The following article by Caitlin Rooney, Charlie Whittington and Laura E. Durso was posted on the Center for American Progress website August 13 2018:
Introduction and summary
“In the nearly seven years since I transitioned, I have been unemployed, surviving off the charity of friends and family, and government assistance when I could get it. I have over 20 years of experience in my field, yet I cannot even land a part-time retail position.”
— Respondent to the 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey1
Employment discrimination, along with discrimination in housing and health care, is all too common in the LGBTQ community. It can impede LGBTQ people’s ability to attain and maintain economic security. That’s why it’s crucial that LGBTQ people have access to supports that help them put food on the table, access health care, and put a roof over their heads. Despite high need for public benefits in the LGBTQ community, access to these benefits is far from assured. At the state and federal levels, there are recent and ongoing attacks on programs that ensure basic living standards, including the implementation of harsh work requirements for recipients of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and Medicaid and proposed funding cuts to SNAP in the House farm bill.2 These efforts increase the urgency to examine how cuts to benefits such as nutrition assistance and Medicaid could affect the LGBTQ community.
While research has shown that members of the LGBTQ community report lower incomes and higher rates of poverty, increased food insecurity, higher unemployment, and greater vulnerability to homelessness than the general population,3additional research is needed to examine LGBTQ people’s receipt of a range of crucial benefits that may help address those issues. The new Center for American Progress survey data explored in this report use a nationally representative sample of both LGBTQ-identified and non-LGBTQ-identified adults to deepen the understanding of the extent to which the LGBTQ community receives certain benefits and determine whether disparities exist on the basis of LGBTQ identity and other demographic factors.
The CAP survey responses—collected in 2017 and summarized in Figures 1 through 5—indicate that LGBTQ people and their families4 are more likely to participate in a range of public programs than non-LGBTQ families. Survey respondents were asked whether they, their partner, or their child received assistance from SNAP, Medicaid,5 unemployment,6 or public housing assistance in the year preceding the survey. In general, a greater proportion of LGBTQ respondents reported that they or their families had participated in these programs compared with non-LGBTQ respondents. The following analysis presents descriptive data about receipt of these benefits by sexual orientation and gender identity, as well as other important demographic characteristics such as gender, race and ethnicity, and disability status. The survey’s findings underscore the importance of opposing benefits cuts, including work requirements, that would likely disproportionately harm the LGBTQ community. Instead of cutting these benefits, state and federal governments should expand these crucial supports and forward other policies proven to help boost wages and improve the economic security of all people, including LGBTQ people.