The Bush administration is now proposing major cuts to housing subsidies for the poor.

Hidden in the supplement to President Bush's budget, released in February, was a major cut to the HUD voucher program. Robert Greenstein states that these cuts "...would be the most severe cut in a low-income program since the early years of the Reagan Administration."

The Housing voucher program currently assists over 2 million poor families. These poor families include single mothers with children, senior citizens on fixed incomes, and the disabled. Housing vouchers provide these families with cash rental payments to private landlords. The amount of assistance a family receives is calculated by the families income. Each family pays a rental portion equal to one third of the monthly income. A family of three with a monthly income of $2,500 would pay approximately 750 per month in rent. The housing department would send the landlord a check for the remaining amount.

The new budget proposal seeks to eliminate 800,000 families from the program by the year 2009. Furthermore, families left on the program will loose the 1/3 income rule and face higher rental payments. For families barely making it in high market rent areas like California, these proposed changes could produce an increase in homelessness, more stress on families (that has been correlated with increased child abuse), and increased depravation among the poor.