I avoid writing about homelessness for the most part, partly because there are just too many aspects that average working people just don't get. People aren't dumb, it's just that they just don't live in the homeless world day to day, and see the actual issues keeping so many people on the streets. It would be like me understanding the issues an airline pilot has day to day. I'm not in that world, so I don't understand the nuances.
Right about now, you are most likely thinking "but that's what shelters are for, to get people off the streets, right" No, homeless shelters, and most programs, funnel homeless people into two tracks, addiction or mental illness, and these two tracks have a bunch of programs to "help" homeless people. They do help in some ways. The part most people don't get is that these programs help homeless people get into a structured environment, and those vary widely. But the purpose of nearly all "homeless programs" is to process the person through a series of programs run by organizations, some non-profit, and some for profit, that get that person on every possible government assistance program. Those government pay for for homeless shelters, motel rooms, "tiny homes," other temporary housing, and eventually "permanent housing." This can be Section 8 housing, or another program.
During this process, there are addiction programs, mental health counseling programs, and medical programs. Nearly all of these are paid for by your tax dollars, or sometimes by grants, to the organizations. In and of itself, there's nothing wrong with that, if these were all efficiently run programs, and got all the homeless people possible working and paying taxes again, renting their own apartments at some point. Shouldn't the point be to get homeless people paying taxes again, whenever possible, instead of living off of them?
But that is not the point of homeless programs. The point of most homeless programs is to get homeless people into a living situation where government funds, your tax dollars, pay for these people to NOT work... for the rest of their lives. Yes, there are a lot of homeless people who will never work a normal job again for medical or other issues. Bu there are also a huge percentage of people who could work again, and our current programs actually pay them not to in most cases. Social Security Disability is full of scammers, millions of them, it appears, who live in apartments, buy food, watch Netflix, and play video games all day, usually with plenty of drugs, if they choose. All this is paid for, sometimes dramatically overpaid for, with your tax dollars.
To get off the streets, and actually start working and making a decent living again, IS NOT the goal. For someone who just wants to get back working again, and renting our own apartment, we need to cross The Gap. To go from panhandling or recycling $5-$10 to buy lunch and bus fare, to earning around $2,500 a month, from the streets, to pay for renting a weekly motel room ($450-$550 a week), or a roommate room ($7000-$900 a month) buy any meds, do laundry, have transportation money, and day to day essential items. If you get kicked off of Food Stamps for working and earning too much, then you need food money as well.
If you go into housing programs, and find a decent paying work, you'll most likely lose your food stamps, Disability, G.R. SSI, or other payments before your earn enough to rent a room of some kind, and pay all normal expenses. Plus you may lose your medical, and everyone on the streets has some kind medical issues, if only minor ones.
In addition, homeless people in prorams are often treated like little kids, have overly strict rules, curfews, and other rules that make the temporary housing programs worse than living on the streets. Yes, rules are needed, I get that. So what I've seen happen, over and over, is people go into programs, and they just work the system for a couple of months, maybe a few months, until they get sick of the B.S.m the rules (can't smoke a cigarette inside or outside, can't have friends into their room, etc.). Then they have a meltdown, or just go AWOL from the program, because they'd prefer their personal freedom on the streets to the life in the program. Then they live the street life of their choice (drugs, alcohol, prositution, or just living alone and free, whatever), until the programs seem worth another chance. That's usually when bad or cold wather hits. Ask a paramedic how many ambulance calls they get right before a big storm or a cold spell. Homeless people call ambulances just to try and get out of the cold all the time.
In the meantime, when a new program gets going, their workers motivation is to stay employed, and the program's motivation is to keep that program going, so they need a continuing stream of new bums to sign-up. I'm not saying these programs don't have value, they help some people leave the streets, and live on a govrnment check, sometimes permanently. S.S. Disability IS Universal Basic Income already, in effect, if not in name, for some sick people, and a lot of lazy people, usually with addictions. These programs, collectively, now run into the billions of dollars now in some metro areas, over a few years time.
Both of these become feedback loops. Homeless people, particularly lazy ones, and many addicts, are used to bouncing in and out of programs, living for months on the street in between. On the flip side, many homeless programs (non-profit and profitable) have a neverending stream of their needed commodity, homless people. These feedback loops have been growing for 20 years or so, and those people who earn their living working in these programs plan to KEEP making their living in them. These cycles keep growing, so the visible street (and RV/van) homless populations keep growing, and the dollars flowing to programs keep growing as well.
Just a reminder, the 10 Year plan to End Homelessness had its 20th anniversary in 2022, it began in 2002. There were A LOT LESS homeless people in 2002.
Meanwhile, the people who are temporarily down and out, and just trying to find decent work again (a "normal" job, gig work, some other legit source of income) have to cross The Gap, from coming up with $5 to $25 a day to get by, to a stream of income of around $2,500 a month to rent a room (motel or roommates), then pay for food, transportation, laundry, new clothes, a storage unit, perhaps education/training, and basic everyday needs. They have to do all of that, while doing what's needed to survive and get by in the streets, or some sketchy situation day after day. It's damn near impossible.
That's why most people just lay back and bounce in and out of programs. Some wind up in Section 8 eventually, some just bounce between the streets and programs indefinitely. This is also why we now have about three men who are unemployed and NOT looking for work, for every "officially" unemployed man that's counted in the unemployment data (See Men Without Work, Nicolas Eberstadt). The numbers are lower for women, but there's a similar trend. The homeless programs are one of many things pulling working age Americans out of the workforce, permanently. Less workers, more strain on Social Security for retires, and government programs of all kinds.
This is just ONE little aspect of the homelessness issue, which I've learned way too much about, and which I really don't want to spend time writing about. But the general lack of understanding of the issues involved bug me. I'm going to get my ass kicked, in some way ,for writing this post. But it needed to be said somewhere.
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