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You'll never cure poverty when you import it by the millions of illiterates that come here yearly. We keep spreading the available aid, housing thinner.
We restock the welfare shelves faster than we can get them out of the store.
Exactly what the powers that be want. They'd lose their power if they didn't have a large underclass dependent on them.
Well, I see homeless when I drive to work every day. No one's helping them. And no one seems interested in helping them.
So there are 500,000 homeless. How much would it cost to simply rent apartments for them? By my reckoning about $6 billion a year. The U.S. federal budget is $2.1 trillion a year, so we could resolve that problem if we wanted to shift two tenths of one percent of resources.
But we won't.
Except it's not anywhere near that simple.
I lived across the street from a homeless encampment for over a year. For many of these people homelessness is a symptom of many other issues (mental illness, drug/alcohol, childhood abuse). Many of these folks are extremely low functioning and essentially need some kind of adult babysitting for lack of a better word. If you just put them in apartments, many of them will trash them.
Not to mention, the more stuff you build that's "free" the more demand you'll have for it. You can't fix problems by only looking at the outer symptoms.
After I 'retired' I worked several low wage retail type jobs so I got to know a lot of millennial/younger people just starting out. They were in their 20's, living at home, had huge debts, mostly student loans. There were tons of jobs available but none of them paid anything. And you can forget full time with benefits. Most of these young people had 2 or 3 jobs plus a side gig here and there and they were still not making it.
If I compare myself at that age to these people, I was lightyears ahead of them. And that should not be the case. Thanks to FB, I am still in touch with them and they are now in their 30's. Some have managed to find better jobs but some haven't and they are still working hard for no money. Most have still never had a vacation. And many still have no healthcare. And they haven't had any for a decade or more now. They are no where even close to where I was in my 30's. They are still eating ramen and trying to get out of mom and dad's basement. And 10 years later we still have tons of jobs available that pay nothing. These people are now about 1/2 way through their working years and they have nothing to show for it. They are still trying to meet their basic needs. I would bet very few have anything in savings. You can't save what you don't have.
If my livelihood was on the line I would do whatever it took to preserve it. Most people would do the same.
That's true. But there's an inherent conflict of interest that prevents government bureaucracies from solving social problems. If the problem is actually solved, the people who salaries depended on solving it have to find something else to do...and they typically don't want to do that. So they, intentionally or not, find new ways to perpetuate the problem in some way or other.
Last edited by mysticaltyger; 08-30-2018 at 01:08 AM..
After I 'retired' I worked several low wage retail type jobs so I got to know a lot of millennial/younger people just starting out. They were in their 20's, living at home, had huge debts, mostly student loans. There were tons of jobs available but none of them paid anything. And you can forget full time with benefits. Most of these young people had 2 or 3 jobs plus a side gig here and there and they were still not making it.
If I compare myself at that age to these people, I was lightyears ahead of them. And that should not be the case. Thanks to FB, I am still in touch with them and they are now in their 30's. Some have managed to find better jobs but some haven't and they are still working hard for no money. Most have still never had a vacation. And many still have no healthcare. And they haven't had any for a decade or more now. They are no where even close to where I was in my 30's. They are still eating ramen and trying to get out of mom and dad's basement. And 10 years later we still have tons of jobs available that pay nothing. These people are now about 1/2 way through their working years and they have nothing to show for it. They are still trying to meet their basic needs. I would bet very few have anything in savings. You can't save what you don't have.
You have a point. Retail jobs generally suck.
But I have a friend who works a crappy retail job in a very high cost area. Yet he has little debt, and fairly significant savings for someone with a low income. He took care of his mother for years. The 2 of them lived in a 1BR apartment. He does have a subsidized studio apartment now, but the rent is something like $900 a month. In many places you can get a non-subsidized 1BR or 2BR for that price.
He hasn't lived a great life in material terms. Yet at the same time, he didn't have kids out of wedlock (ok, he's gay, so that was easy....but then again, I know plenty of gay men who had kids out of wedlock or went the marriage/kids/divorce route---it's not as rare as some people think). He isn't HIV positive, doesn't have tattoos, doesn't smoke (pot or cigarettes), drinks alcohol rarely, etc. If more low wage workers were like him, they would be in much better financial shape. Of course, he's an immigrant from Latin America, so that explains why he sees BS consumerism for what it is.
After I 'retired' I worked several low wage retail type jobs so I got to know a lot of millennial/younger people just starting out. They were in their 20's, living at home, had huge debts, mostly student loans. There were tons of jobs available but none of them paid anything. And you can forget full time with benefits. Most of these young people had 2 or 3 jobs plus a side gig here and there and they were still not making it.
If I compare myself at that age to these people, I was lightyears ahead of them. And that should not be the case. Thanks to FB, I am still in touch with them and they are now in their 30's. Some have managed to find better jobs but some haven't and they are still working hard for no money. Most have still never had a vacation. And many still have no healthcare. And they haven't had any for a decade or more now. They are no where even close to where I was in my 30's. They are still eating ramen and trying to get out of mom and dad's basement. And 10 years later we still have tons of jobs available that pay nothing. These people are now about 1/2 way through their working years and they have nothing to show for it. They are still trying to meet their basic needs. I would bet very few have anything in savings. You can't save what you don't have.
Generally the people I know who ended up in low wages jobs are people who failed to acquire marketable skills, college or not. Many college majors (actually most) do not provide hard skills that are sell able to an employer for a good wage.
Meanwhile, I just paid my plumber several thousand dollars to dig up and replace a sewer pipe in my front yard.
I lived across the street from a homeless encampment for over a year. For many of these people homelessness is a symptom of many other issues (mental illness, drug/alcohol, childhood abuse). Many of these folks are extremely low functioning and essentially need some kind of adult babysitting for lack of a better word. If you just put them in apartments, many of them will trash them.
Not to mention, the more stuff you build that's "free" the more demand you'll have for it. You can't fix problems by only looking at the outer symptoms.
Well in that case we could institutionalize them, if indeed they need that much help. That might, oh, quadruple or quintuple my estimate? Maybe 30-40 billion a year? Now we're talking a whopping 1.5% or so of national resources.
Well in that case we could institutionalize them, if indeed they need that much help.
The problem is, WE CAN'T. Courts haven't allowed it. A lot of court decisions would have to be overturned. Maybe a good idea, but not an immediate solution.
Quote:
Originally Posted by redguard57
That might, oh, quadruple or quintuple my estimate? Maybe 30-40 billion a year? Now we're talking a whopping 1.5% or so of national resources.
You still didn't address the problem of "free". Whenever something's free, especially something like housing, demand will increase exponentially. Unless you put some kind of restrictions on it, demand will run away. Generally, the most dysfunctional people will be attracted to such housing. Those are the people using the drugs, committing the crime, etc. (although generally such housing for senior citizens doesn't have the major issues of dysfunction, but you still have the demand exceeding supply problem).
You really don't get that these problems are more complex than you make them out to be.
That's true. But there's an inherent conflict of interest that prevents government bureaucracies from solving social problems. If the problem is actually solved, the people who salaries depended on solving it have to find something else to do...and they typically don't want to do that. So they, intentionally or not, find new ways to perpetuate the problem in some way or other.
Again, who doesn't?
Look at anyone who makes or sells or does any service for anyone. They always want to sell more or find more buyers. A hotel wants you to have a repeat stay or review them well so others stay. If you grow corn or mine salt, you want more and more food products to use your commodity and those manufacturers want to find ways to make their food addictive. A car dealership wants you to buy a new car every few years. Netflix wants you to keep paying for a subscription even though you only watch 1% of available content, etc, etc ad infinitum. The entire economy is kind of a Ponzi scheme if you really think about it.
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