying rent for people who otherwise wouldn't be able to cover their rental obligations and verily, verily would probably live like nomads, moving from place to place, either because they were smart and knew they couldn't pay the next months rent and moved out before they could be evicted, or simply because they were evicted because they wanted to exhaust all available time they had going through the court system.
Anyhow, I have this lovely voucher, but forever have problems locating rentals. Most Landlords don't accept them. But, it is now illegal in the City of Chicago for a Landlord to turn down a Housing Voucher formally know by most people as "Section 8". Its under descrinination, and say its discriminating a persons source of income, and rightfully so. But, then I have to go to the defense of some landlords who have had horrid experiences in spite of the new background checks Housing performs on all Voucher Holders now; from unruly and unappreciative recipients who find destruction of someones property satisfying. People like that make all Voucher holders look bad and makes our lives harder.