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> Making it sound like deciding to enforce crimes would be easy and cheap and fix ... San Francisco used to enforce these quality of life laws, and things were

> Making it sound like deciding to enforce crimes would be easy and cheap and fix ... San Francisco used to enforce these quality of life laws, and things were different. The thing is that San Franciscans didn’t like that world. Sure, people got in trouble for crapping on the sidewalk, but they didn’t have better places to crap. Instead of creating better places to crap, San Francisco decided not to hassle people for crapping on the sidewalk. I agree that’s a little more compassionate, but it’s not paradise.

m0llusk 7y ago
That is extremely incorrect analysis. Nationwide homelessness used to be extremely rare and limited to mostly middle aged men and older women. Now in America homelessness has become common everywhere and we have homeless working families which simply didn't happen before. Back in the 1970s minimum wage would support a small family and modest homes were available in most markets. Blaming San Francisco for this major nationwide change makes no sense at all. As recently as the mid 1970s simply being black or in a homosexual relationship could get you beaten up and thrown in jail. People rejected this arrangement because it was unfair, unreasonable, and extremely expensive. Then the drug war turned the whole nation into a kind of gulag. Go ahead and object to Chinese treatment of minorities, but we have more in jail here. Neoliberal economists said that if we just lowered taxes enough there would be plenty of opportunity, but modern capitalism runs lean and fires fast. Even basically competent middle aged men can have trouble, so the larger population which includes people of various genders, ages, and capacities is not doing well. Labor markets are as brutal in America now as during the depression. You can't shred labor markets and leave them in tatters and then whine about how society isn't fixing itself like before. The appeal to dominance and laws and enforcement is a silly delusion that we will have to get over if we ever want to make progress with this problem for real.
- maxlybbert 7y ago
  San Francisco certainly did used to enforce quality of life laws, and they certainly have intentionally relaxed that enforcement: “based on the sit/lie ordinance [prohibiting people from sitting or lying on the sidewalk], infractions peaked at 1,011 in 2013, but since that time they have steadily declined, falling to 114 in 2017. ... SFPD's current policy focuses on steering homeless people to shelters, rather than arresting them” ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sit-lie_ordinance#San_Francisco https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sit-lie_ordinance#San_Francisc... ). Incidentally, the city believes there are roughly the same number of homeless people today as there were back when they enforced quality of life laws: “The sense that homelessness itself is exploding in San Francisco is not reflected in the city’s numbers. According to the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing, the city’s homeless population has remained essentially flat in recent years. The agency counted 7,499 people experiencing homelessness in 2017, about 2 percent higher than 2013 levels, and slightly lower than in 2015” ( https://www.citylab.com/equity/2018/08/san-franciscos-sidewalk-poop-problem/566621/ https://www.citylab.com/equity/2018/08/san-franciscos-sidewa... ). They claim that back then, there wasn’t crap on the street because people were crapping in vacant buildings. Now, because of the building boom, there aren’t many vacant buildings. I’m not saying that hassling people for crapping on the street is the right approach. I understand why San Franciscans by and large rejected it. But it absolutely can be done, because that is what they used to do.
  - Data_Junkie 7y ago
    So what the city is saying is more people crap on the streets because there is less shelter ? Wow, color me shocked the reason we have problems with homeless people is that they have no shelter. These geniuses are sure to solve this problem !

m0llusk 7y ago

That is extremely incorrect analysis. Nationwide homelessness used to be extremely rare and limited to mostly middle aged men and older women. Now in America homelessness has become common everywhere and we have homeless working families which simply didn't happen before. Back in the 1970s minimum wage would support a small family and modest homes were available in most markets. Blaming San Francisco for this major nationwide change makes no sense at all. As recently as the mid 1970s simply being black or in a homosexual relationship could get you beaten up and thrown in jail. People rejected this arrangement because it was unfair, unreasonable, and extremely expensive. Then the drug war turned the whole nation into a kind of gulag. Go ahead and object to Chinese treatment of minorities, but we have more in jail here. Neoliberal economists said that if we just lowered taxes enough there would be plenty of opportunity, but modern capitalism runs lean and fires fast. Even basically competent middle aged men can have trouble, so the larger population which includes people of various genders, ages, and capacities is not doing well. Labor markets are as brutal in America now as during the depression. You can't shred labor markets and leave them in tatters and then whine about how society isn't fixing itself like before. The appeal to dominance and laws and enforcement is a silly delusion that we will have to get over if we ever want to make progress with this problem for real.

maxlybbert 7y ago
San Francisco certainly did used to enforce quality of life laws, and they certainly have intentionally relaxed that enforcement: “based on the sit/lie ordinance [prohibiting people from sitting or lying on the sidewalk], infractions peaked at 1,011 in 2013, but since that time they have steadily declined, falling to 114 in 2017. ... SFPD's current policy focuses on steering homeless people to shelters, rather than arresting them” ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sit-lie_ordinance#San_Francisco https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sit-lie_ordinance#San_Francisc... ). Incidentally, the city believes there are roughly the same number of homeless people today as there were back when they enforced quality of life laws: “The sense that homelessness itself is exploding in San Francisco is not reflected in the city’s numbers. According to the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing, the city’s homeless population has remained essentially flat in recent years. The agency counted 7,499 people experiencing homelessness in 2017, about 2 percent higher than 2013 levels, and slightly lower than in 2015” ( https://www.citylab.com/equity/2018/08/san-franciscos-sidewalk-poop-problem/566621/ https://www.citylab.com/equity/2018/08/san-franciscos-sidewa... ). They claim that back then, there wasn’t crap on the street because people were crapping in vacant buildings. Now, because of the building boom, there aren’t many vacant buildings. I’m not saying that hassling people for crapping on the street is the right approach. I understand why San Franciscans by and large rejected it. But it absolutely can be done, because that is what they used to do.
- Data_Junkie 7y ago
  So what the city is saying is more people crap on the streets because there is less shelter ? Wow, color me shocked the reason we have problems with homeless people is that they have no shelter. These geniuses are sure to solve this problem !