5 ms·

Why would they lie?

by nwah1 11y ago

Why would they lie?

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
kafkaesq 11y ago
Many people believe the homeless are, by and large possessed of intrinsically low intelligence and/or ethical character, and generally have only themselves to blame for their situation. So (this reasoning goes) when approached by a pollster, why wouldn't they lie?
- JBReefer 11y ago
  Or, less snarkily, some people believe that homeless people are rational actors like the rest of us, and therefore gravitate towards the regions with the highest cash benefits/most generous housing programs/etc. Therefore, it would behoove the homeless to protect those benefits by lying about their point of origination to garner more sympathy from those who pay for their benefits.
  - anigbrowl 11y ago
    Assuming that people are lying on surveys is quite common, but unless there's systematic organized bias sampling theory suggests an approximately equal number of people will lie in the opposite direction and that both 'signals' will fall into the noise floor.
    - JBReefer 11y ago
      However, if there's an incentive to lie, the lies will trend towards the incented direction
- astrodust 11y ago
  This is pretty low even by Hacker News standards. There are some highly intelligent people who are homeless, they have no ethical problems. They may have dependency issues, they might have a mental illness. In the US it's even possible they got wiped out by medical bills and can't afford anything, their credit is destroyed and they're not physically able to work, yet that's just the visible homeless, not all of the actually homeless people. I've been technically homeless for six months. Even though I had money, I had a job, and I spent every day looking for listings, finding a place was crazy hard, every listing would be snapped up within hours of being posted. I ended up couch surfing and living out of my office. It didn't matter that I had a job, that I even owned the company, I was still homeless. It sucked. The place I was renting was sold, I had to move, and the timing was awful. Long-term homeless people have a host of issues that keep them in that trap, but that's a small portion of homeless people in general.
  - kafkaesq 11y ago
    This is pretty low even by Hacker News standards. Woah, big misunderstanding here: I was pointing out that other people believed that -- not that that's what I believe.

Why would they lie?

by nwah1 11y ago

Why would they lie?

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

kafkaesq 11y ago

Many people believe the homeless are, by and large possessed of intrinsically low intelligence and/or ethical character, and generally have only themselves to blame for their situation. So (this reasoning goes) when approached by a pollster, why wouldn't they lie?

JBReefer 11y ago
Or, less snarkily, some people believe that homeless people are rational actors like the rest of us, and therefore gravitate towards the regions with the highest cash benefits/most generous housing programs/etc. Therefore, it would behoove the homeless to protect those benefits by lying about their point of origination to garner more sympathy from those who pay for their benefits.
- anigbrowl 11y ago
  Assuming that people are lying on surveys is quite common, but unless there's systematic organized bias sampling theory suggests an approximately equal number of people will lie in the opposite direction and that both 'signals' will fall into the noise floor.
  - JBReefer 11y ago
    However, if there's an incentive to lie, the lies will trend towards the incented direction
astrodust 11y ago
This is pretty low even by Hacker News standards. There are some highly intelligent people who are homeless, they have no ethical problems. They may have dependency issues, they might have a mental illness. In the US it's even possible they got wiped out by medical bills and can't afford anything, their credit is destroyed and they're not physically able to work, yet that's just the visible homeless, not all of the actually homeless people. I've been technically homeless for six months. Even though I had money, I had a job, and I spent every day looking for listings, finding a place was crazy hard, every listing would be snapped up within hours of being posted. I ended up couch surfing and living out of my office. It didn't matter that I had a job, that I even owned the company, I was still homeless. It sucked. The place I was renting was sold, I had to move, and the timing was awful. Long-term homeless people have a host of issues that keep them in that trap, but that's a small portion of homeless people in general.
- kafkaesq 11y ago
  This is pretty low even by Hacker News standards. Woah, big misunderstanding here: I was pointing out that other people believed that -- not that that's what I believe.