26 ms·

Policies that make the poor less poor

223 points by DoreenMichele 5y ago

admax88q 5y ago
Slight tangent but I've always wondered what the economic impact would be if public transit were just free. If there was no monetary nor mental overhead to getting around the city could that boost commerce enough to pay for it?
- netizen-936824 5y ago
  That could also be good for the environment, in that it encourages use of shared transportation and lowers barriers.
- toast0 5y ago
  Seattle used to have free transit inside the downtown core, maybe there's some data from the period they were doing that.
  - xyzzyz 5y ago
    Yes, Seattle discontinued its mobile homeless shelter program, and instead moved it to occupy city parks and sidewalk greenery.
  - xenocyon 5y ago
    Long-time Seattle resident and transit rider here. Seattle's erstwhile "Ride Free Zone" was instituted with the aim of promoting tourist activity and applied solely to rides that began and ended within a tiny part of the city center; for example, if you were a homeless person in the U District making a trip downtown, you would still have to pay, each way. So - except for very short trips - it was not necessarily something that meaningfully benefited poor people nor low-income people. More recently Seattle's Transit Riders Union (among other groups) has advocated for more substantial free transit. Some baby steps in this direction have been realized with such things as free transit for high school students.
- oconnor663 5y ago
  My understanding is that one of the serious practical downsides to free public transit in American cities is that lots of homeless people use it. This sounds silly (like, isn't that the goal?), but some fraction of those people are smelly and/or scary, and what tends to happen is that anyone who has a choice stops using those parts of the system. And then however one might feel about that outcome, what tends to happen next is that the transit system loses political support and funding. There's probably a common sense solution somewhere that includes both free ridership and also fairly strong enforcement around loitering and hygeine, but I don't know if any city has managed to really nail it. Incidentally, I think a lot of similar problems come up in cities that have free public bathrooms. A small number of abusers tend to make those bathrooms extremely unpleasant for everyone else.
  - bombcar 5y ago
    This is it exactly - in areas without a "homeless problem" however you want to define that - you have a completely workable solution (example: airport shuttle trains, etc). Where you have an issue the fare requirement is often used an excuse to enforce a minimum level of "cleanliness" if you will.
  - analog31 5y ago
    This sounds like a strange idea, but when I traveled in Europe, there were always first and second class carriages on the trains. You could do the same thing with transit. Every other bus is free. People could then choose between hanging out with the people for a few blocks, or paying for a ride.
    - ampdepolymerase 5y ago
      What an innovative idea! Here in the states, economic indicators are a great proxy for many other aspects. Maybe we could do a trial in Montgomery, Alabama, surely nothing would go wrong.
      - mikro2nd 5y ago
        It would be helpful to us non-US persons if you'd explain what signal you're proxying with "Montgomery, Alabama". As it is this means nothing to a large number of people reading your comment.
- 73gfg 5y ago
  Transport within Melbourne's entire downtown area is free: https://www.ptv.vic.gov.au/assets/default-site/Maps-and-Timetables-PDFs/Maps/Network-maps/5b4a3efe80/PTV-Free-Tram-Zone-Map.pdf https://www.ptv.vic.gov.au/assets/default-site/Maps-and-Time...
  - senectus1 5y ago
    Same in Perth Western Australia also the current Lab gov has promised to cap Public Transport at a maximum of $4.90. A pretty significant saving https://twitter.com/MarkMcGowanMP/status/1350648142585217025/photo/1 https://twitter.com/MarkMcGowanMP/status/1350648142585217025... *Goes into effect Jan 2022
  - pomian 5y ago
    Calgary, Canada; has free transit in the downtown core. But not very far, and not to the suburbs. But makes it very convenient when you are in the centre, and don't need to think twice about moving around that core.
    - Mandatum 5y ago
      In Vancouver it's unenforced, about half of people actually pay for their tickets.
  - gelatocar 5y ago
    The free tram zone is great, but only covers the CBD which is pretty tiny.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- jandrewrogers 5y ago
  This has been done, I’ve lived in cities where this was the case for a while. In at least some cities, this turned public transit into a mobile homeless shelter, drug den, etc. So normal people stopped using public transit because it was unsafe and unpleasant.
- aaron695 5y ago
  Free public transport has been researched and it's not clear if it's positive. It's certainly not a slam dunk community good - https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S2213624X17300858 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S22136... ( https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cstp.2017.10.002 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cstp.2017.10.002 )
  - admax88q 5y ago
    Abstract from your link suggests that the study was pretty inconclusive. > Findings suggest certain flaws limit the program’s potential success since the program design is misaligned with its primary stated goals, and several program goals relating to external effects of fare reform cannot be evaluated. Although it would be valuable for transport managers in other cities to learn about this experience, the Tallinn fare-free public transport program provides scant transferable evidence about how such a program can operate outside of a politicized context,
  - Cthulhu_ 5y ago
    Anecdotal: The Dutch government offers students free public transit. This allowed me and millions of others to be able to attend a much better (college, uni level) education than I would otherwise be able to have. Or it would involve a 25 kilometer bike ride every day. Another anecdotal one: Many companies offer travel / commute expense cover. If my commute wasn't covered by my employer, I'd be spending €250 a month out of pocket just to get to work (in addition to the time spent). It would make me reconsider working for that employer in favor of something more local.
    - josephcsible 5y ago
      I like these kinds of solutions way better than just removing all fare gates, because then you won't have a huge influx of people who will abuse the service and drive away anyone with the means to avoid public transit.
- shaggyfrog 5y ago
  Why would public transportation need to be paid for by "boosted commerce" to be beneficial? Why does it need to be profitable? As a public service, do we ask fire departments to be profitable? What consequences happen when we try and make other essential services profitable, e.g. police? Should armed forces be made to be profitable? How do you define profitability in the first place... how do you define the costs and benefits? Why does this question only ever seem to come up when we're talking about things that raise quality of life for the poor?
  - josephcsible 5y ago
    > Why does it need to be profitable? It doesn't need to be profitable, but if it isn't, then the money to subsidize it needs to come from somewhere. Do you think raising taxes for this would be politically popular, especially if most taxpayers wouldn't use it? > As a public service, do we ask fire departments to be profitable? It is politically popular to use tax dollars to fund fire departments. > Should armed forces be made to be profitable? This is a textbook example of a public good. You can't give national defense only to people who pay for it. Either the whole country has it or nobody does. > How do you define profitability in the first place... how do you define the costs and benefits? This seems fairly obvious: if the income from fares exceeds the costs to pay the drivers, maintain the vehicles, etc. > Why does this question only ever seem to come up when we're talking about things that raise quality of life for the poor? Because people don't like paying for things that they don't get value from, even if other people do.
    - asdff 5y ago
      In LA a majority of voters elected to raise sales taxes several times to improve transit, despite only like 20% of commuters using it city wide (transit use is extremely high in certain neighborhoods like Westlake, though). LA metro is considering slashing fares because they make up something like 5% of the operating budget, thanks to these sales tax measures and federal grants. It's not just LA metro that is funded like this, cleveland RTA is also funded by a portion of sales tax revenues.
    - shaggyfrog 5y ago
- renewiltord 5y ago
  SF public transit is de facto free. I don’t think it’s led to any particular surge of commercial activity.
  - kelnos 5y ago
    > SF public transit is de facto free. Huh? I mean, sure, enforcement is pretty lax, but most people who ride buses in SF do indeed pay. The homeless generally do not, and drivers look the other way. (Frankly, I'm ok with this, as long as they aren't violent or using the bus as a toilet.)
- asdff 5y ago
  I commute on transit and in my experience, those that can't afford transit simply don't pay the fare, so I'd guess impact would be pretty limited for those that might benefit the most from free transit. They either hop on via the back of the bus on the second set of doors away from the driver, walk directly onto the train platform without tapping up a fare card, or for the few stations that do have turnstyles, they use the emergency exit gate which says is alarmed, but in fact is not and swings open freely.
- throwaway0a5e 5y ago
  > Slight tangent but I've always wondered what the economic impact would be if public transit were just free. Look at areas where the cost of distance is high. Rural areas. Areas with bad transit. Islands. Then reverse that. Basically anything you do to decrease the cost (in money or time) of moving from A to B flattens the cost of living. The poor guy who just wants to hang a picture doesn't have to put up with the insane costs of some wire and nails at the local hardware store that mostly caters to yuppies and has the pricing to match. He can justify the cost in time and money of getting on the subway or get in his car and go where it's cheap. Now apply this to every economic transaction from buying milk to getting a job and everything in-between. The second and third order effects are immense. People can afford to stop transacting with bad jobs and bad landlords because they can afford to access the alternative equivalent services. Of course improving transit never gets much support because the people with the money don't want it spend on the subways they don't use and they don't want to have to compete with the poors for access to car infrastructure so you never see that stuff democratized, just more fees and whatnot to discourage use by those not wealthy enough.
- tomjen3 5y ago
  I don't know how much that will matter in the states, but when we tried it in Denmark (in some towns), it meant people took the bus more - but it was those who would otherwise take their bike or walk, not people who would otherwise use their car. It makes sense too. I can get a 30 day pass to drive with public transportation as much as I want, but it is so much faster to take my car that I essentially only take it (prepandemic).
fungiblecog 5y ago
Our overlords have no desire to make the poor less poor
ElViajero 5y ago
If you look at the list some are enablers that help to achieve the others. If you get this ones: - Get to where they need to go conveniently and inexpensively. - Get access to education, training and credentialing. - Get access to things that support their health, whether that is nutritious food, adequate exercise, clean air or medical treatment. It is easier to get this other ones: - Access housing that is within their budget. - Get access to earned income. All this seems quite basic. And it should be in place as it benefits everybody in the long term. But, I guess that that's the problem, short term some people will get more if this does not happen. Long term investment is lacking.
- mym1990 5y ago
  This is just a hunch, and obviously overly simplistic but I think the key phrase is investment in that a lot of infrastructure or policy action looks for tangible ROI and the people at the top either don't believe that it is there for these types of issues, or it doesn't fall within their ideology to help provide such things. And this is a total shame because society can benefit so much if we were able to look past the dollar sign as a measuring stick.
adolph 5y ago
I have a disability but didn't have money to get a doctor's appointment to fill out the paperwork proving I qualified for discounted bus fare as a disabled person. One of the things I wished for while homeless was a program that would provide me with free access to a doctor for purposes of filling out such paperwork and getting me access to the discount to which I am legally entitled but have never received. [...] In my case, without ever managing to arrange to get my disabled fare card, my life got better simply moving to places with cheaper bus fare and a lower cost of living. Keeping public transit affordable and/or making sure it is good quality and will get people where they need to go can help poor people more than other groups who are more likely to own their own vehicle.
etempleton 5y ago
This is what generally kills me about a lot of public policy in the US. I think people need to be helped and assisted when down and out without removing agency or deincentizing upward mobility. Too many policies create an awkward situation where you are incentivized to not work or improve your situation in the short term because you may actually worsen your financials by doing so. For example, if you are laid off you are better off just taking unemployment then taking a lower paid job until you find something more suitable. Section 8 housing is also a great example of bad public policy. Since landlords are under no obligation to accept the vouchers, and even when landlords are they will find another reason not to accept the vouchers, it segregates poor people into specific apartment complexes that do accept the vouchers. These properties are usually terrible and not worth the market value cost. Years ago I lived in a very nice apartment that was cheaper and in much better condition than the apartments that accepted section 8 housing in my town. Perhaps a universal basic income makes the most sense as it would provide choice without labeling someone as poor. I suspect this would simply lead to an increase in housing and commodity prices across the board, but at least people have the agency to decide what they need most. I also suspect it would be a much more efficient and effective form of public assistance.
- 6gvONxR4sf7o 5y ago
  The education is just as hard as the incentives. With a complicated system, it’s hard to get people to understand their incentives. For example, I’ve known people who have turned down raises because it would put them into a higher tax bracket. They thought it would result in less money overall (which is not how it works, in case anyone reading finds themselves in this situation). That’s a benefit of something like UBI. It’s easy to understand your incentives.
  - lotsofpulp 5y ago
    There was a complete lack of education about how taxes, governments, zoning, city planning, or any of that community type stuff in school when I went through it 30 years ago. I do not see why kids cannot be taught how the system works, including marginal tax rates which is a one day lesson in 5th grade math.
opportune 5y ago
Thanks for another great post about something that a lot of people on this forum don't even think about. I think part of what this boils down to, more than just means testing or fares/rates/etc. is that any time you put up logistical/bureaucratic/cognitive/complicated barriers to something, you discourage its use beyond what you're directly trying to prevent (in name - sometimes the barriers are entirely intentional. something something voting...) This goes beyond just poor peoples' access to public transportation. Most adults experience this in at least some way dealing with government bureaucracy. It's key in product design - making something confusing and hard to use will discourage its use, even if it delivers a lot of value once the difficulty is overcome. Humans only have limited amounts of patience, focus, attention, time. If you are poor those are even more scarce, since they're being spent on basic day-to-day survival. Anyway, I think particular public policy options that could fix these types of problems may delve a bit too far into politics. But I think the problem is fixable. Make things simpler
- throwaway0a5e 5y ago
  >in name - sometimes the barriers are entirely intentional. something something voting... Voting. Packing heat. Getting a parking pass for the state park. Building a garage. Basically anything the white collar and higher class doesn't trust the poors to do to their liking gets all sorts of bureaucratic red tape added.
btilly 5y ago
Not only is means tested a barrier, but it also tends to lead to funding cliffs. My niece wound up being a case in point. She got a job offer for $0.20/hour more than would allow her to stay on food stamps. As a single mother of 3, she could not afford to go off of food stamps. The job she would have joined was a union job and so could not pay her anything other than the union rate. The result? She remained in a job that she was overqualified for and turned down the better job because she literally could not afford to take it. If you think that this is an argument for basic income, it is. And exactly because having it be not means tested avoids this kind of perverse incentive that helps trap people in poverty.
- josephcsible 5y ago
  A year ago, I would have agreed with this in its entirety. Today, I still agree with most of it, but I disagree with the last paragraph. If basic income isn't enough to survive on, then you'll still need some other services and so you'll still have the funding cliff. But if it is enough to survive on, then too many people who are capable of working will choose to instead just survive on it indefinitely.
  - lostcolony 5y ago
    Survive. Not thrive. If someone is inclined to make it work on so minimal an amount even when able to make more, they won't be useful at a job anyway.
  - yenwel 5y ago
    Well isn't the point of ubi that people less people could work. Productivity with automation has never been higher and we still work ourselves to death for less pay. We need to take the path of increased automation anyway since we've got some sort of ubi for the elderly population already. Now it's a burden for the young people. If we could automate a lot of basic needs like food production and processing, construction, transport etc you would have unlimited near costless basic needs met and provide for the elderly. Then it would just be panem et circenses but a bit more advanced and without the slavery and the need for empire building like the romans but just technological advancement and automation.
randyrand 5y ago
This blog appears inspired by this comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27573799 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27573799
29athrowaway 5y ago
Imagine there is a magic button, that once pressed, solves the basic needs of shelter, food, clothing, access to water, education, healthcare... permanently, for every living person. The only catch is that this magical work still costs natural resources to work. Topsoil, fresh water, oil, fish, lumber, pollinators, etc... every necessary resource to keep things working gets allocated and used automatically. What will happen right after pressing this button is that there will be a massive population boost followed by a massive allocation of resources because perceive no longer perceives economic resistance as their families grow. So population grows exponentially and so does resource sage. Then, once resource depletion is imminent, a war over resources would take place. After years of non-stop war, people will realize that peace is possible if they establish reproduction quotas. But each time the quotas are not respected, war happens again. Would that be a better world? I don't think so.
- com2kid 5y ago
  People who can afford to have all their basic needs met without worry have less children on average. See: population decline in advanced economies, especially Nordic countries and middle/upper middle class America. Humans are still animals that act on instinct, and our instinctive behavior is, when faced with dangerous short term threats, to reproduce en-masse. War torn countries are the best example of this, humans fall back to a mass quantity strategy for survival. But in a situation of resource abundance? People have less kids and invest more in each child.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- Cthulhu_ 5y ago
  Most of those resources you mention are renewable (and we're working on getting rid of the need for oil), their limits are an economic and / or technologic problem that can be solved, especially if we can get more people educated and working on these problems. Anyway as another commenter pointed out, birth rates will decline on their own if people are comfortable and happy. Which presents itself with its own problems in the current economic system that seems to depend on constant population growth, and in many economies where birth rates have declined they compensated with immigration. Which presents its own challenges of course, but then, the US was founded by colonizer invaders, the local population genocided, then built up by millions and millions of immigrants (voluntary or slaves).
truenamenofame 5y ago
You could try giving them money. I'm poor and after the reality of covid hit and I was out of a job, I confided in my best friend to give me a loan of $5000 in order to give me some sense of security, so that I could snap myself out of the curse of poverty-induced short term thinking. The kind of thinking that pushes someone into bad dead-end jobs instead of going back to school or learning a trade to gain superior skills because paying rent in the short term is more important, eat cheap nutritonally-void junk food to save a buck, and to skip the health insurance and pray for good luck that they may not get sick or have a freak accident everyday of their living, breathing lives. I have not actually used a single dollar of my friend's money. My mind was clear enough to figure out how to apply for unemployment insurance. Then the inflow of unemployment insurance only gave me compound interest on that sense of security that could only be afforded by a good enough lump sum of money in my savings account. At some point I decided I don't need the unemployment insurance anymore because I didn't want to just find some random minimum wage job to pay the bills (which was no longer a fear due to the money I had in my savings). So I got off of it, and then started making key efforts everyday to put myself into community college. So that's the short/long story of how I was able to find myself back in school in my late 20s after a long 7 years of struggle. Could've saved a lot of time if someone gave me that loan 7 years ago, but hey, better late than never.
failwhaleshark 5y ago
I live in ATX near I-35. Homelessness is being brutally re-criminalized here. It's all about sweeping poor people under the rug so tourists can get drunk without being offended that the society is so unjust, uncaring, and unequal.
- systemvoltage 5y ago
  We need to separate two things: 1) Homelessness is never a desirable state and it helps no one, especially tourism which employs a lot of lower middle class people. Look at SF and Portland. 2) Just because homelessness is bad != not providing assistance and putting these people in jail. They’re two separate issues. I would vote for progressive issues that are highlighted in the article but I can’t stand progressives that try to demean others by calling them ‘cruel’ and gain moral high-ground over others. It’s unproductive. We should never accept crime and shitty streets as an acceptable compromise. We can do much much better as the article indicates. I am disappointed at how many people in SF Bay Area think that tent cities are okay and they think they’re some kinda of a saint for caring for the homeless. If they really cared, they wouldn’t have let this problem happen in the first place. Anyone who is trying to solve the problem is looked down upon here which is mind boggling. Immediately labeling people as cruel without having a deeper discussion is not going to solve the problem. We should strive to eliminate homelessness and not make it the new normal.
  - failwhaleshark 5y ago
    Then do something and stop talking about "more discussions." Tax the crap out of empty investment housing. Give people homes. I lived in vehicles for 9 years, so don't get self-righteous or white-knighting. It is cruel to criminalize poverty, and it is cruel to "benignly" neglect homeless people with a lack of services, treating them like criminals in the assistance programs, offer a troublesome patchwork of charity resources rather than integrated delivery, and give only a pittance of assistance instead of doing what is cost-effective and humane to get people into better situations holistically and comprehensively. Mental healthcare including psychiatry, social skills training, and therapy, substance treatment, nutrition, and good medical care are just some of the essential aspects of raising people up. The US typically has an awful and abhorrent track-record when it comes to delivering necessary social services. For example, in Santa Clara County, an average homeless man without Social Security can expect to receive ~$149 in almost cash and ~$205 in SNAP (previously known as a "food stamps"). The ABAWD requirement comes-and-goes periodically with mandating work in order to receive benefits. (How can a homeless person hold a job if they don't have shoes or the resources to clean themselves?) Healthcare is provided by substandard Medi-Cal (Medic-Aid) which now includes slightly less horrible dental services (Denti-Cal). Cell phones are provided by the Lifeline service.
tedk-42 5y ago
The rich are getting really rich via real estate. Rents are getting too high and people can't save to buy a place of their own anymore. I believe if you fix the housing problem (fundamentally limiting how much property a person or corporation can own), then you'll make life easier for a huge percentage of poor people stuck in debt traps that leave them without a crucial asset for survival - a roof over there head.
- joe_the_user 5y ago
  This, The policies that today make the rich richer ... well, make the poor, poorer - who would think! It should be noted that a policies make marginal housing impossible and so create the situation of anyone losing ordinary housing sinking to absolute destitution. We need more mobile home parks, more residential hotels and so-forth. And oppositely, these are seen things lower home values and so relentlessly attacked (though SF seems to be allowing more of these to open up lately, according to what I see on craigslist).
mym1990 5y ago
Hopefully this isn't too dumb of a question but: can the current levels of (above average) unemployment benefits give insight into what might ACTUALLY happen under UBI? I am currently traveling around the USA and hitting a mix of large metro areas and small towns, and everyone seems to be struggling with filling employment demand. I am guessing we will still need to see what or if there are longer term impacts...but just curious on the above question.
- DoingIsLearning 5y ago
  If you were going to adjust a 1960's salary to today and take into account housing costs etc. they would probably be making in the 20 or 30 dollars per hour range. I read discussions of 7 dollars for some of these positions. The issue is not that employers are struggling to fill vacancies it is that the salaries have not kept up with cost of living for so long that people are now reaching a tipping point. As others have put it, it is not a shortage of people but a shortage of suckers. Irrespective of UBI the cost of goods and services should probably have a much smaller profit margin or much higher price tag, but no one able to influence or correct this stands to benefit.
  - Folcon 5y ago
    I was curious about your comment so I looked it up[0] and yep, around $20 seems about right. - [0]: https://www.epi.org/publication/the-federal-minimum-wage-has-been-eroded-by-decades-of-inaction/ https://www.epi.org/publication/the-federal-minimum-wage-has...
    - DoingIsLearning 5y ago
      Also a house was probably one to five years worth of salary for a lot of people in most developed nations. Many people in minimum wage jobs today would not be able to save enough for a house within their whole work life. Owning a house and not having housing costs associated is a huge disposable income multiplier.
  - mym1990 5y ago
nkssy 5y ago
UBI would sort out a lot of these friction points. So much bureaucracy is tied up in eligibility, inspection and compliance. Just be done with it. Fake tokens, food stamps etc are just resource drains.
student2k 5y ago
is that me or as long as you get 'free' and good quality, healthcare, education, food, and home, it is kind of OK being poor?
- jokoon 5y ago
  Are you asking it it's socially acceptable of being poor? It's a difficult question to answer or to ask. Some being people gave up motivation to get out of poverty for political or personal reasons, some people are happy enough in poverty, some people try hard to get out of poverty but are lacking education, degrees, experience, opportunity, appropriate network or just the proper social norm that let them be accepted in an environment that allows them to get out of poverty. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asceticism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asceticism “The philosopher Diogenes was eating bread and lentils for supper. He was seen by the philosopher Aristippus, who lived comfortably by flattering the king. Said Aristippus, 'If you would learn to be subservient to the king you would not have to live on lentils.' Said Diogenes: 'Learn to live on lentils and you will not have to be subservient to the king".”
ZeroGravitas 5y ago
Good advice, but I feel it's like saying "The way to free the slaves is to free the slaves". Everyone knows it's true, most slaves and non-slaveholders agree both morally and pragmatically it's the way forward. And yet strangely, the people who became rich from owning slaves, when offered the opportunity to free those slaves, instead started an expensive and catastrophic war to try to prolong the practice. What would you do if your absolute and relative wealth relied on a bunch of other people being poor?
pulse7 5y ago
"I have a disability but didn't have money to get a doctor's appointment to fill out the paperwork proving I qualified for discounted bus fare as a disabled person." I am not from the US and I have a question: Did ObamaCare provide a solution for such cases?
- tfehring 5y ago
  Medicaid has provided free healthcare to people with qualifying disabilities since long before Obamacare. Obamacare did encourage states to expand Medicaid to low-income people regardless of health status and provide them with funding to do so, so in most of the US [0] it expanded Medicaid availability to people who previously weren't "disabled enough" to qualify. [0] https://www.kff.org/medicaid/issue-brief/status-of-state-medicaid-expansion-decisions-interactive-map/ https://www.kff.org/medicaid/issue-brief/status-of-state-med...
eric4smith 5y ago
Great points in the article. One thing I see traveling around the world and observing cultures, is lack of direction. It's a common theme in every country and culture. And by that I don't mean just providing raw information. But actually holding someone by the hand and showing them a better way too -- and arming them with the information and examples in real life to show that it actually works. Example -- it's all well and good to give that mom lower bus fares. Good. But also how do you help that mom to craft a good sustainable 5 year plan to get her out of poverty by following it. What's needed is to point out that - say - becoming a nurse is a good option. And that to become that nurse you start with A, then go to B, then C then Nurse. The low bus fares alone, not gonna do that.
kangnkodos 5y ago
"Access housing that is within their budget." It's by far the biggest issue to address. And also the most difficult one. So easy to say. So hard to implement. Especially if the goal is that the access does not go away as income goes up. Most solutions out there involve shoveling money at the problem. But in practice, this will just make housing prices go up. The poor will still be left out in the cold. The only solution which might work is building more units that would appeal to people with low income in desirable locations. This is still almost impossible due to zoning restrictions, but it's the only way out.
known 5y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income leading Civilians to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-actualization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-actualization is the SOLUTION

223 points by DoreenMichele 5y ago

Slight tangent but I've always wondered what the economic impact would be if public transit were just free. If there was no monetary nor mental overhead to getting around the city could that boost commerce enough to pay for it?

netizen-936824 5y ago
That could also be good for the environment, in that it encourages use of shared transportation and lowers barriers.
toast0 5y ago
Seattle used to have free transit inside the downtown core, maybe there's some data from the period they were doing that.
- xyzzyz 5y ago
  Yes, Seattle discontinued its mobile homeless shelter program, and instead moved it to occupy city parks and sidewalk greenery.
- xenocyon 5y ago
  Long-time Seattle resident and transit rider here. Seattle's erstwhile "Ride Free Zone" was instituted with the aim of promoting tourist activity and applied solely to rides that began and ended within a tiny part of the city center; for example, if you were a homeless person in the U District making a trip downtown, you would still have to pay, each way. So - except for very short trips - it was not necessarily something that meaningfully benefited poor people nor low-income people. More recently Seattle's Transit Riders Union (among other groups) has advocated for more substantial free transit. Some baby steps in this direction have been realized with such things as free transit for high school students.
oconnor663 5y ago
My understanding is that one of the serious practical downsides to free public transit in American cities is that lots of homeless people use it. This sounds silly (like, isn't that the goal?), but some fraction of those people are smelly and/or scary, and what tends to happen is that anyone who has a choice stops using those parts of the system. And then however one might feel about that outcome, what tends to happen next is that the transit system loses political support and funding. There's probably a common sense solution somewhere that includes both free ridership and also fairly strong enforcement around loitering and hygeine, but I don't know if any city has managed to really nail it. Incidentally, I think a lot of similar problems come up in cities that have free public bathrooms. A small number of abusers tend to make those bathrooms extremely unpleasant for everyone else.
- bombcar 5y ago
  This is it exactly - in areas without a "homeless problem" however you want to define that - you have a completely workable solution (example: airport shuttle trains, etc). Where you have an issue the fare requirement is often used an excuse to enforce a minimum level of "cleanliness" if you will.
- analog31 5y ago
  This sounds like a strange idea, but when I traveled in Europe, there were always first and second class carriages on the trains. You could do the same thing with transit. Every other bus is free. People could then choose between hanging out with the people for a few blocks, or paying for a ride.
  - ampdepolymerase 5y ago
    What an innovative idea! Here in the states, economic indicators are a great proxy for many other aspects. Maybe we could do a trial in Montgomery, Alabama, surely nothing would go wrong.
    - mikro2nd 5y ago
      It would be helpful to us non-US persons if you'd explain what signal you're proxying with "Montgomery, Alabama". As it is this means nothing to a large number of people reading your comment.
73gfg 5y ago
Transport within Melbourne's entire downtown area is free: https://www.ptv.vic.gov.au/assets/default-site/Maps-and-Timetables-PDFs/Maps/Network-maps/5b4a3efe80/PTV-Free-Tram-Zone-Map.pdf https://www.ptv.vic.gov.au/assets/default-site/Maps-and-Time...
- senectus1 5y ago
  Same in Perth Western Australia also the current Lab gov has promised to cap Public Transport at a maximum of $4.90. A pretty significant saving https://twitter.com/MarkMcGowanMP/status/1350648142585217025/photo/1 https://twitter.com/MarkMcGowanMP/status/1350648142585217025... *Goes into effect Jan 2022
- pomian 5y ago
  Calgary, Canada; has free transit in the downtown core. But not very far, and not to the suburbs. But makes it very convenient when you are in the centre, and don't need to think twice about moving around that core.
  - Mandatum 5y ago
    In Vancouver it's unenforced, about half of people actually pay for their tickets.
- gelatocar 5y ago
  The free tram zone is great, but only covers the CBD which is pretty tiny.
deleted 5y ago
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jandrewrogers 5y ago
This has been done, I’ve lived in cities where this was the case for a while. In at least some cities, this turned public transit into a mobile homeless shelter, drug den, etc. So normal people stopped using public transit because it was unsafe and unpleasant.
aaron695 5y ago
Free public transport has been researched and it's not clear if it's positive. It's certainly not a slam dunk community good - https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S2213624X17300858 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S22136... ( https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cstp.2017.10.002 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cstp.2017.10.002 )
- admax88q 5y ago
  Abstract from your link suggests that the study was pretty inconclusive. > Findings suggest certain flaws limit the program’s potential success since the program design is misaligned with its primary stated goals, and several program goals relating to external effects of fare reform cannot be evaluated. Although it would be valuable for transport managers in other cities to learn about this experience, the Tallinn fare-free public transport program provides scant transferable evidence about how such a program can operate outside of a politicized context,
- Cthulhu_ 5y ago
  Anecdotal: The Dutch government offers students free public transit. This allowed me and millions of others to be able to attend a much better (college, uni level) education than I would otherwise be able to have. Or it would involve a 25 kilometer bike ride every day. Another anecdotal one: Many companies offer travel / commute expense cover. If my commute wasn't covered by my employer, I'd be spending €250 a month out of pocket just to get to work (in addition to the time spent). It would make me reconsider working for that employer in favor of something more local.
  - josephcsible 5y ago
    I like these kinds of solutions way better than just removing all fare gates, because then you won't have a huge influx of people who will abuse the service and drive away anyone with the means to avoid public transit.
shaggyfrog 5y ago
Why would public transportation need to be paid for by "boosted commerce" to be beneficial? Why does it need to be profitable? As a public service, do we ask fire departments to be profitable? What consequences happen when we try and make other essential services profitable, e.g. police? Should armed forces be made to be profitable? How do you define profitability in the first place... how do you define the costs and benefits? Why does this question only ever seem to come up when we're talking about things that raise quality of life for the poor?
- josephcsible 5y ago
  > Why does it need to be profitable? It doesn't need to be profitable, but if it isn't, then the money to subsidize it needs to come from somewhere. Do you think raising taxes for this would be politically popular, especially if most taxpayers wouldn't use it? > As a public service, do we ask fire departments to be profitable? It is politically popular to use tax dollars to fund fire departments. > Should armed forces be made to be profitable? This is a textbook example of a public good. You can't give national defense only to people who pay for it. Either the whole country has it or nobody does. > How do you define profitability in the first place... how do you define the costs and benefits? This seems fairly obvious: if the income from fares exceeds the costs to pay the drivers, maintain the vehicles, etc. > Why does this question only ever seem to come up when we're talking about things that raise quality of life for the poor? Because people don't like paying for things that they don't get value from, even if other people do.
  - asdff 5y ago
    In LA a majority of voters elected to raise sales taxes several times to improve transit, despite only like 20% of commuters using it city wide (transit use is extremely high in certain neighborhoods like Westlake, though). LA metro is considering slashing fares because they make up something like 5% of the operating budget, thanks to these sales tax measures and federal grants. It's not just LA metro that is funded like this, cleveland RTA is also funded by a portion of sales tax revenues.
  - shaggyfrog 5y ago
renewiltord 5y ago
SF public transit is de facto free. I don’t think it’s led to any particular surge of commercial activity.
- kelnos 5y ago
  > SF public transit is de facto free. Huh? I mean, sure, enforcement is pretty lax, but most people who ride buses in SF do indeed pay. The homeless generally do not, and drivers look the other way. (Frankly, I'm ok with this, as long as they aren't violent or using the bus as a toilet.)
asdff 5y ago
I commute on transit and in my experience, those that can't afford transit simply don't pay the fare, so I'd guess impact would be pretty limited for those that might benefit the most from free transit. They either hop on via the back of the bus on the second set of doors away from the driver, walk directly onto the train platform without tapping up a fare card, or for the few stations that do have turnstyles, they use the emergency exit gate which says is alarmed, but in fact is not and swings open freely.
throwaway0a5e 5y ago
> Slight tangent but I've always wondered what the economic impact would be if public transit were just free. Look at areas where the cost of distance is high. Rural areas. Areas with bad transit. Islands. Then reverse that. Basically anything you do to decrease the cost (in money or time) of moving from A to B flattens the cost of living. The poor guy who just wants to hang a picture doesn't have to put up with the insane costs of some wire and nails at the local hardware store that mostly caters to yuppies and has the pricing to match. He can justify the cost in time and money of getting on the subway or get in his car and go where it's cheap. Now apply this to every economic transaction from buying milk to getting a job and everything in-between. The second and third order effects are immense. People can afford to stop transacting with bad jobs and bad landlords because they can afford to access the alternative equivalent services. Of course improving transit never gets much support because the people with the money don't want it spend on the subways they don't use and they don't want to have to compete with the poors for access to car infrastructure so you never see that stuff democratized, just more fees and whatnot to discourage use by those not wealthy enough.
tomjen3 5y ago
I don't know how much that will matter in the states, but when we tried it in Denmark (in some towns), it meant people took the bus more - but it was those who would otherwise take their bike or walk, not people who would otherwise use their car. It makes sense too. I can get a 30 day pass to drive with public transportation as much as I want, but it is so much faster to take my car that I essentially only take it (prepandemic).

fungiblecog 5y ago

Our overlords have no desire to make the poor less poor

ElViajero 5y ago

If you look at the list some are enablers that help to achieve the others. If you get this ones: - Get to where they need to go conveniently and inexpensively. - Get access to education, training and credentialing. - Get access to things that support their health, whether that is nutritious food, adequate exercise, clean air or medical treatment. It is easier to get this other ones: - Access housing that is within their budget. - Get access to earned income. All this seems quite basic. And it should be in place as it benefits everybody in the long term. But, I guess that that's the problem, short term some people will get more if this does not happen. Long term investment is lacking.

mym1990 5y ago
This is just a hunch, and obviously overly simplistic but I think the key phrase is investment in that a lot of infrastructure or policy action looks for tangible ROI and the people at the top either don't believe that it is there for these types of issues, or it doesn't fall within their ideology to help provide such things. And this is a total shame because society can benefit so much if we were able to look past the dollar sign as a measuring stick.

adolph 5y ago

I have a disability but didn't have money to get a doctor's appointment to fill out the paperwork proving I qualified for discounted bus fare as a disabled person. One of the things I wished for while homeless was a program that would provide me with free access to a doctor for purposes of filling out such paperwork and getting me access to the discount to which I am legally entitled but have never received. [...] In my case, without ever managing to arrange to get my disabled fare card, my life got better simply moving to places with cheaper bus fare and a lower cost of living. Keeping public transit affordable and/or making sure it is good quality and will get people where they need to go can help poor people more than other groups who are more likely to own their own vehicle.

etempleton 5y ago

This is what generally kills me about a lot of public policy in the US. I think people need to be helped and assisted when down and out without removing agency or deincentizing upward mobility. Too many policies create an awkward situation where you are incentivized to not work or improve your situation in the short term because you may actually worsen your financials by doing so. For example, if you are laid off you are better off just taking unemployment then taking a lower paid job until you find something more suitable. Section 8 housing is also a great example of bad public policy. Since landlords are under no obligation to accept the vouchers, and even when landlords are they will find another reason not to accept the vouchers, it segregates poor people into specific apartment complexes that do accept the vouchers. These properties are usually terrible and not worth the market value cost. Years ago I lived in a very nice apartment that was cheaper and in much better condition than the apartments that accepted section 8 housing in my town. Perhaps a universal basic income makes the most sense as it would provide choice without labeling someone as poor. I suspect this would simply lead to an increase in housing and commodity prices across the board, but at least people have the agency to decide what they need most. I also suspect it would be a much more efficient and effective form of public assistance.

6gvONxR4sf7o 5y ago
The education is just as hard as the incentives. With a complicated system, it’s hard to get people to understand their incentives. For example, I’ve known people who have turned down raises because it would put them into a higher tax bracket. They thought it would result in less money overall (which is not how it works, in case anyone reading finds themselves in this situation). That’s a benefit of something like UBI. It’s easy to understand your incentives.
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  There was a complete lack of education about how taxes, governments, zoning, city planning, or any of that community type stuff in school when I went through it 30 years ago. I do not see why kids cannot be taught how the system works, including marginal tax rates which is a one day lesson in 5th grade math.

opportune 5y ago

Thanks for another great post about something that a lot of people on this forum don't even think about. I think part of what this boils down to, more than just means testing or fares/rates/etc. is that any time you put up logistical/bureaucratic/cognitive/complicated barriers to something, you discourage its use beyond what you're directly trying to prevent (in name - sometimes the barriers are entirely intentional. something something voting...) This goes beyond just poor peoples' access to public transportation. Most adults experience this in at least some way dealing with government bureaucracy. It's key in product design - making something confusing and hard to use will discourage its use, even if it delivers a lot of value once the difficulty is overcome. Humans only have limited amounts of patience, focus, attention, time. If you are poor those are even more scarce, since they're being spent on basic day-to-day survival. Anyway, I think particular public policy options that could fix these types of problems may delve a bit too far into politics. But I think the problem is fixable. Make things simpler

throwaway0a5e 5y ago
>in name - sometimes the barriers are entirely intentional. something something voting... Voting. Packing heat. Getting a parking pass for the state park. Building a garage. Basically anything the white collar and higher class doesn't trust the poors to do to their liking gets all sorts of bureaucratic red tape added.

btilly 5y ago

Not only is means tested a barrier, but it also tends to lead to funding cliffs. My niece wound up being a case in point. She got a job offer for $0.20/hour more than would allow her to stay on food stamps. As a single mother of 3, she could not afford to go off of food stamps. The job she would have joined was a union job and so could not pay her anything other than the union rate. The result? She remained in a job that she was overqualified for and turned down the better job because she literally could not afford to take it. If you think that this is an argument for basic income, it is. And exactly because having it be not means tested avoids this kind of perverse incentive that helps trap people in poverty.

josephcsible 5y ago
A year ago, I would have agreed with this in its entirety. Today, I still agree with most of it, but I disagree with the last paragraph. If basic income isn't enough to survive on, then you'll still need some other services and so you'll still have the funding cliff. But if it is enough to survive on, then too many people who are capable of working will choose to instead just survive on it indefinitely.
- lostcolony 5y ago
  Survive. Not thrive. If someone is inclined to make it work on so minimal an amount even when able to make more, they won't be useful at a job anyway.
- yenwel 5y ago
  Well isn't the point of ubi that people less people could work. Productivity with automation has never been higher and we still work ourselves to death for less pay. We need to take the path of increased automation anyway since we've got some sort of ubi for the elderly population already. Now it's a burden for the young people. If we could automate a lot of basic needs like food production and processing, construction, transport etc you would have unlimited near costless basic needs met and provide for the elderly. Then it would just be panem et circenses but a bit more advanced and without the slavery and the need for empire building like the romans but just technological advancement and automation.

randyrand 5y ago

This blog appears inspired by this comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27573799 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27573799

29athrowaway 5y ago

Imagine there is a magic button, that once pressed, solves the basic needs of shelter, food, clothing, access to water, education, healthcare... permanently, for every living person. The only catch is that this magical work still costs natural resources to work. Topsoil, fresh water, oil, fish, lumber, pollinators, etc... every necessary resource to keep things working gets allocated and used automatically. What will happen right after pressing this button is that there will be a massive population boost followed by a massive allocation of resources because perceive no longer perceives economic resistance as their families grow. So population grows exponentially and so does resource sage. Then, once resource depletion is imminent, a war over resources would take place. After years of non-stop war, people will realize that peace is possible if they establish reproduction quotas. But each time the quotas are not respected, war happens again. Would that be a better world? I don't think so.

com2kid 5y ago
People who can afford to have all their basic needs met without worry have less children on average. See: population decline in advanced economies, especially Nordic countries and middle/upper middle class America. Humans are still animals that act on instinct, and our instinctive behavior is, when faced with dangerous short term threats, to reproduce en-masse. War torn countries are the best example of this, humans fall back to a mass quantity strategy for survival. But in a situation of resource abundance? People have less kids and invest more in each child.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
Cthulhu_ 5y ago
Most of those resources you mention are renewable (and we're working on getting rid of the need for oil), their limits are an economic and / or technologic problem that can be solved, especially if we can get more people educated and working on these problems. Anyway as another commenter pointed out, birth rates will decline on their own if people are comfortable and happy. Which presents itself with its own problems in the current economic system that seems to depend on constant population growth, and in many economies where birth rates have declined they compensated with immigration. Which presents its own challenges of course, but then, the US was founded by colonizer invaders, the local population genocided, then built up by millions and millions of immigrants (voluntary or slaves).

truenamenofame 5y ago

You could try giving them money. I'm poor and after the reality of covid hit and I was out of a job, I confided in my best friend to give me a loan of $5000 in order to give me some sense of security, so that I could snap myself out of the curse of poverty-induced short term thinking. The kind of thinking that pushes someone into bad dead-end jobs instead of going back to school or learning a trade to gain superior skills because paying rent in the short term is more important, eat cheap nutritonally-void junk food to save a buck, and to skip the health insurance and pray for good luck that they may not get sick or have a freak accident everyday of their living, breathing lives. I have not actually used a single dollar of my friend's money. My mind was clear enough to figure out how to apply for unemployment insurance. Then the inflow of unemployment insurance only gave me compound interest on that sense of security that could only be afforded by a good enough lump sum of money in my savings account. At some point I decided I don't need the unemployment insurance anymore because I didn't want to just find some random minimum wage job to pay the bills (which was no longer a fear due to the money I had in my savings). So I got off of it, and then started making key efforts everyday to put myself into community college. So that's the short/long story of how I was able to find myself back in school in my late 20s after a long 7 years of struggle. Could've saved a lot of time if someone gave me that loan 7 years ago, but hey, better late than never.

failwhaleshark 5y ago

I live in ATX near I-35. Homelessness is being brutally re-criminalized here. It's all about sweeping poor people under the rug so tourists can get drunk without being offended that the society is so unjust, uncaring, and unequal.

systemvoltage 5y ago
We need to separate two things: 1) Homelessness is never a desirable state and it helps no one, especially tourism which employs a lot of lower middle class people. Look at SF and Portland. 2) Just because homelessness is bad != not providing assistance and putting these people in jail. They’re two separate issues. I would vote for progressive issues that are highlighted in the article but I can’t stand progressives that try to demean others by calling them ‘cruel’ and gain moral high-ground over others. It’s unproductive. We should never accept crime and shitty streets as an acceptable compromise. We can do much much better as the article indicates. I am disappointed at how many people in SF Bay Area think that tent cities are okay and they think they’re some kinda of a saint for caring for the homeless. If they really cared, they wouldn’t have let this problem happen in the first place. Anyone who is trying to solve the problem is looked down upon here which is mind boggling. Immediately labeling people as cruel without having a deeper discussion is not going to solve the problem. We should strive to eliminate homelessness and not make it the new normal.
- failwhaleshark 5y ago
  Then do something and stop talking about "more discussions." Tax the crap out of empty investment housing. Give people homes. I lived in vehicles for 9 years, so don't get self-righteous or white-knighting. It is cruel to criminalize poverty, and it is cruel to "benignly" neglect homeless people with a lack of services, treating them like criminals in the assistance programs, offer a troublesome patchwork of charity resources rather than integrated delivery, and give only a pittance of assistance instead of doing what is cost-effective and humane to get people into better situations holistically and comprehensively. Mental healthcare including psychiatry, social skills training, and therapy, substance treatment, nutrition, and good medical care are just some of the essential aspects of raising people up. The US typically has an awful and abhorrent track-record when it comes to delivering necessary social services. For example, in Santa Clara County, an average homeless man without Social Security can expect to receive ~$149 in almost cash and ~$205 in SNAP (previously known as a "food stamps"). The ABAWD requirement comes-and-goes periodically with mandating work in order to receive benefits. (How can a homeless person hold a job if they don't have shoes or the resources to clean themselves?) Healthcare is provided by substandard Medi-Cal (Medic-Aid) which now includes slightly less horrible dental services (Denti-Cal). Cell phones are provided by the Lifeline service.

tedk-42 5y ago

The rich are getting really rich via real estate. Rents are getting too high and people can't save to buy a place of their own anymore. I believe if you fix the housing problem (fundamentally limiting how much property a person or corporation can own), then you'll make life easier for a huge percentage of poor people stuck in debt traps that leave them without a crucial asset for survival - a roof over there head.

joe_the_user 5y ago
This, The policies that today make the rich richer ... well, make the poor, poorer - who would think! It should be noted that a policies make marginal housing impossible and so create the situation of anyone losing ordinary housing sinking to absolute destitution. We need more mobile home parks, more residential hotels and so-forth. And oppositely, these are seen things lower home values and so relentlessly attacked (though SF seems to be allowing more of these to open up lately, according to what I see on craigslist).

mym1990 5y ago

Hopefully this isn't too dumb of a question but: can the current levels of (above average) unemployment benefits give insight into what might ACTUALLY happen under UBI? I am currently traveling around the USA and hitting a mix of large metro areas and small towns, and everyone seems to be struggling with filling employment demand. I am guessing we will still need to see what or if there are longer term impacts...but just curious on the above question.

DoingIsLearning 5y ago
If you were going to adjust a 1960's salary to today and take into account housing costs etc. they would probably be making in the 20 or 30 dollars per hour range. I read discussions of 7 dollars for some of these positions. The issue is not that employers are struggling to fill vacancies it is that the salaries have not kept up with cost of living for so long that people are now reaching a tipping point. As others have put it, it is not a shortage of people but a shortage of suckers. Irrespective of UBI the cost of goods and services should probably have a much smaller profit margin or much higher price tag, but no one able to influence or correct this stands to benefit.
- Folcon 5y ago
  I was curious about your comment so I looked it up[0] and yep, around $20 seems about right. - [0]: https://www.epi.org/publication/the-federal-minimum-wage-has-been-eroded-by-decades-of-inaction/ https://www.epi.org/publication/the-federal-minimum-wage-has...
  - DoingIsLearning 5y ago
    Also a house was probably one to five years worth of salary for a lot of people in most developed nations. Many people in minimum wage jobs today would not be able to save enough for a house within their whole work life. Owning a house and not having housing costs associated is a huge disposable income multiplier.
- mym1990 5y ago

nkssy 5y ago

UBI would sort out a lot of these friction points. So much bureaucracy is tied up in eligibility, inspection and compliance. Just be done with it. Fake tokens, food stamps etc are just resource drains.

student2k 5y ago

is that me or as long as you get 'free' and good quality, healthcare, education, food, and home, it is kind of OK being poor?

jokoon 5y ago
Are you asking it it's socially acceptable of being poor? It's a difficult question to answer or to ask. Some being people gave up motivation to get out of poverty for political or personal reasons, some people are happy enough in poverty, some people try hard to get out of poverty but are lacking education, degrees, experience, opportunity, appropriate network or just the proper social norm that let them be accepted in an environment that allows them to get out of poverty. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asceticism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asceticism “The philosopher Diogenes was eating bread and lentils for supper. He was seen by the philosopher Aristippus, who lived comfortably by flattering the king. Said Aristippus, 'If you would learn to be subservient to the king you would not have to live on lentils.' Said Diogenes: 'Learn to live on lentils and you will not have to be subservient to the king".”

ZeroGravitas 5y ago

Good advice, but I feel it's like saying "The way to free the slaves is to free the slaves". Everyone knows it's true, most slaves and non-slaveholders agree both morally and pragmatically it's the way forward. And yet strangely, the people who became rich from owning slaves, when offered the opportunity to free those slaves, instead started an expensive and catastrophic war to try to prolong the practice. What would you do if your absolute and relative wealth relied on a bunch of other people being poor?

pulse7 5y ago

"I have a disability but didn't have money to get a doctor's appointment to fill out the paperwork proving I qualified for discounted bus fare as a disabled person." I am not from the US and I have a question: Did ObamaCare provide a solution for such cases?

tfehring 5y ago
Medicaid has provided free healthcare to people with qualifying disabilities since long before Obamacare. Obamacare did encourage states to expand Medicaid to low-income people regardless of health status and provide them with funding to do so, so in most of the US [0] it expanded Medicaid availability to people who previously weren't "disabled enough" to qualify. [0] https://www.kff.org/medicaid/issue-brief/status-of-state-medicaid-expansion-decisions-interactive-map/ https://www.kff.org/medicaid/issue-brief/status-of-state-med...

eric4smith 5y ago

Great points in the article. One thing I see traveling around the world and observing cultures, is lack of direction. It's a common theme in every country and culture. And by that I don't mean just providing raw information. But actually holding someone by the hand and showing them a better way too -- and arming them with the information and examples in real life to show that it actually works. Example -- it's all well and good to give that mom lower bus fares. Good. But also how do you help that mom to craft a good sustainable 5 year plan to get her out of poverty by following it. What's needed is to point out that - say - becoming a nurse is a good option. And that to become that nurse you start with A, then go to B, then C then Nurse. The low bus fares alone, not gonna do that.

kangnkodos 5y ago

"Access housing that is within their budget." It's by far the biggest issue to address. And also the most difficult one. So easy to say. So hard to implement. Especially if the goal is that the access does not go away as income goes up. Most solutions out there involve shoveling money at the problem. But in practice, this will just make housing prices go up. The poor will still be left out in the cold. The only solution which might work is building more units that would appeal to people with low income in desirable locations. This is still almost impossible due to zoning restrictions, but it's the only way out.

known 5y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income leading Civilians to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-actualization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-actualization is the SOLUTION