besides they argued the japanese family supported its own and made public assistance unnecessary whereas western families were portrayed as collections of autonomous individuals in japan according to one senior official it is a family shame to send one of its own out to bother outsiders and to depend on others for assistance abe cites estimates from the late s that about of households below the income criteria for entitlement to meanstested public housing actually live in public housing and that of households whose annual income is below jpy million certainly below the income criteria live in public housing the public assistance law of was influenced by conditions imposed by the occupying powers which included governmental responsibility to provide social welfare and a guaranteed social minimum the new law did not link eligibility to inability to work like the old one did estevezabe in and public assistance was paid to roughly of all households and in the early s it absorbed of social security expenditure