I believe that the answer to the question posed in the title of this article is "Yes". I also believe that, like most of us, the majority of the people involved in social services, whether they be employed by government agencies or charitable organizations, believe that their personal values are the "right" values, and are the values that should be imposed on adopted by those less fortunate than themselves. Sort of a "white man's burden", updated to modern America.

It is, unfortunately, not mere coincidence that many of the values of social service workers coincide perfectly with the values that corporate America would have them hold. These values include, but are by no means limited to, the following:

• Consume
• Incur debt
• Don't share.

As case in point, I refer you to the "1997- 1999 Jobs - Welfare Reform Plan for Jackson & Josephine Counties", published by The Oregon Department of Human Resources Adult & Family Services Division. This document notes that the following desirable "self-sufficiency" outcomes, among several others, are now being adopted across the spectrum of social service agencies:

• Home-ownership as preferable to renting or living with friends or family.
• Working at a paying job full-time as preferable to working part-time.
• Post-secondary (i.e., college) education as preferable to vocational training.

From whence are these values derived? In whose opinion, and on what basis, is home-ownership preferable to living with friends or family? Why is it preferable to spend 40-60 hours per week working at a job that one may or may not find satisfying, if one can meet ones financial needs with a part-time job? In whose judgement does one derive more benefit from college than one does from vocational training? And why should others be encouraged to mindlessly accept that judgement?

I could (and probably eventually will) discuss each of these questions in turn. For now I want to focus on the first of the above-listed concepts that DHS is promoting, namely home-ownership. Please be aware that DHS is not alone in wishing to inflict these values on others, using taxpayers' money to do so. For instance, in a November 25, 1997 "Guest Opinion" in the Grants Pass Daily Courier, Mayor Gordon Anderson boasts of a program he devised that uses tax money to "...encourage first-time buyers into home-ownership."

What's wrong with this picture? Isn't home-ownership a good thing? Shouldn't society want to encourage people to own their own homes? Well, it depends.

• For those who move frequently, home-ownership can become an economic disaster. In the current real estate market, it can take over three years before a home buyer can expect to recoup his investment if he must, or chooses to, sell. This is because real estate commissions, settlement costs, and finance charges (aka "points") are costs that must be recouped before the home-owner breaks even. These one-time costs are, of course, in addition to the monthly mortgage interest charges, the higher insurance rates, property taxes, and so forth that a homeowner incurs, and also does not take into account the loss of interest or other income that would have accrued had the home buyer elected to invest in the stock market or certificates of deposit instead of a down payment on his house.
• For those on low incomes, the cost of maintaining a home can be prohibitive. Because most homes in this area are detached, and because, other things being equal, detached homes have substantially higher cooling and heating costs than apartments, the additional monthly energy charges alone can be burdensome. To this one must add the cost of maintaining a lawn, periodic interior and exterior painting, and maintenance of plumbing, heating, major appliances and structural components of the home, among other things.
• For most of those who value independence and personal freedom, home-ownership can be stifling, inasmuch as it effectively prevents them from moving from one place to another until they can find a buyer for their home at a price they are willing to sell for. And even after finding such a buyer, there is often a delay of several months before the purchase transaction actually takes place.
• For those who derive satisfaction from sharing, cooperation, social interaction, or the extended family, home-ownership (as distinguished from living with others) can be an isolating, insulating and generally negative experience.

Is there anyone for whom own ownership makes financial sense? Well, yes, but not as many as one might think.

• Those who are confident that they will live in one place for a long time will often, but not always, find themselves saving money by owning rather than renting their homes.
• Those who buy a home in an area where housing prices are rising rapidly can often better themselves financially by buying instead of renting. (This is provided that they eventually sell their homes. If they don't sell, the increase in value of their property merely has the effect of increasing their property taxes.) However, such people run the risk of encountering a dramatic shift in the housing market, such as occured in Colorado in the late 1970's, Houston in the late 1980's, and Southern California in the 1990's during which hundreds of thousands of people lost hundreds of millions of dollars and/or found themselves stuck in locations from which they would have preferred to emigrate.

(Needless to say, even the people who fall in the latter two categories would find themselves financially better-off if they lived with friends or family instead of owning their own homes.)

Well, if home-ownership makes financial and lifestyle sense only to some people, why is our government actively promoting it for everyone? To put it another way: If only a fraction of people who own their own homes are better off as a result of home-ownership, are there other groups all of whom are better off as a result of widespread home-ownership? The answer, as you probably suspected, is "yes". Here is a small sampling of such groups:

• The construction industry (because detached single family-dwellings are the most expensive, per occupant, to build).
• The real estate industry (because the housing market is their biggest source of income).
• The banking industry (because home-ownership almost always requires the homeowner to obtain a substantial loan, and loans are the wellspring of the banking industry's survival and growth).
• Energy companies (because more energy is consumed, per occupant, in detached single family dwellings than in multi-family apartments).
• Federal, state & local government (because property taxes collected are highest, per resident, on single family homes, and because homes that are owner-occupied cannot be depreciated as a deduction on income tax returns).

In short, vast economic empires are built on the foundation of widespread home-ownership, and many of these empires would be crippled, if not toppled, if home-ownership dramatically decreased.

So it is appropriate to ask again why our government, particularly the social services component of government, is vigorously promoting homeownership for its clients. And it is now appropriate to ask why our government, particularly the social services component of government, is not instead actively educating its clients about the benefits of more efficient, less risky, and less constraining forms of housing. Is it just that these government entities and their employees have accepted, without examination, the heavily-advertised notion that home-ownership is (or should be) the ultimate goal of every American? Or are they actively complicit with the (mostly huge) corporations and big government that benefit from the proliferation of home-ownership?