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According to stats there was 7100 homeless in Finland in the end of 2014, so though they exist, they aren't a regular feature of the city landscape. Some drug-addicts or alcoholics who have slim hopes of getting an apartment are squatters, and live in some kind of shack or abandoned building.
What I find encouraging is that there was only 427 homeless with families.
Of those who are permanently homeless over half lives in Helsinki, so in smaller cities they can be virtually nonexistant. Here in Turku (pop 185k), it's estimated that there's around 500 homeless in total, of which 200 are practically these shopping-cart-pushers-with-raggy-clothes type of people.
Wow, that's an insanely low number of homeless people. There are something like 82,000 homeless people in any given night in Los Angeles County alone.
We have about 27.000 homeless people in Holland of which half of them live in the four big cities Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague and Utrecht. I don't think that's a very high number. 20 years ago it was much much worse. There were homeless people and junkies everywhere, big and small cities, but now it seems to be almost gone. I rarely see one when I'm in the city although they are there of course, but they're well taken care of by homeless shelters, government homes etc.
Also the heroin addicts are completely gone. A while back I read an article saying "Were did all the junkies go?". It used to be a real plague which seemed unstoppable but they took care of that pretty well by helping those people to get off the drugs through various programs. The worse addicts got methadone to stay on, and the absolutely worse that couldn't be helped at all got free medical heroin for the rest of their lives.
So nowadays the average age of a junkie in Amsterdam is 55 years old, and I think in twenty years or so, there won't be any left.
In Italy homeless people are around 50 thousands, most of them live in the cities (8k in Rome, 4k in Milan, 2k in Naples, Florence, Venice, Bologna and Turin). Anyway a large part of them are illegal migrants who come either from Subsaharian Africa or from the Indian subcontinent. Unlike many other countries we don't have a large problem with addicts and they make up only a low percentage of the homeless, most of them are housed in special rehabilitation centers.
The only reason why you won't see many homeless Italian citizens is because of our welfare policies, in fact you are elegible for a demand of free housing:
if you have lived in a doss-house for the last 6 months (Category A)
widow, divorced or single mothers with a son/daughter younger than 18 (Cat. B)
families whose annual income is lower than €3651 and who are taken care of by the municipal Social Service (Cat. D)
the families where one or more of the members have a disability higher than 67% (Cat. E)
families whose members are all younger than 35 and who have formed themselves in the last 3 years (Cat. G)
families with more than 3 children (Cat. H)
families whose annual income is lower than the lowest retirement pension given by INPS (Cat. Q)
anyone whose income si 90% dependant on his retirement pension or dependant work (Cat. U)
There are 20 different categories, i haven't listed them all, each category awards points the sum of which determines the waiting list to get free housing.
These people just want to survive, I know it's easy to say things like that but those poor people are making me sad. They're not born in a "good" country, so they want to go elsewhere.
I saw them on TV at Calais. Very very sad.
There's a similar problem in Ventimiglia at the French-Italian borders, most of these people are trying to reach their relatives in Germany, UK, Sweden, Norway, France, ecc.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Bluefox
Wow, that's an insanely low number of homeless people. There are something like 82,000 homeless people in any given night in Los Angeles County alone.
There are almost twice as much of them in Los Angeles County than in the whole of Italy
Had no idea that California, and to a lesser extent the rest of the USA, had a large problem with homelessness. I remember watching a documentary about the rise of the number of addicts (due to cheap drugs like crystal meth) in a few Californian cities like Fresno, Bakersfield, Stockton, ecc.
There is more homelessness in the U.S. because it doesn't have the level of social safety nets that many European countries do. I think this is pretty well-known by now. Inequality is very real.
Also, individualism, self-initiative and self-reliance are deeply embedded values in American society. Americans tend to believe that you shape your own destiny for the most part and they take great pride in that philosophy. However, because of this the majority tends to be desensitized to the plight of those who are at the very bottom socioeconomically. There is also a large racial element to this issue which only complicates the problem.
Things are changing slowly though. As time progresses, the U.S. is becoming more and more "socialist" like Europe, in my opinion. Obama has moved the country a little closer to universal healthcare. If Hillary Clinton is elected, she will definitely institute changes like raising the minimum wage and taxing the rich for a lot of different social programs, etc. It's going to be interesting to see how any of these changes affects the homeless population.
The homelessness that is being discussed here has nothing to do with "safety nets". It is caused by the de-institutionalization of the mentally unstable.
In Germany we don't have reliable or current statistics about this topic.
Charity organizations estimates that there were 20,000 homeless people in Germany in 2008. That are those people that really live on the street. Thus those people that are typically seen as homeless people.
Then there is a second number of 223,000 people, also for 2008, that live without a permanent residence. That are people who live in a uncertain housing situation. Living by various friends, women living in women's refugees, teenager that live temporary in a youth shelter, because of domestic violence at home. Or those who lost their housing only for a few days or so.
I really don't know which number is the appropriate one to compare to figures from other countries. I guess it's difficult to compare numbers from different countries, because each country use probably different definitions for homelessness.
Quote:
There are something like 82,000 homeless people in any given night in Los Angeles county alone.
What does that mean? Do they all really live on the street? Even during the night? That seems unbelievable high. Or does that number also include people who live in some sort of shelter?
When I compare the homelessness in the U.S. that is visible by Google Streetview with the homelessness in Germany, visible by Google Streetview. Then the homelessness in the U.S. seems hundredfold higher than in Germany.
Location: Northern Ireland and temporarily England
7,668 posts, read 5,258,522 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Bluefox
The same could be said of the US, there are very different cities and regions. In my OP I asked about which cities and places in Europe have the largest homeless problems and which have the least.
Well America is one country, Europe is a group of foreign, independent countries.
Location: Northern Ireland and temporarily England
7,668 posts, read 5,258,522 times
Reputation: 1392
Quote:
Originally Posted by improb
In Italy homeless people are around 50 thousands, most of them live in the cities (8k in Rome, 4k in Milan, 2k in Naples, Florence, Venice, Bologna and Turin). Anyway a large part of them are illegal migrants who come either from Subsaharian Africa or from the Indian subcontinent. Unlike many other countries we don't have a large problem with addicts and they make up only a low percentage of the homeless, most of them are housed in special rehabilitation centers.
The only reason why you won't see many homeless Italian citizens is because of our welfare policies, in fact you are elegible for a demand of free housing:
if you have lived in a doss-house for the last 6 months (Category A)
widow, divorced or single mothers with a son/daughter younger than 18 (Cat. B)
families whose annual income is lower than €3651 and who are taken care of by the municipal Social Service (Cat. D)
the families where one or more of the members have a disability higher than 67% (Cat. E)
families whose members are all younger than 35 and who have formed themselves in the last 3 years (Cat. G)
families with more than 3 children (Cat. H)
families whose annual income is lower than the lowest retirement pension given by INPS (Cat. Q)
anyone whose income si 90% dependant on his retirement pension or dependant work (Cat. U)
There are 20 different categories, i haven't listed them all, each category awards points the sum of which determines the waiting list to get free housing.
That's what I noticed in Rome aswell, not very many natives sleeping on the streets.
What does that mean? Do they all really live on the street? Even during the night? That seems unbelievable high. Or does that number also include people who live in some sort of shelter?
When I compare the homelessness in the U.S. that is visible by Google Streetview with the homelessness in Germany, visible by Google Streetview. Then the homelessness in the U.S. seems hundredfold higher than in Germany.
Well America is one country, Europe is a group of foreign, independent countries.
Sure but the US and the EU are often compared in many different contexts. Sure, they are all different countries but are united (mostly) by a single currency and there is generally free movement with the Eurozone.
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