“I’m in a job where I don’t earn much, but I just try to keep as much as I can,” she said. “Rent is not the only thing that has to be paid every month.”
Since the pandemic struck, food pantries across the country have had record demand.
From January to November, the Food Bank of New York City distributed 70% more food, compared to the same period last year, said Matt Honeycutt, its director of development.
“Because that’s what people are doing, all year round, without a pandemic,” he said. “They choose every month: do I pay rent, buy medicine, leave the heater on or buy food? The food is the first to be cut. “He added:” These are impossible choices that people have to make all the time – add a pandemic to that, and I don’t know how they do it. “
Nationally, up to 14 million tenant households are considered at risk of eviction. If these evictions continued, the cost to social services would be more than $ 128.5 billion, according to a recent study by the University of Arizona and the National Low Income Housing Coalition.
States responded with a patchwork of eviction moratoriums and deprivation exemptions related to Covid-19, but no state has fully addressed the issue of arrears, according to Professor Benfer. Nor is it clear whether any state would succeed, given the fiscal crisis that states and local governments are facing.
New York City has an exceptionally robust social safety net, in part because the City has reached legal settlements with advocacy groups. This includes the so-called right under.
“The city has an obligation to house all homeless people, and that’s expensive: more than $ 3,000 per family and $ 2,000 for a single person,” said Judith Goldiner, a lawyer with the Legal Aid Society, citing the monthly expense . “This cost alone is huge for the city.”