9 ms·

I understand the desire to convert a discussion of homelessness to a discussion of high house prices, but homelessness is not caused by high house prices. 99% p

by rsj_hn 9y ago

I understand the desire to convert a discussion of homelessness to a discussion of high house prices, but homelessness is not caused by high house prices. 99% percent of the population cannot afford to buy a house in Manhattan. That doesn't mean that they are living on the streets there. They move to where they can afford to live, and the U.S. has many areas where housing is quite cheap. If you are able to maintain a steady income, then you can also maintain housing. But if you are not able to maintain a steady income, then there is no price at which you can afford to buy a house. Even if free, you would not be able to pay property taxes, maintenance, or utilities. San Francisco has a high homelessness problem because of the mild climate, large amounts of city services, and the liberal attitude. The homeless people here expect and receive a steady income from people on the street as well city services. I remember the first time I was in San Francisco and someone came up to me and demanded money for food. He said "I don't eat meat!". I was stunned, both at a stranger coming up to me and asking for money and also about why they can be so picky about their diet. I gave him $1. He looked at me like I insulted him and said "Salads cost more than meat". The homeless in San Francisco are really quite aggressive in comparison to other cities, and just like the rest of my fellow San Franciscans, there is a strong feeling of entitlement. There is just no price at which the number of homeless will decrease -- only when we start paying the homeless to live in houses will that happen. The only thing I can think of is fully funded group homes that are mandatory to live in -- basically prisons with nice amenities and educational programs that you can graduate out of based on demonstrating a track record of being able to provide for yourself. Because as long as we give people the option of living on the street, there is a certain small subset of the population that will prefer to do that over the other options available to them, and San Francisco will be home to an outsized share of that population.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
misterhtmlcss 9y ago
Bingo! Some one with big enough balls to say the actually and undesirable reality of homelessness on the streets. The richer the city the greater the homelessness, because the homeless like every animal in the world (us included) goes where life is the easiest. And rich cities, have richer populations that then donate more money to homeless people. In my hometown there are people that quite there jobs to panhandle, because they make more money doing it. It's not common, but it happens and it shows that it's not a simple issue. FYI mental illness is also common in the homeless population and for them I'm very much in favor of looking at any solution that'll help them have the success they desire in their lives. *Just saying.
- jdhzzz 9y ago
  That which you subsidize you get more of.
- slackingoff2017 9y ago
  In my city the panhandlers are professionals. You can find open positions on Craigslist and there's set shifts at standardized locations. If you get up early enough sometimes you'll see a shift change. A cheap cargo van shows up, the guy gets in, and another hops out to take his place. All of the nearby locations with panhandlers are setup this way, maybe a couple hundred spots in the city. Sometimes I wonder how many people there are running the system...
ChuckMcM 9y ago
I think it is absolutely true that homelessness is much more nuanced than "housing is expensive." It is also pretty clear from the last 5 years that where SF is spending its money is not as effective as they would like. (it is called out in the article, millions more spent and the problem hasn't changed). There is also the issue that while you have population counts you can't really track individuals, so did last years money get 5,000 people into homes who have been replaced by 5,000 new people for a net change of zero, or was it just ineffective? Hard to say given the data sets available. One of the observations is that homeless populations tend to self select into encampments. And part of the expense and challenge is that where they choose to camp does not facilitate maintenance (cleaning, services, etc). I have not found any papers or articles on municipalities that have built infrastructure that specifically designed for hosting a homeless encampment. Could you build a system that would support a locally hosted infrastructure? Passive sanitation systems, trash depositories and collection points, water supplies?
boomboomsubban 9y ago
You're saying that the homeless people that approach you for money represent all or most of the homeless people that exist, and that simply isn't true. There are some people that choose a panhandling lifestyle, but there are many more who end up homeless and are too sick or proud to do that.
davidf18 9y ago
In NYC and not only Manhattan housing is expensive. Yet in NYC is where a lot of jobs are. Taking care of very poor populations who may indeed have very high medical costs are substantially reduced by giving them stable housing which is hard to do with zoning density restrictions that makes housing expensive.
- DrScump 9y ago
  very high medical costs are substantially reduced by giving them stable housing Do you know of any study that documents such an effect?
  - Mz 9y ago
    Not exactly what you requested, but a pertinent source: http://www.salon.com/2017/06/10/cuts-in-federal-housing-help-would-hurt-peoples-health-research-suggests_partner/ http://www.salon.com/2017/06/10/cuts-in-federal-housing-help... I also know that health crises for homeless people tend to hard to resolve and cost a lot more than for people who are housed. Medical advice like "stay off your foot and soak it twice a day" simply cannot be complied with if you are homeless. The health issues of the homeless tend to compound and get incredibly expensive, in most cases. Source: I have had a class on homelessness and public policy, I am homeless, I run a few websites pertinent to this problem space. (In essence, I am kind of a SME here.)
  - davidf18 9y ago
    It us known in medical circles that take care of the poor. I am speaking of people that cost the medical system a huge amount of money. This is a great explanation. http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/01/24/the-hot-spotters http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/01/24/the-hot-spotter...
    - DrScump 9y ago
      Saying "it is known" is not data. For example the "it is known" premise that the ACA and Medicaid expansion would result in lower consumption of medical care overall. The opposite has happened. One example, with data: http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/06/21/emergency-room-visits-by-medi-cal-patients-soaring-state-data-shows/ http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/06/21/emergency-room-visits-...
freyir 9y ago
Maybe I look uncharitable, but I very rarely run into panhandlers in San Francisco. Perhaps it depends on the neighborhood. In the Tenderloin and parts of SOMA, there is an abundance of drug addicts and people with mental health issues living on the streets. I'm randomly screamed at or verbally threatened, but they don't ask for money.
- liragg 9y ago
  I started smoking at 15. When I was in my early 40s, i was diagnosed with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD),It was becoming increasingly worse. My dad and his dad died from this. It's a hard disease that seems to start out like bad asthma and progresses into chronic lung infections. One day i saw a blog online,were so many people are writing about how perfect health herbal medicine cured them of COPD,so i contact perfect health herbal medicine home immediately via email,which they replied immediately too ,and told me to purchased the herbal medicine for COPD,They gave me guarantee that i will be cured with 6 weeks of usage,i believed them and purchased,after purchasing ,the herbal medicine was shipped to my home address,i received within 3 days. i used the herbal medicine for 6 weeks ,and i was totally cured of COPD ,All thanks to perfect health medicine home.please get your COPD cure immediately you see these testimony . CONTACT DETAILS; (Email;perfecthealthherbalmedicine @ gmail com) (website:www ' perfecthealthherbal ' weebly ' com)
- closeparen 9y ago
  I used to think there were lots of panhandlers asking for money. Then I realized that there are roughly four different people working BART station entrances along Market Street, who collectively account for 100% of the times I've been asked for money.
BinaryIdiot 9y ago
I've been working in SF for a year now. After working in Baltimore City and going to NYC multiple times, it's amazing just how bad it is in SF. But the vast majority of homeless people I've run into never ask for money but instead simply "exist", sleeping or walking around on the sidewalks. Many, maybe even most, have mental issues that make it harder to re-integrate. While housing prices are a little different, zoning is most certainly an issue as many would much prefer to stay in any type of housing. You suggest making it a requirement but I contest that as that wouldn't actually be constitutional and most of the homeless here would love a place to stay. In NYC there are TONS of places for the homeless to stay but in SF, many shelters will have lines out the door well into the night and into the morning. There just isn't much shelter for them here. Attempting to build new homeless housing is always faced with NIMBY opposition.
- rsj_hn 9y ago
  Sure, they would love a place to stay, as long as someone else took care of it and paid all the bills. But the same difficulty with life that causes them to be where they are -- whether mental, physical, or abuse related, is going to prevent them from being self-sufficient even if the rent they have to pay is zero. In terms of being unconstitutional, maybe it is, but it's the only solution to this problem. People who are unable to take care of their basic needs and defecate on the streets need to be forced into group home situations until they demonstrate an ability to handle the difficulties of managing self-care.
  - HumbleGamer 9y ago
    Not to be rude, but you sound like the out of towners we are sick of already in the bay area.
    - tomcam 9y ago
      Please read grandparent's other posts. They are thoughtful, born from experience, and (IMHO) dead on.
  - BinaryIdiot 9y ago
Mz 9y ago
but homelessness is not caused by high house prices. I have had an actual college class on homelessness and public policy. There is no single cause of homelessness, but sky high housing costs definitely contribute to homelessness. There has been a serious and growing lack of affordable housing in the U.S. going back decades, about 80% of SROs were torn down in the 60s and 70s at a time when they weren't really needed for demographic reasons but they were never replaced, and average housing size has more than doubled while average number of occupants has dropped. Meanwhile, homelessness has been on the rise nationwide for years. No, high housing costs do not single handedly and directly cause homelessness. But that's because there is no single cause of homelessness. But high housing costs are absolutely a contributing factor. Your dystopian solution of basically imprisoning the poor is outlandish.
- sillysaurus3 9y ago
  Your dystopian solution of basically imprisoning the poor is outlandish. There's a Star Trek episode that explores this idea. http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Sanctuary_District http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Sanctuary_District It's difficult to think of ways of combating homelessness. To get them on their feet, you might need to redefine what a job is. A normal job requires some common elements: a shower, the ability to be there on a regular schedule, some productive task to do. But homeless people don't really have the ability to do any of those, except perhaps show up during regular hours. It's hard to shake the feeling that the only solution is to give them money, and that most of them will just spend it on drugs or alcohol. But that's too heartless of an outlook. Some people who fall into homelessness are just like you or me. When your family connections fail and you have a debilitating illness, homelessness tends to result. And those kinds of people could be pulled out, if only we could figure out how. There are homeless people that are essentially unsalvageable, though, and it's hard to know what to do with them. No family, no home, but most critically no willingness to help themselves even when given a small opportunity. But they still have friends, and if we focus on helping their friends out of homelessness, they might want to follow.
  - Mz 9y ago
    Just because you can't imagine a solution does not mean there is none. Steve Jobs was homeless for a time. Richard Stallman was sometimes 'between apartments' while working on his open source stuff and had trouble getting a voter registration card because of it until some big publication listed his maker space as his address and then the registrar of voters was finally willing to accept that answer. I am homeless and have had a class on homelessness and these are two of my websites: http://whathelpsthehomeless.blogspot.com/ http://whathelpsthehomeless.blogspot.com/ http://sandiegohomelesssurvivalguide.blogspot.com/ http://sandiegohomelesssurvivalguide.blogspot.com/ I also started a Reddit recently called Housing Works and I have various related little blogs, like Project SRO. I am still kind of throwing things at a wall and seeing what sticks, but the San Diego Homeless Survival Guide is a thing I started for myself in order to keep track of useful info I needed while homeless in downtown San Diego and I abandoned it after I left downtown. It was not updated at all for six months and then I realized it had organic traffic. It has the most organic traffic of any site I run because there is need for the info. A lot of people who have spent time homeless are ashamed of that fact and don't volunteer that information normally. Even those who are not ashamed and not actively hiding it, well, you don't know just from looking at someone that they used to be homeless. Lots of people do get off the street. It is not a permanent situation for everyone. However, homelessness has been on the rise nationwide for some years now and it does concern me that there are larger forces at play here that are causing it to be more of an uphill battle than it used to be.
pvnick 9y ago
> The only thing I can think of is fully funded group homes that are mandatory to live in -- basically prisons with nice amenities and educational programs that you can graduate out of based on demonstrating a track record of being able to provide for yourself Sounds like a great premise for a dystopian short story
kevinburke 9y ago
> homelessness is not caused by high house prices For what it's worth, 70% of SF's homeless population lived in SF in homes before they were on the street. It's probably fair to assume that if rents were lower, more of those people would still be in homes.
- chrinic726 9y ago
  Not everyone is entitled to live in San Francisco. You are either (1) rich and are able to live in SF or (2) you are a recent college grad making $80K, will eventually be forced to return to your home state or continue downgrading your housing situation untill homelessness ensues (I've talked to many homeless individuals and many do have a college degree).
- masonic 9y ago
  Source? SF's official stats have most of their homeless coming from outside of the city/county altogether with their sole SF "residence" being shelters and/or outdoors.
  - kevinburke 9y ago
    https://mobile.twitter.com/alastairgee/status/875756743522897920 https://mobile.twitter.com/alastairgee/status/87575674352289...
pimmen 9y ago
As soon as someone starts pulling out anecdotes to generalize people, I don't read much past that. And seriously, locking up people for not living in homes and working? We used to do that in my country back in the late 19th century, it was a very handy law for the government to dust off when you had to jail protesters or strikers in the street.

by rsj_hn 9y ago

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

misterhtmlcss 9y ago

Bingo! Some one with big enough balls to say the actually and undesirable reality of homelessness on the streets. The richer the city the greater the homelessness, because the homeless like every animal in the world (us included) goes where life is the easiest. And rich cities, have richer populations that then donate more money to homeless people. In my hometown there are people that quite there jobs to panhandle, because they make more money doing it. It's not common, but it happens and it shows that it's not a simple issue. FYI mental illness is also common in the homeless population and for them I'm very much in favor of looking at any solution that'll help them have the success they desire in their lives. *Just saying.

jdhzzz 9y ago
That which you subsidize you get more of.
slackingoff2017 9y ago
In my city the panhandlers are professionals. You can find open positions on Craigslist and there's set shifts at standardized locations. If you get up early enough sometimes you'll see a shift change. A cheap cargo van shows up, the guy gets in, and another hops out to take his place. All of the nearby locations with panhandlers are setup this way, maybe a couple hundred spots in the city. Sometimes I wonder how many people there are running the system...

ChuckMcM 9y ago

I think it is absolutely true that homelessness is much more nuanced than "housing is expensive." It is also pretty clear from the last 5 years that where SF is spending its money is not as effective as they would like. (it is called out in the article, millions more spent and the problem hasn't changed). There is also the issue that while you have population counts you can't really track individuals, so did last years money get 5,000 people into homes who have been replaced by 5,000 new people for a net change of zero, or was it just ineffective? Hard to say given the data sets available. One of the observations is that homeless populations tend to self select into encampments. And part of the expense and challenge is that where they choose to camp does not facilitate maintenance (cleaning, services, etc). I have not found any papers or articles on municipalities that have built infrastructure that specifically designed for hosting a homeless encampment. Could you build a system that would support a locally hosted infrastructure? Passive sanitation systems, trash depositories and collection points, water supplies?

boomboomsubban 9y ago

You're saying that the homeless people that approach you for money represent all or most of the homeless people that exist, and that simply isn't true. There are some people that choose a panhandling lifestyle, but there are many more who end up homeless and are too sick or proud to do that.

davidf18 9y ago

In NYC and not only Manhattan housing is expensive. Yet in NYC is where a lot of jobs are. Taking care of very poor populations who may indeed have very high medical costs are substantially reduced by giving them stable housing which is hard to do with zoning density restrictions that makes housing expensive.

DrScump 9y ago
very high medical costs are substantially reduced by giving them stable housing Do you know of any study that documents such an effect?
- Mz 9y ago
  Not exactly what you requested, but a pertinent source: http://www.salon.com/2017/06/10/cuts-in-federal-housing-help-would-hurt-peoples-health-research-suggests_partner/ http://www.salon.com/2017/06/10/cuts-in-federal-housing-help... I also know that health crises for homeless people tend to hard to resolve and cost a lot more than for people who are housed. Medical advice like "stay off your foot and soak it twice a day" simply cannot be complied with if you are homeless. The health issues of the homeless tend to compound and get incredibly expensive, in most cases. Source: I have had a class on homelessness and public policy, I am homeless, I run a few websites pertinent to this problem space. (In essence, I am kind of a SME here.)
- davidf18 9y ago
  It us known in medical circles that take care of the poor. I am speaking of people that cost the medical system a huge amount of money. This is a great explanation. http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/01/24/the-hot-spotters http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/01/24/the-hot-spotter...
  - DrScump 9y ago
    Saying "it is known" is not data. For example the "it is known" premise that the ACA and Medicaid expansion would result in lower consumption of medical care overall. The opposite has happened. One example, with data: http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/06/21/emergency-room-visits-by-medi-cal-patients-soaring-state-data-shows/ http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/06/21/emergency-room-visits-...

freyir 9y ago

Maybe I look uncharitable, but I very rarely run into panhandlers in San Francisco. Perhaps it depends on the neighborhood. In the Tenderloin and parts of SOMA, there is an abundance of drug addicts and people with mental health issues living on the streets. I'm randomly screamed at or verbally threatened, but they don't ask for money.

liragg 9y ago
I started smoking at 15. When I was in my early 40s, i was diagnosed with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD),It was becoming increasingly worse. My dad and his dad died from this. It's a hard disease that seems to start out like bad asthma and progresses into chronic lung infections. One day i saw a blog online,were so many people are writing about how perfect health herbal medicine cured them of COPD,so i contact perfect health herbal medicine home immediately via email,which they replied immediately too ,and told me to purchased the herbal medicine for COPD,They gave me guarantee that i will be cured with 6 weeks of usage,i believed them and purchased,after purchasing ,the herbal medicine was shipped to my home address,i received within 3 days. i used the herbal medicine for 6 weeks ,and i was totally cured of COPD ,All thanks to perfect health medicine home.please get your COPD cure immediately you see these testimony . CONTACT DETAILS; (Email;perfecthealthherbalmedicine @ gmail com) (website:www ' perfecthealthherbal ' weebly ' com)
closeparen 9y ago
I used to think there were lots of panhandlers asking for money. Then I realized that there are roughly four different people working BART station entrances along Market Street, who collectively account for 100% of the times I've been asked for money.

BinaryIdiot 9y ago

I've been working in SF for a year now. After working in Baltimore City and going to NYC multiple times, it's amazing just how bad it is in SF. But the vast majority of homeless people I've run into never ask for money but instead simply "exist", sleeping or walking around on the sidewalks. Many, maybe even most, have mental issues that make it harder to re-integrate. While housing prices are a little different, zoning is most certainly an issue as many would much prefer to stay in any type of housing. You suggest making it a requirement but I contest that as that wouldn't actually be constitutional and most of the homeless here would love a place to stay. In NYC there are TONS of places for the homeless to stay but in SF, many shelters will have lines out the door well into the night and into the morning. There just isn't much shelter for them here. Attempting to build new homeless housing is always faced with NIMBY opposition.

rsj_hn 9y ago
Sure, they would love a place to stay, as long as someone else took care of it and paid all the bills. But the same difficulty with life that causes them to be where they are -- whether mental, physical, or abuse related, is going to prevent them from being self-sufficient even if the rent they have to pay is zero. In terms of being unconstitutional, maybe it is, but it's the only solution to this problem. People who are unable to take care of their basic needs and defecate on the streets need to be forced into group home situations until they demonstrate an ability to handle the difficulties of managing self-care.
- HumbleGamer 9y ago
  Not to be rude, but you sound like the out of towners we are sick of already in the bay area.
  - tomcam 9y ago
    Please read grandparent's other posts. They are thoughtful, born from experience, and (IMHO) dead on.
- BinaryIdiot 9y ago

Mz 9y ago

but homelessness is not caused by high house prices. I have had an actual college class on homelessness and public policy. There is no single cause of homelessness, but sky high housing costs definitely contribute to homelessness. There has been a serious and growing lack of affordable housing in the U.S. going back decades, about 80% of SROs were torn down in the 60s and 70s at a time when they weren't really needed for demographic reasons but they were never replaced, and average housing size has more than doubled while average number of occupants has dropped. Meanwhile, homelessness has been on the rise nationwide for years. No, high housing costs do not single handedly and directly cause homelessness. But that's because there is no single cause of homelessness. But high housing costs are absolutely a contributing factor. Your dystopian solution of basically imprisoning the poor is outlandish.

sillysaurus3 9y ago
Your dystopian solution of basically imprisoning the poor is outlandish. There's a Star Trek episode that explores this idea. http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Sanctuary_District http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Sanctuary_District It's difficult to think of ways of combating homelessness. To get them on their feet, you might need to redefine what a job is. A normal job requires some common elements: a shower, the ability to be there on a regular schedule, some productive task to do. But homeless people don't really have the ability to do any of those, except perhaps show up during regular hours. It's hard to shake the feeling that the only solution is to give them money, and that most of them will just spend it on drugs or alcohol. But that's too heartless of an outlook. Some people who fall into homelessness are just like you or me. When your family connections fail and you have a debilitating illness, homelessness tends to result. And those kinds of people could be pulled out, if only we could figure out how. There are homeless people that are essentially unsalvageable, though, and it's hard to know what to do with them. No family, no home, but most critically no willingness to help themselves even when given a small opportunity. But they still have friends, and if we focus on helping their friends out of homelessness, they might want to follow.
- Mz 9y ago
  Just because you can't imagine a solution does not mean there is none. Steve Jobs was homeless for a time. Richard Stallman was sometimes 'between apartments' while working on his open source stuff and had trouble getting a voter registration card because of it until some big publication listed his maker space as his address and then the registrar of voters was finally willing to accept that answer. I am homeless and have had a class on homelessness and these are two of my websites: http://whathelpsthehomeless.blogspot.com/ http://whathelpsthehomeless.blogspot.com/ http://sandiegohomelesssurvivalguide.blogspot.com/ http://sandiegohomelesssurvivalguide.blogspot.com/ I also started a Reddit recently called Housing Works and I have various related little blogs, like Project SRO. I am still kind of throwing things at a wall and seeing what sticks, but the San Diego Homeless Survival Guide is a thing I started for myself in order to keep track of useful info I needed while homeless in downtown San Diego and I abandoned it after I left downtown. It was not updated at all for six months and then I realized it had organic traffic. It has the most organic traffic of any site I run because there is need for the info. A lot of people who have spent time homeless are ashamed of that fact and don't volunteer that information normally. Even those who are not ashamed and not actively hiding it, well, you don't know just from looking at someone that they used to be homeless. Lots of people do get off the street. It is not a permanent situation for everyone. However, homelessness has been on the rise nationwide for some years now and it does concern me that there are larger forces at play here that are causing it to be more of an uphill battle than it used to be.

pvnick 9y ago

> The only thing I can think of is fully funded group homes that are mandatory to live in -- basically prisons with nice amenities and educational programs that you can graduate out of based on demonstrating a track record of being able to provide for yourself Sounds like a great premise for a dystopian short story

kevinburke 9y ago

> homelessness is not caused by high house prices For what it's worth, 70% of SF's homeless population lived in SF in homes before they were on the street. It's probably fair to assume that if rents were lower, more of those people would still be in homes.

chrinic726 9y ago
Not everyone is entitled to live in San Francisco. You are either (1) rich and are able to live in SF or (2) you are a recent college grad making $80K, will eventually be forced to return to your home state or continue downgrading your housing situation untill homelessness ensues (I've talked to many homeless individuals and many do have a college degree).
masonic 9y ago
Source? SF's official stats have most of their homeless coming from outside of the city/county altogether with their sole SF "residence" being shelters and/or outdoors.
- kevinburke 9y ago
  https://mobile.twitter.com/alastairgee/status/875756743522897920 https://mobile.twitter.com/alastairgee/status/87575674352289...

pimmen 9y ago

As soon as someone starts pulling out anecdotes to generalize people, I don't read much past that. And seriously, locking up people for not living in homes and working? We used to do that in my country back in the late 19th century, it was a very handy law for the government to dust off when you had to jail protesters or strikers in the street.