I think it's really spurious to imply that moving to a luxury apartment would be high on the list of priorities for anyone receiving a small cash infusion instead of in-kind benefits. I see no reason to expect even a small number of people receiving assistance to squander it on overpriced housing.
Is there any evidence to suggest that cash assistance to poor families is wasted at anywhere near the rate you're describing? I can understand being uncomfortable with the amount that may get spent on alcohol or other vices, but I still think that any reasonable amount to expect would be much lower than the amount wasted on administering in-kind and similar benefit programs. Just think about how much it costs us as a society to administer EBT systems -- it raises the cost of food for everyone, not just the benefit recipients.
Assuming an average market rent of $2,000 (a huge underestimate), and assuming dormitories could be provided in distant brooklyn/queens/bronx for $700 (an overestimate), that means we are wasting 70M/month on luxury goods for poor folks in one county alone.
Are you really trying to claim that the cost of administration would exceed $1300/month per housing unit?
Across the entire nation, the cost of administration doesn't need to exceed 1300/mo to be a worse option than cash benefits. It just needs to be greater than whatever waste recipients generate in aggregate. Manhattan low-income housing: 53,809 units, per your above claims, from one of the most expensive places to live in the entire country. 46.7 million Americans were below the poverty line in 2014:
The vast majority of the US is quite a bit cheaper than NYC. Further, we don't need to provide cash assistance to match an area's rent -- thus achieving the same "ship out the poor people" policy you seem to espouse above. If someone can spend their $500 monthly benefit on Manhattan rent, or spend that same benefit on NJ rent, many will choose the latter and thus avoid the waste you claim is inevitable.
And you've still cited no evidence which makes me think that the waste you're citing could exist on a national scale anywhere close to the administrative burden of an in-kind program.
Is there any evidence to suggest that cash assistance to poor families is wasted at anywhere near the rate you're describing? I can understand being uncomfortable with the amount that may get spent on alcohol or other vices, but I still think that any reasonable amount to expect would be much lower than the amount wasted on administering in-kind and similar benefit programs. Just think about how much it costs us as a society to administer EBT systems -- it raises the cost of food for everyone, not just the benefit recipients.