We are constantly told that solutions to some of the greatest challenges facing poor and working class people in the U.S. do not exist. Meanwhile, billions taxpayer dollars are being used to fund the genocide of Palestinians.
That very money could have ended homelessness in the United States.
Money for our needs, not the U.S.-Israeli war machine!
Lack of housing really isn’t the root cause of the homeless epidemic. That money would need to go to revamping the mental health services Reagan destroyed to help the chronically homeless.
Lack of affordable housing is certainly an issue.
When rent is over half of your budget, how do you keep a roof over your head when an emergency comes up.
We need mental health care too, but we also need to correct the housing market in general. Building lots of cheap housing is still a good option.
The new housing development near me is trying to sell brownstones for half a million, and the new condos are going for 250K. They’re all nearly empty because very few can afford them. So we either need higher wages, or actually affordable housing. Ideally we’d get both, it’s not like we don’t have the money to try multiple solutions.
Wages have not kept up with everything else.
There are two demographics of homeless people. The first is people who are down on their luck and just need some help to get back on their feet. Those are not the people being talked about when the homelessness epidemic is being discussed.
The homeless epidemic is largely people who are mentally ill, drug addicts, or both.
These people need help, but giving them cheap housing isn’t going to be the help that they really need, and will just end up with them being back on the street.
Housing First is the correct way to reduce homelessness. The main cause of homelessness is being priced out of the housing market, because the vast majority of housing in America is entirely privatized. Plus most public housing in America is not done nor funded well, until our European counterparts.
The problem in America is the housing market is nearly entirely private, zoning laws that prevent dense housing from being built, and the lack of public funded (nice) public housing. Housing is first and foremost an investment here, not a fundamental right to shelter like it should be.
Drug addiction is a symptom of late-stage homelessness, not a cause. The cause is almost always the private housing market pricing people out of affording even rent.
https://www.pdx.edu/homelessness/housing-first
This has worked famously in Finland
Housing is a human right: How Finland is eradicating homelessness - CBC
Here’s how Finland solved its homelessness problem - WEF