Why would you even tell them about your roommates? Sure they might come up with some ways of hassling you based on the historical occupancy of a premises, instr

Why would you even tell them about your roommates? Sure they might come up with some ways of hassling you based on the historical occupancy of a premises, instrumented usage patterns, etc. But the underlying dynamic is to give them the fewest "income" figures that will end their questions, since verifying an absence of something is generally tough. The way by-income stuff is normally done is either on tax forms directly (obviously), or as subsidies for very low income such that they people who really need and want it are willing to jump through the paperwork hoops and spill their personal information. If this has been decided as the appropriate public policy, then it should be assessed right on the state income tax filing. But instead this perverse private-public "partnership" (read: corruption) makes it so that regulators have thought it appropriate for "private" companies to be directly involved in financial surveillance. So they aren't bound by the statutory secrecy of government, while the fact they're monopolies means you can't avoid them.