6 ms·

Sorry if I sound flippant but, well maybe I'm being flippant. Your idea of creating jobs is awesome and objectively laudable, but your post ignores the actual r

Sorry if I sound flippant but, well maybe I'm being flippant. Your idea of creating jobs is awesome and objectively laudable, but your post ignores the actual reality of millions of people becoming homeless for reasons out of their control very, very soon. Many people, even if they gained employment at the moment that you're reading this, will be carrying around their blankets and food outside of their former place of housing before the next pay period. The scale of this issue is so incredibly large that it's kind of hard to understand unless you yourself have recently had to pack all your shit up and find a safe place to park for the night (assuming in this case you've got a car, which many do not). I applaud your efforts to create more jobs, which WILL BE HELPFUL, but it's kind of akin to offering bandaids in the WW1 trenches. Useful! But not the solution.

DoreenMichele 6y ago
Feel free to come up with better answers and outshine me and make me look like a fool. I will be happy to sit back and clap and say attaboy/girl! In the meantime, I will continue to offer the spoonful of assistance I'm capable of offering while much of HN seems to pass the popcorn and watch the world burning like it's entertainment.
- robertlagrant 6y ago
  Yeah it's rather easier to say (with no evidence) "yes but that doesn't help 100 % of people" than to do something. Well done for doing something, DoreenMichele.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - newbie789 6y ago
    Are you implying that I've somehow missed evidence that creating some jobs will keep millions of people from becoming homeless in the coming week and my post was simply to be a wet blanket? As I said repeatedly in my post this is a good idea and I applaud her efforts. My point was (I'm sorry that this isn't clear) that the required changes need to be at a much larger scale than individuals creating jobs (unless it's organized at a... much larger scale). While I am absolutely delighted to watch people do what they can, and encourage it wholeheartedly, I'm not all-in on the whole "job creators" idea as a panacea. Infact, if a person chooses to do ONLY the "job creation" thing and declines trying to address systemic issues, I'd also in some cases view them as eating popcorn while they watch the world burn with the added activity of patting themselves on the back. If you were offended by my post, I apologize.
PopeDotNinja 6y ago
I'm smart, hardworking, and educated. In 2009 I still ended up homeless. I couldn't find a job. It happens, and it can happen fast.
- Overtonwindow 6y ago
  Was it because of decisions you made, or someone else?
  - PopeDotNinja 6y ago
    Bad luck, bad timing, and poor life choices. Figurative crippling student debt, literal crippling bike accident (2 broken arms) w/ associated disruptions, an economy in the shitter, and trying to start a startup with savings which didn’t take off before the money ran out. The concept of being homeless didn’t really hit me until after I was homeless. I was sleeping on the floor of someone I just met, and at one point the room got a bit too small for the two of us and he kicked me out. I remember thinking to myself “where am I going to put my stuff tonight?” I could find a place to sleep, but I couldn’t necessarily find a place to sleep & not lose my stuff. I had a laptop that was my lifeline to searching for work, and without that I would have been royally jacked.
    - vertis 6y ago
      Having spent a bunch of time helping homelessness charities in Australia, I now have a much better understanding of it. Enough to realise that I was technically homeless for a while when I was much younger (circa 2004), in the couch-surfing leaning on others kind of way. Some of the associated problems are hard to deal with. Mentally you end up in a spin, spending all your mental energy on making money go far enough. I had very unstable self-employed IT income. No ability to get a job because I'd dropped out of University (because of lack of money). As much as I was never at risk of sleeping rough, it was still a humbling experience. I hadn't really made bad choices*. In hindsight there were many things that I could have done better, swallowing my pride and telling people being at least one. But hindsight is 20/20 and has the benefit of years of reflection. The financial problems took years to resolve even when the income became more stable. It also became a puzzle. In order to get a house you have to have a bond, even finding a share house they want stable income (to be clear I wasn't making nothing it was just sporadic). Not being aware of even where to ask for help is also problematic (There are websites now that help with this a little). There are many reasons that people end up homeless, and to varying degrees. Society tends to lump them all together. Drugs and mental illness may be issues that cause homelessness, but so are unstable finances and domestic violence. Now, it will absolutely be COVID19 related, but that won't change the negative experience.
sixstringtheory 6y ago
You should probably have a look at DoreenMichele’s bio... > I blog about a variety of topics, including things like homelessness and earning money from the street, something I have firsthand experience with.

DoreenMichele 6y ago

Feel free to come up with better answers and outshine me and make me look like a fool. I will be happy to sit back and clap and say attaboy/girl! In the meantime, I will continue to offer the spoonful of assistance I'm capable of offering while much of HN seems to pass the popcorn and watch the world burning like it's entertainment.

robertlagrant 6y ago
Yeah it's rather easier to say (with no evidence) "yes but that doesn't help 100 % of people" than to do something. Well done for doing something, DoreenMichele.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- newbie789 6y ago
  Are you implying that I've somehow missed evidence that creating some jobs will keep millions of people from becoming homeless in the coming week and my post was simply to be a wet blanket? As I said repeatedly in my post this is a good idea and I applaud her efforts. My point was (I'm sorry that this isn't clear) that the required changes need to be at a much larger scale than individuals creating jobs (unless it's organized at a... much larger scale). While I am absolutely delighted to watch people do what they can, and encourage it wholeheartedly, I'm not all-in on the whole "job creators" idea as a panacea. Infact, if a person chooses to do ONLY the "job creation" thing and declines trying to address systemic issues, I'd also in some cases view them as eating popcorn while they watch the world burn with the added activity of patting themselves on the back. If you were offended by my post, I apologize.

PopeDotNinja 6y ago

I'm smart, hardworking, and educated. In 2009 I still ended up homeless. I couldn't find a job. It happens, and it can happen fast.

Overtonwindow 6y ago
Was it because of decisions you made, or someone else?
- PopeDotNinja 6y ago
  Bad luck, bad timing, and poor life choices. Figurative crippling student debt, literal crippling bike accident (2 broken arms) w/ associated disruptions, an economy in the shitter, and trying to start a startup with savings which didn’t take off before the money ran out. The concept of being homeless didn’t really hit me until after I was homeless. I was sleeping on the floor of someone I just met, and at one point the room got a bit too small for the two of us and he kicked me out. I remember thinking to myself “where am I going to put my stuff tonight?” I could find a place to sleep, but I couldn’t necessarily find a place to sleep & not lose my stuff. I had a laptop that was my lifeline to searching for work, and without that I would have been royally jacked.
  - vertis 6y ago
    Having spent a bunch of time helping homelessness charities in Australia, I now have a much better understanding of it. Enough to realise that I was technically homeless for a while when I was much younger (circa 2004), in the couch-surfing leaning on others kind of way. Some of the associated problems are hard to deal with. Mentally you end up in a spin, spending all your mental energy on making money go far enough. I had very unstable self-employed IT income. No ability to get a job because I'd dropped out of University (because of lack of money). As much as I was never at risk of sleeping rough, it was still a humbling experience. I hadn't really made bad choices*. In hindsight there were many things that I could have done better, swallowing my pride and telling people being at least one. But hindsight is 20/20 and has the benefit of years of reflection. The financial problems took years to resolve even when the income became more stable. It also became a puzzle. In order to get a house you have to have a bond, even finding a share house they want stable income (to be clear I wasn't making nothing it was just sporadic). Not being aware of even where to ask for help is also problematic (There are websites now that help with this a little). There are many reasons that people end up homeless, and to varying degrees. Society tends to lump them all together. Drugs and mental illness may be issues that cause homelessness, but so are unstable finances and domestic violence. Now, it will absolutely be COVID19 related, but that won't change the negative experience.

sixstringtheory 6y ago

You should probably have a look at DoreenMichele’s bio... > I blog about a variety of topics, including things like homelessness and earning money from the street, something I have firsthand experience with.