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How Could Housing Be Improved? When members of the public think about solutions, their understanding is powerfully shaped by models of individual responsibility and by a deep ambivalence towards public solutions. In very speci"c, limited situations (e.g., temporary housing support in natural disaster situations), the public sees a necessary role for government. However, in general, assumptions about government corruption and inefficiency undermine people's support for government involvement in housing issues. In addition, because housing is considered to be a consumer good, government intervention is o%en viewed as inappropriate, because it violates the assumption that, in a marketplace, each individual is responsible for his or her own outcomes and situation. A. !e Individual Responsibility model. Most participants placed responsibility for improving housing conditions squarely on individual homeowners. Even in the case of rented homes, participants ascribed responsibility for improvements to residents themselves, as they assumed that renters are always free to move if they don't like their current living conditions. #is model follows logically from the Consumerism model described above: Since housing is a consumer good governed by market forces, people simply need to make good decisions in "purchasing" the housing that is best for them. Members of the public assume that people should be able to afford housing on their own as participants in the labor and housing markets. As such, direct government intervention is thought to be not only unnecessary but counterproductive, because in taking responsibility away from the individual, it creates dependency on government. Participant: #ere was a lady I know who lived in her car because she wanted to drink. And that was her choice. So, she wanted to drink and do drugs, and she didn't want to pay for housing, because she had the money to do it. So, she lived in her car on purpose. — Participant: People need to be accountable. Everybody needs to be accountable. If everybody was more accountable for their own situation, we wouldn't have half the problems. B. !e Government Is Inefficient and Corrupt model. #is cultural model surfaces when the American public thinks about government-based solutions across a wide range of social issues. 8 When thinking with this model, the public associates government with corrupt politicians and with people abusing the system, and views government programs as inefficient and ineffective. Analysis showed that this model powerfully attaches to discussions of housing, especially when conversations focus on improving housing through public policy. Applied to housing, the model hijacks productive consideration of the importance and potential of government solutions at every level—federal, state, and local—though it is most powerful in structuring thinking about federal government programs. "A House, a Tent, a Box": Mapping the Gaps Between Expert and Public Understanding of Healthy Housing 26

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