4 ms·

I’ve done outreach and volunteer work before. Not sure how you interpreted my reply but it was not a negative question. These topics are of interest to me.

by wil421 5y ago

DoreenMichele 5y ago
I took it as negative because you closed with this: They were offered housing while they get back on their feet and chose not to take it. It's full of implicit accusation that the homeless are difficult, uncooperative, causing their own problems and you can't help them because they are irrational pains in the butt. I interpreted it that way in part because many homeless services are so bad they help keep the problem alive rather than helping to solve it. As just one example: Most homeless people have serious health issues. It's an underlying cause of their financial problems and a barrier to employment. But if you go to a soup kitchen, you are exposed to other sick people, plus cigarette smoke and marijuana smoke. I eventually quit going to soup kitchens and just worked at finding other ways to keep myself fed because my health issues are my number one problem making my life not work, so anything that makes it harder for me to take care of my health is a very serious problem. I think we should lower the barrier to food stamps in the US. It's a good program that allows you to access food from normal middle class venues which are actually clean etc. I think we should do all we can to cut the bureaucratic costs and as much as humanly possible say "If you want food stamps, here you go" without asking people to prove they need them. But I don't expect anything like that will ever happen. Talk of UBI appears to be code for "And now rich people can say Shut up. You are getting a check, you ingrate." rather than a genuine attempt to give meaningful relief to poor Americans. Cutting a check is an easy answer to a hard problem, so likely won't solve anything. I've listed my blogs elsewhere in another comment if you genuinely want to know more about what I think about homelessness, housing issues and community development.
- wil421 5y ago
  Doreen, I only asked the question because I wanted your input from your experience. Most of the people who didn’t want to leave were in various stages of addiction and alcoholism. Addiction is something I know about from my life. Not a fan of UBI. I worked endless hours in the Restaurant industry until I was 27 and got into IT and software development. Not trying to compare to your situation. Food stamps and health care assistance should absolutely be raised. I have family who struggle with both costs. Thank you for your blogs and your time.
  - DoreenMichele 5y ago
    Sorry, I'm not trying to be difficult. Sometimes people just have incompatible communication styles and it doesn't go well. (Or it just doesn't go well. Because life.) Best.
- zamzoid 5y ago
  I am wondering why you think a basic income check wouldn’t help anything, because it seems to exactly solve the issue you describe. You sign up for the check (or a lot of the times, get it automatically from the IRS), get it regularly, and buy food with it. Very little bureaucracy compared with food stamps. I agree that one must not call those who rely on the checks entitled and refuse them any further assistance. I think the best thing is to do what we can to help people get back on their feet or at least in a stable situation, and a basic income check would be only one (albeit major) element of that. I concede that distributing the checks may be difficult to those without stable mailing addresses. Then it may help to for example allow distribution in cash at the local post office. The pandemic stimulus checks appear to have had a tremendous impact in reducing poverty, see https://www.marketwatch.com/story/this-government-program-cut-poverty-more-than-any-other-this-year-and-its-extremely-unlikely-to-return-any-time-soon-11627588649 https://www.marketwatch.com/story/this-government-program-cu..., at least based on the studies there. I don’t know what the path is for this becoming regular policy, but the proposed child tax credit is projected to greatly decrease child poverty (although it has its own problems, it’s tough to get people to understand it exists and how to use it).
  - DoreenMichele 5y ago
    The amount they are proposing for UBI wouldn't even cover rent in some parts of the US. Or it would barely cover rent in some places with little or nothing leftover. Online conversations about UBI frequently include comments to the effect that "If you had UBI, you could move someplace with lower rent." It amounts to the latest version of putting homeless people on a bus and shipping them elsewhere so they stop being a local problem. If rent is lower, it is probably because services are less available. If you need those services, such as specialized health care, telling you "Here's a check. Move someplace where it covers rent." is essentially a big fat fuck you. We have torn down more than a million SROs and largely zoned out of existence the ability to build new Missing Middle Housing in mixed use, walkable neighborhoods. So you not only need to cover a high rent, you also need to have a car which is another huge expense and another big fat fuck you if you simply can't drive for some reason (as is true for me -- I am handicapped and no longer drive). If we pass UBI, I believe it will only get harder to convince people to build SROs and Missing Middle Housing and walkable neighborhoods. That would be an important part of actually solving things. We also need universal healthcare coverage in the US. Medical expenses are another huge hardship in the US. If it were possible to find cheap housing, live without a car and get medical care without it being a hardship, that would make it possible to live on very little and then most people could make their lives work even if they only worked part-time. Currently, if you can't work full-time at a well paid job with benefits, you can't make your life work and we aren't creating enough jobs of that sort. We are increasingly moving to gig work which would be fine if you didn't need a job with good benefits to get medical care and if you could find a cheap place where living without a car really worked and you mostly can't arrange that in the US. Throwing money at the problem doesn't fix those systemic issues and likely just makes people in power feel like they did something and don't have to feel guilty while they shirk on dealing with resolving the hard problems because actually fixing anything is hard work and painful and no one wants to actually do that if they can find an easy out like "I cut you check. Stop bothering me."

I’ve done outreach and volunteer work before. Not sure how you interpreted my reply but it was not a negative question. These topics are of interest to me.

by wil421 5y ago

I’ve done outreach and volunteer work before. Not sure how you interpreted my reply but it was not a negative question. These topics are of interest to me.

DoreenMichele 5y ago

I took it as negative because you closed with this: They were offered housing while they get back on their feet and chose not to take it. It's full of implicit accusation that the homeless are difficult, uncooperative, causing their own problems and you can't help them because they are irrational pains in the butt. I interpreted it that way in part because many homeless services are so bad they help keep the problem alive rather than helping to solve it. As just one example: Most homeless people have serious health issues. It's an underlying cause of their financial problems and a barrier to employment. But if you go to a soup kitchen, you are exposed to other sick people, plus cigarette smoke and marijuana smoke. I eventually quit going to soup kitchens and just worked at finding other ways to keep myself fed because my health issues are my number one problem making my life not work, so anything that makes it harder for me to take care of my health is a very serious problem. I think we should lower the barrier to food stamps in the US. It's a good program that allows you to access food from normal middle class venues which are actually clean etc. I think we should do all we can to cut the bureaucratic costs and as much as humanly possible say "If you want food stamps, here you go" without asking people to prove they need them. But I don't expect anything like that will ever happen. Talk of UBI appears to be code for "And now rich people can say Shut up. You are getting a check, you ingrate." rather than a genuine attempt to give meaningful relief to poor Americans. Cutting a check is an easy answer to a hard problem, so likely won't solve anything. I've listed my blogs elsewhere in another comment if you genuinely want to know more about what I think about homelessness, housing issues and community development.

wil421 5y ago
Doreen, I only asked the question because I wanted your input from your experience. Most of the people who didn’t want to leave were in various stages of addiction and alcoholism. Addiction is something I know about from my life. Not a fan of UBI. I worked endless hours in the Restaurant industry until I was 27 and got into IT and software development. Not trying to compare to your situation. Food stamps and health care assistance should absolutely be raised. I have family who struggle with both costs. Thank you for your blogs and your time.
- DoreenMichele 5y ago
  Sorry, I'm not trying to be difficult. Sometimes people just have incompatible communication styles and it doesn't go well. (Or it just doesn't go well. Because life.) Best.
zamzoid 5y ago
I am wondering why you think a basic income check wouldn’t help anything, because it seems to exactly solve the issue you describe. You sign up for the check (or a lot of the times, get it automatically from the IRS), get it regularly, and buy food with it. Very little bureaucracy compared with food stamps. I agree that one must not call those who rely on the checks entitled and refuse them any further assistance. I think the best thing is to do what we can to help people get back on their feet or at least in a stable situation, and a basic income check would be only one (albeit major) element of that. I concede that distributing the checks may be difficult to those without stable mailing addresses. Then it may help to for example allow distribution in cash at the local post office. The pandemic stimulus checks appear to have had a tremendous impact in reducing poverty, see https://www.marketwatch.com/story/this-government-program-cut-poverty-more-than-any-other-this-year-and-its-extremely-unlikely-to-return-any-time-soon-11627588649 https://www.marketwatch.com/story/this-government-program-cu..., at least based on the studies there. I don’t know what the path is for this becoming regular policy, but the proposed child tax credit is projected to greatly decrease child poverty (although it has its own problems, it’s tough to get people to understand it exists and how to use it).
- DoreenMichele 5y ago
  The amount they are proposing for UBI wouldn't even cover rent in some parts of the US. Or it would barely cover rent in some places with little or nothing leftover. Online conversations about UBI frequently include comments to the effect that "If you had UBI, you could move someplace with lower rent." It amounts to the latest version of putting homeless people on a bus and shipping them elsewhere so they stop being a local problem. If rent is lower, it is probably because services are less available. If you need those services, such as specialized health care, telling you "Here's a check. Move someplace where it covers rent." is essentially a big fat fuck you. We have torn down more than a million SROs and largely zoned out of existence the ability to build new Missing Middle Housing in mixed use, walkable neighborhoods. So you not only need to cover a high rent, you also need to have a car which is another huge expense and another big fat fuck you if you simply can't drive for some reason (as is true for me -- I am handicapped and no longer drive). If we pass UBI, I believe it will only get harder to convince people to build SROs and Missing Middle Housing and walkable neighborhoods. That would be an important part of actually solving things. We also need universal healthcare coverage in the US. Medical expenses are another huge hardship in the US. If it were possible to find cheap housing, live without a car and get medical care without it being a hardship, that would make it possible to live on very little and then most people could make their lives work even if they only worked part-time. Currently, if you can't work full-time at a well paid job with benefits, you can't make your life work and we aren't creating enough jobs of that sort. We are increasingly moving to gig work which would be fine if you didn't need a job with good benefits to get medical care and if you could find a cheap place where living without a car really worked and you mostly can't arrange that in the US. Throwing money at the problem doesn't fix those systemic issues and likely just makes people in power feel like they did something and don't have to feel guilty while they shirk on dealing with resolving the hard problems because actually fixing anything is hard work and painful and no one wants to actually do that if they can find an easy out like "I cut you check. Stop bothering me."