Please review my numbers on this topic. I show that it is largely a socialist giveaway program.
Gee FDR would be proud of you.
I don't know if it can be considered a "socialist giveaway" or not, but the tax credits part of it is largely an attempt to manipulate the market. If there was a market for low income housing, the developers would be building it. Since they aren't, I have to assume it's either a low profit or no profit venture. The tax credits are an attempt to artificially inflate the profit potential in building low income housing to inflate the supply. If the developer's aren't careful they'll lose their butts, because tax credits don't do you any good if you didn't make any money to owe taxes on. Government attempts at market manipulation seem to have a history of unintended consequences as bad as, or worse, than what they were trying to solve.