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Thanks for the question. I'm saying it should be easy to solve for the richest country in the World given the sheer amount of resources it possess. It looks i

Thanks for the question. I'm saying it should be easy to solve for the richest country in the World given the sheer amount of resources it possess. It looks impossible for the same exact country, because the society there doesn't like the solution. Or to be more precise, they don't like being told that if other have solved it, they should just copy what the others have done. Looks like that if you try to teach America something, the knee jerk reaction is always "X is of course underestimating something, the problem is hard, the solution can't be that easy and if X is proposing it is obviously wrong, or X would be richer then us" Other countries have solved it, so it is solvable. Solvable doesn't even mean it will disappear in this case, it means the situation can drammatically improve just by tuning a few knobs. Like wearing and not wearing a mask, keeping or not keeping social distance, etc. you put all of these precautions together and you magically have much better chances of avoiding the contagion. It is that simple. Why it isn't in the US? Because they don't want to solve it. It would be as easy as reading the Wikipedia page on homelessness in Japan, for example I'm taking Japan as an example because it was struggling with the problem, then they changed approach to it and have radically improved the condition of homeless people and reduce their number. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homelessness_in_Japan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homelessness_in_Japan > At the beginning of the 1990s, the homeless in Japan were viewed as a nuisance. The government tried to get rid of the people on streets because of "beautification programmes". Only in 1997 did Tokyo at last acknowledge the existence of homeless group representatives and start listening to their issues. > I'll be honest, it seems like english is your second language and you're struggling to connect a few different ideas I could write it in Italian, French, Spanish and even in bad German, but that would make it harder for people to follow. The best I can do is my confusing English, sorry.

BobbyJo 6y ago
First, Japan's lower incidence of homeless is an anomaly mostly owing to the countries culture of extreme personal responsibility. If you've ever been to Japan you'd notice that extends to basically everything they do in public. Changing the culture of a melting pot of 300 million people is significantly harder than reading a wikipedia page. Side note (as someone whose been to Japan several times, and has several close friends who are Japanese citizens) Japan's homelessness problem is much more extreme in severity than raw number would lead you to believe. They have a smaller incidence, and the homeless themselves tend to try very hard to stay out of the way, but in the words of a Japanese friend "Japanese homeless are very very homeless". They aren't just people down on their luck, they are people with extreme mental and developmental impairments. Japan has an altogether different problem when it comes to homeless than other nations, not to mention many non-profits think the government's official numbers underreport the population of homeless by 2-3x.(TL;DR: Japan is a really awful model for any other country to follow.) Second, the US has a lower incidence of homeless people than many countries with much more generous social programs (Canada, France, UK, New Zealand). Saying we just aren't throwing enough of our wealth at the problem is also evidently wrong. (You can look that up on Wikipedia) Third, the homeless rate in the US has been on the decline for decades. So blowing San Francisco's problems up into some larger conversation that the US as a whole is failing is just inaccurate.
- pompeirules 6y ago
  > Second, the US has a lower incidence of homeless people than many countries with much more generous social programs US have 17/100k of population, Italy has 8. We are not famous for being big on personal responsibility. > Japanese homeless are very very homeless They are 0.3/100k of population though or roughly 56 times less than US. At that level the problem is solved, not completely, but at least the number the country has to deal with is manageable. If US had the same share of homeless people of Italy (and they could do muuuuuuch better than us) they would have half of the homeless population. Which is a radical improvement if you ask me. > Third, the homeless rate in the US has been on the decline for decades. Is it? According to the stats it increased from 2018 onwards from previous years https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/09/18/surprising-holes-our-knowledge-americas-homeless-population/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/09/18/surprisin...
  - BobbyJo 6y ago
    >US have 17/100k of population, Italy has 8. We are not famous for being big on personal responsibility. I didn't say we were the best, just that we are doing better than some who are throwing much more money at the problem. So money obviously isn't the issue. >They are 0.3/100k of population though or roughly 56 times less than US. >At that level the problem is solved, not completely, but at least the number the country has to deal with is manageable. >If US had the same share of homeless people of Italy (and they could do muuuuuuch better than us) they would have half of the homeless population. >Which is a radical improvement if you ask me. Yeah, again, the US isn't the best. You can find many countries with lower homeless rates. We can do better. The countries with the best rates can do better. So what? Japan has one of the highest suicide rates in the world. Italy has double the unemployment of the rest of the EU average. "Do what they do" is obviously not good advice in a general sense. Homelessness is a hard problem, but San Francisco specifically is doing an awful job, even relative to the US as a whole, managing it because of local politics. >According to the stats it increased from 2018 onwards from previous years And I'm sure COVID-19 made things worse as well, but I said decades, not years. Years are lumpy, but the trend line at least since 2007 is very much downward.

BobbyJo 6y ago

First, Japan's lower incidence of homeless is an anomaly mostly owing to the countries culture of extreme personal responsibility. If you've ever been to Japan you'd notice that extends to basically everything they do in public. Changing the culture of a melting pot of 300 million people is significantly harder than reading a wikipedia page. Side note (as someone whose been to Japan several times, and has several close friends who are Japanese citizens) Japan's homelessness problem is much more extreme in severity than raw number would lead you to believe. They have a smaller incidence, and the homeless themselves tend to try very hard to stay out of the way, but in the words of a Japanese friend "Japanese homeless are very very homeless". They aren't just people down on their luck, they are people with extreme mental and developmental impairments. Japan has an altogether different problem when it comes to homeless than other nations, not to mention many non-profits think the government's official numbers underreport the population of homeless by 2-3x.(TL;DR: Japan is a really awful model for any other country to follow.) Second, the US has a lower incidence of homeless people than many countries with much more generous social programs (Canada, France, UK, New Zealand). Saying we just aren't throwing enough of our wealth at the problem is also evidently wrong. (You can look that up on Wikipedia) Third, the homeless rate in the US has been on the decline for decades. So blowing San Francisco's problems up into some larger conversation that the US as a whole is failing is just inaccurate.

pompeirules 6y ago
> Second, the US has a lower incidence of homeless people than many countries with much more generous social programs US have 17/100k of population, Italy has 8. We are not famous for being big on personal responsibility. > Japanese homeless are very very homeless They are 0.3/100k of population though or roughly 56 times less than US. At that level the problem is solved, not completely, but at least the number the country has to deal with is manageable. If US had the same share of homeless people of Italy (and they could do muuuuuuch better than us) they would have half of the homeless population. Which is a radical improvement if you ask me. > Third, the homeless rate in the US has been on the decline for decades. Is it? According to the stats it increased from 2018 onwards from previous years https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/09/18/surprising-holes-our-knowledge-americas-homeless-population/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/09/18/surprisin...
- BobbyJo 6y ago
  >US have 17/100k of population, Italy has 8. We are not famous for being big on personal responsibility. I didn't say we were the best, just that we are doing better than some who are throwing much more money at the problem. So money obviously isn't the issue. >They are 0.3/100k of population though or roughly 56 times less than US. >At that level the problem is solved, not completely, but at least the number the country has to deal with is manageable. >If US had the same share of homeless people of Italy (and they could do muuuuuuch better than us) they would have half of the homeless population. >Which is a radical improvement if you ask me. Yeah, again, the US isn't the best. You can find many countries with lower homeless rates. We can do better. The countries with the best rates can do better. So what? Japan has one of the highest suicide rates in the world. Italy has double the unemployment of the rest of the EU average. "Do what they do" is obviously not good advice in a general sense. Homelessness is a hard problem, but San Francisco specifically is doing an awful job, even relative to the US as a whole, managing it because of local politics. >According to the stats it increased from 2018 onwards from previous years And I'm sure COVID-19 made things worse as well, but I said decades, not years. Years are lumpy, but the trend line at least since 2007 is very much downward.