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It's true about the money wasted by the government, and yes, if that were under control, a lot of things, not just housing the homeless, could be done.
As for government creating the problem, it certainly wasn't helped when Reagan ordered so many mental hospitals closed and the people in them put out on the street. I remember that as being the first time that anyone actually ever said anything about the homeless in print or in the news.
I will say one thing though. OK, one more thing. LOL If the people that are homeless are expected to get a job and get back into mainstream society, they first need homes. I can tell you firsthand how incredibly hard it is getting a job when you're homeless. Many businesses don't want to hire homeless people, so if you don't have a phone number or an address, you may not even be considered for a job. Add to that the stress of living on the street, worried about being assaulted or robbed, not having a place to go to the bathroom, wondering where you're going to sleep, trying to keep warm, how you're going to get food, carrying everything you own on your back including a suit or dress you're trying to keep clean and unwrinkled for job interviews, and trying to just keep clean, is enough to push even a strong person over the edge.
Some people can climb up out of all that and get a job. Most can't, but most could if they had the big problem of housing solved. It doesn't have to be a house, either. It could be a motel room, or like where I am living now, which is a building turned into SROs - single room occupancy - where the rents are charged at 30% of income (and you know, it says something about this country when your actual rent isn't supposed to be more than 30% of your income and here it's considered subsidized if it's kept at 30% of income). So I have a small room, a kitchenette, and a shared bathroom, and yes, there are rules. No smoking inside, no drugs, no drinking. Stricter rules than most people have in their own homes. Homeless people are held to a higher standard when they're in subsidized housing, if you want to look at it that way.
And this works, but the downside is there's usually a year's wait to get in. And I'd have to check, but I think our Section 8 was closed several years ago because at that time, there was a 7 year wait to get into Section 8 housing. How many people here think they could survive on the street for 7 years until they finally had a place to live?
Last edited by rodentraiser; 11-23-2014 at 09:12 PM..
Reason: edited because I can't spell! eeeeeeee!
And, er, I thought the lack of government regulation was the cause of banks and mortgage companies going wild and causing the crash of 2008.
And this was after the Savings and Loan mess in the 80s. You would have thought after that the government would be all over regulating banks more. Hands off is great, but these people can't seem to regulate themselves for anything.
If I'm wrong on any of this, I'm open to correction.
If you mean "naivete", that doesn't begin to pardon the willful ignorance displayed in your premises in this thread. I suggest before you go any further that you read up on mental illness, requirements for gaining and maintaining public housing, addiction, the history of public housing, welfare, disability, public finance, funding trends in social services, the causes of poverty, social engineering, etc.
Location: where you sip the tea of the breasts of the spinsters of Utica
8,297 posts, read 14,166,733 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by rodentraiser
It's true about the money wasted by the government, and yes, if that were under control, a lot of things, not just housing the homeless, could be done.
As for government creating the problem, it certainly wasn't helped when Reagan ordered so many mental hospitals closed and the people in them put out on the street. I remember that as being the first time that anyone actually ever said anything about the homeless in print or in the news.
I will say one thing though. OK, one more thing. LOL If the people that are homeless are expected to get a job and get back into mainstream society, they first need homes. I can tell you firsthand how incredibly hard it is getting a job when you're homeless. Many businesses don't want to hire homeless people, so if you don't have a phone number or an address, you may not even be considered for a job. Add to that the stress of living on the street, worried about being assaulted or robbed, not having a place to go to the bathroom, wondering where you're going to sleep, trying to keep warm, how you're going to get food, carrying everything you own on your back including a suit or dress you're trying to keep clean and unwrinkled for job interviews, and trying to just keep clean, is enough to push even a strong person over the edge.
Some people can climb up out of all that and get a job. Most can't, but most could if they had the big problem of housing solved. It doesn't have to be a house, either. It could be a motel room, or like where I am living now, which is a building turned into SROs - single room occupancy - where the rents are charged at 30% of income (and you know, it says something about this country when your actual rent isn't supposed to be more than 30% of your income and here it's considered subsidized if it's kept at 30% of income). So I have a small room, a kitchenette, and a shared bathroom, and yes, there are rules. No smoking inside, no drugs, no drinking. Stricter rules than most people have in their own homes. Homeless people are held to a higher standard when they're in subsidized housing, if you want to look at it that way.
And this works, but the downside is there's usually a year's wait to get in. And I'd have to check, but I think our Section 8 was closed several years ago because at that time, there was a 7 year wait to get into Section 8 housing. How many people here think they could survive on the street for 7 years until they finally had a place to live?
Judging by your current zip code, I wonder if you were homeless in Seattle? I was, sometime in the early 2000s. Remember the DESC with its gym mats to sleep on? I usually chose to live in a tent in Discovery Park back then.
Seattle had a continuum of homeless housing from shelters to shared housing, eventually to having an apartment of one's own. The only problem was that it was all packed full, and yet there were still thousands living out on the streets.
Portland and San Francisco have a large population of both. They vary from interesting people to nuisances. While they're less sympathetic to population 2 (mentally ill / drug addicts) they're often less irritating. While #2 are sad cases, some can be unpleasant to have around. There's a loud woman who walks on the downtown street and rides the local buses who yells at no one in particular. Or this:
A police hunt for a stolen bicycle Saturday took officers into a clearing off Hockanum Road. There, they say, they found their suspect using a spoon for “cooking†a shot of heroin, which he swallowed when he saw an officer approaching.
Though some of the "homeless by choice" have drug habits, but they're usually not as dirty or obviously off.
I visited Spain recently. While Spain does have its own issues, one thing I noticed was the lack of homeless and mentally ill in the center cities. Nothing like many American cities, let alone something like the Tenderloin in San Francisco.
Regarding homeless by choice (as you're referring to in your first paragraph), Denver and Boulder both have a lot of such people. During our recent cold snap, the shelters were packed.
I heard a story on NPR recently (within the past week) about homeless in Rome, so yes, they do exist in Europe, despite most European countries' arguably better social safety nets.
But building anyone a house or renting anyone an apartment on the backs of the taxpayer is out of the question. Creating additional victims and adding to our 70% overall tax burden is a non-starter. In fact, perhaps if we had a small, efficient government and people got to keep most of what they earn and own, far less people would be prone to falling into street life..
The problem with this attitude, IMHO, is that some people are just functionally useless in the modern economy due to some combination of low intelligence, poor ability to plan ahead, and bad mental health overall. Further, this is in large part due to traits that they had no choice in - either inherited inclinations or the result of early childhood experiences which cannot be undone in adulthood. Doing nothing to help these people is, morally speaking, as wrong to me as say telling a man in a wheelchair that ramps are too expensive, and they need to just crawl up the steps using their hands.
This is before even considering who actually makes a valid contribution to society has changed over time. In the days of subsistence living, everyone but the heavily disabled would be able to make some contribution to the community. But as civilization rose, the amount of forward planning and mental acuity needed has increased - even though we haven't evolved as a species. In more recent decades, the number of jobs requiring only "strong backs" has lessened due to automation, and more recent advances
And the number of people who functionally have nothing to contribute is increasing by the year, as automation cuts down on the number of jobs (particularly low and medium skill ones). I sincerely believe in a generation we'll be looking at 50% unemployment, with most working-class (and lower level white-collar) jobs having all but vanished, replaced by robots or software. In such a world, some sort of cash subsidy to those not earning a wage becomes a social necessity. Or if they force the work week to be dramatically lower, while raising the minimum wage, so someone could make a living off 20 hours a week of labor. But barring one of these happening, I see no long-term solution besides genocide of the poor, or a socialist revolution.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Marc Paolella
My correct, rational, and moral premise is that the people own100% of what they earn, and it belongs to nobody else, and should be under their absolute control to use and dispose of as they wish without interference. Since it is theirs, and only theirs. Since they earned it.
Therefore, I advise maximum use of the mortgage interest deduction, as it enables people to keep more of what they EARN and already OWNED in the first place.
Money is a shared delusion - it only exists via fiat of the state. The state creates the social conditions needed to make money, because without the state to enforce property laws, your neighbor could easily use their will to power to take what's yours for yourself. I thus don't begrudge the government anything it wants from my paycheck. It's the dues I pay to be part of civil society.
The problem with this attitude, IMHO, is that some people are just functionally useless in the modern economy due to some combination of low intelligence, poor ability to plan ahead, and bad mental health overall. Further, this is in large part due to traits that they had no choice in - either inherited inclinations or the result of early childhood experiences which cannot be undone in adulthood.
Nonsense. We live in a physical world. The "automation destroying physical labor" argument was false when it was irrationally proposed at the start of the industrial revolution. It is false today. It will be false tomorrow. There was, is, and will always be physical labor to be done.
There are always dumb jobs for dumb people, and there will always be, if they want them.
However, need is not a claim, and being stupid does not confer rights to steal from others.
Quote:
Originally Posted by eschaton
Doing nothing to help these people is, morally speaking, as wrong to me as say telling a man in a wheelchair that ramps are too expensive, and they need to just crawl up the steps using their hands.
In a free society, if you want help someone, you will not be stopped. You may direct your time, your money, your creativity, and your good will as you see fit. However, it stops with you. You may not take from others to achieve your goals. You may ask, request, convince, persuade, and provide an example. Robbery is off the table.
Quote:
Originally Posted by eschaton
This is before even considering who actually makes a valid contribution to society has changed over time. In the days of subsistence living, everyone but the heavily disabled would be able to make some contribution to the community. But as civilization rose, the amount of forward planning and mental acuity needed has increased - even though we haven't evolved as a species. In more recent decades, the number of jobs requiring only "strong backs" has lessened due to automation, and more recent advances.
Nonsense. The grass still has to be cut, the snow needs to be shovelled, packages need to be delivered, pipes need to be sweated, roofs need to be re-roofed, homes need to be built, add 75,000 other physical jobs that have to be done, and will have to be done. Dumb people can survive, and being dumb does not confer rights to steal from others.
Quote:
Originally Posted by eschaton
And the number of people who functionally have nothing to contribute is increasing by the year, as automation cuts down on the number of jobs (particularly low and medium skill ones). I sincerely believe in a generation we'll be looking at 50% unemployment, with most working-class (and lower level white-collar) jobs having all but vanished, replaced by robots or software. In such a world, some sort of cash subsidy to those not earning a wage becomes a social necessity. Or if they force the work week to be dramatically lower, while raising the minimum wage, so someone could make a living off 20 hours a week of labor. But barring one of these happening, I see no long-term solution besides genocide of the poor, or a socialist revolution.
This prediction is irrational. Unless the physical world is about to be abolished.
Quote:
Originally Posted by eschaton
Money is a shared delusion - it only exists via fiat of the state. The state creates the social conditions needed to make money, because without the state to enforce property laws, your neighbor could easily use their will to power to take what's yours for yourself.
False: Money is a condensation of time and provides a medium of exchange. Since our individual time on this planet is very short, and we cannot possibly learn everything we need to survive in a modern world, money allows us to leverage the time and talent of others in a synergistic and efficient way. I don't have to learn plumbing, I can hire a plumber. I don't have to learn Law, I can hire a lawyer.
False: Money is not an illusion. It is real. It was invented by Man. It has a purpose. It is good. We all need it. We all want it. We all enjoy it. And we all must be willing to TRADE something of ourselves to accumulate it.
False: The state is created BY THE PEOPLE for the express purpose of protecting our rights, including property rights. The state does not "create social conditions", that is absurd. You really need to examine your philosophy, which appears to be a mix of collectivism, utilitarianism, determinism, and subjectivism. This mix works well in the auditorium at the University of your choice, but fails when subject to reality.
Quote:
Originally Posted by eschaton
I thus don't begrudge the government anything it wants from my paycheck. It's the dues I pay to be part of civil society.
You are free to give your entire paycheck to whomever you want. But keep your hands off what does not belong to you.
Nonsense. We live in a physical world. The "automation destroying physical labor" argument was false when it was irrationally proposed at the start of the industrial revolution. It is false today. It will be false tomorrow. There was, is, and will always be physical labor to be done.
Great. Someone else who doesn't know squat about mental illness.
People with mental illnesses may be physically capable of performing physical labor, but their illnesses often render them emotionally incapable of doing so.
Quote:
There are always dumb jobs for dumb people, and there will always be, if they want them.
People with mental illnesses are not "dumb".
But anyone who thinks so is pretty darn uneducated.
Great. Someone else who doesn't know squat about mental illness.
People with mental illnesses may be physically capable of performing physical labor, but their illnesses often render them emotionally incapable of doing so.
People with mental illnesses are not "dumb".
But anyone who thinks so is pretty darn uneducated.
You are intentionally misrepresenting. I was talking about truly dumb people, not victims of retardation or birth defects.
1) There is a certain segment of society that is mentally healthy, but somewhat unintelligent and unable to pursue very demanding careers. There are a million physical jobs for those people. And there always will be.
2) Too many people are classified as mentally ill, when true mental illness is exceedingly rare. It started with alcoholism. For most people, alcohol abuse is a character problem, not a disease.
3) Today we have a diagnosis for every stupid choice people want to make. Gambling, drugs, alcohol, sex, shoplifting, even failure to pay attention.
This probably has to do with the medical profession, which has figured out that endless amounts of largesse from the health care industry is possible if we make everything a disease that needs "treatment". First: Remove the fact that the bad choices were consciously made. Second: Establish an addiction angle. Third: Add the suffix "ism" to a proposed illness that will address the "affliction". Fourth: COLLECT THE MONEY FROM THE STATE AND THE STATE-CONTROLLED INSURANCE COMPANIES for treating all the innocent, faultless victims who of course never made the choice to engage in the stupid behavior in the first place.
It's all a sick game. And moving back to the homeless, we see that the game is played here also. The homeless are all "mentally ill" and need "treatment" and free housing and free job training and free mental health case workers and free methadone. Homeless advocacy is now a full-fledged industry and the goal of the Homeless-Industrial complex is to build up the problem and collect billions to "treat" it.
"Of course it's not your fault. Of course you couldn't help it. It's a disease. Like cancer."
Last edited by Marc Paolella; 11-24-2014 at 03:47 PM..
You really should stop posting in this thread. It's clear you have no idea what you're talking about when it comes to mental illness.
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