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U.S. homelessness jumps to record high amid affordable housing shortage
- Kollman 2y agoThank you for sharing this information...
- Kollman 2y ago[dead]
- Pikamander2 2y agoDirect link to the report's PDF: https://www.huduser.gov/portal/sites/default/files/pdf/2024-AHAR-Part-1.pdf https://www.huduser.gov/portal/sites/default/files/pdf/2024-...
- typeofhuman 2y ago> HUD officials say another key factor was the recent increase in asylum seekers coming to the U.S., often fleeing dangerous conditions in their home countries. This feels like another "safe and effective" talking point.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- ngcc_hk 2y agoHow many of these are newly illegal immigrants? May be heartless to say that, but one cannot take them all. Obviously winter time and we should have mercy. But there are limits.
- micromacrofoot 2y agowe have a decent amount of housing that sits vacant, lots of houses eventually go derelict...
- idle_zealot 2y agoWe have enough space, but refuse to build affordable housing, for our citizens or for immigrants/asylum seekers. It's a fake problem conjured entirely from broken incentives and an utter lack of political will to fix them.
- xenospn 2y agoWe cant even have affordable healthcare. Affordable housing is a pipe dream.
- hiddencost 2y agoWe absolutely can afford health care, we spend more than twice anyone else, we merely structure our healthcare to be unaffordable.
- easports611 2y agoOur doctors and surgeons are paid roughly double what they make in countries like Sweden. Who’s going to convince them to take a pay cut in USA?
- mmooss 2y agoWho convinces people in other industries that change? Big shifts affect blue collar and professional workers all the time.
- easports611 2y agoWhen’s the last time we’ve moved an entire industry from private to public ownership
- forgetfreeman 2y agoIn point of fact the country is -littered- with affordable housing, frequently sitting unoccupied in places people were perfectly happy to live before all of the economic opportunities in rural America were gutted. How sure are we the current crisis actually involves housing?
- FredPret 2y agoThe report mentions that as a contributing factor.
- mlnj 2y agoThis is only a distraction. There is literally no reason other than keeping the prices up for the government to build more and more housing.
- bojangleslover 2y agoWe don't know. The best we can do is model it as a random variable based on what little data we do have. What data do we have? Well over 2 million border encounters for 2023 and 2024. For a nation of over 350 million that doesn't sound like much but remember, housing is an inelastic good where a 1% fluctuation in the supply can be an absolute shock to the system. These people have to live somewhere — and whether they're taking up a single bedroom or an entire residence, they're living somewhere. So I don't think you should be downvoted. There's nothing wrong with asking about how an uncountable yet sizable population will affect the dynamics of an inelastic good.
- nxm 2y ago~11 million illegal crossings since 2020, more than the combined populations of several states.
- BadHumans 2y agoIllegal crossing does not mean there are 11 million immigrants in the US. Biden has also done a record number of deportations in his presidency.
- xnx 2y agoYou're absolutely right. Crossing != net new person in the US. Total net migration is probably 8 million over the past 4 years: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/11/briefing/us-immigration-surge.html https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/11/briefing/us-immigration-s...
- rat87 2y ago11 million crossing doesn't mean 11 million people (multiple crossing attempts) and it doesn't those people are still in the US. Unfortunately there's a lot of FUD about immigrants and immigration. Most estimates don't go above 12 million unauthorized immigrants *TOTAL* a large percentage who have been here a long time. And that this is probably slightly below a peak unauthorized immigrant population around 2008. * Since some people tend to often claim people who are here legally are "illegals" it's important to note that asylum seekers are here legally as are those granted TPS.
- seanmcdirmid 2y agoIn my area (Seattle), almost none of the visible homeless are illegal immigrants. Granted, these are mostly drug addicts (otherwise you wouldn’t notice them!), but I get the feeling that they have living arrangements somehow given that they are here to make money and not do drugs (it has to pay off for them, and I can’t see that happening if they live in the streets). It might not be very great housing though (think 4 men sharing a room). The “illegal immigrants” are homeless thing feels like a meme to me, but I live far from the southern border so maybe it’s worse down there?
- miunau 2y agoYou're implying you have a conscience but your first thought is that the affordable housing shortage is aggravated by nebulous "illegal" immigrants rather than profit-seeking corporations?
- dpe82 2y agoBuild more housing.
- GiorgioG 2y agoThe people with the power (money) to do so have no incentive to do so because they hold real estate which keeps going up because of the shortage. Why work against yourself?
- riku_iki 2y agosome politician can make it as part of platform, and win +20% of votes for example.
- lpolovets 2y agoI think incentives are different on an individual level. Yes, if everyone built more housing then your property's value would not go up as much. But if a single individual builds housing that's very profitable, that'll way more than offset the tiny reduction to the values of that individual's other properties. It's like a prisoner's dilemma where property owners as a class may not want more housing so that they are wealthier on paper, but any individual property owner will want to build housing because that'll grow their wealth faster.
- davidw 2y agoEh, this is just a cynical excuse to not try. Here in Oregon, we're making some progress on housing reform. The mayor of my city attended the YIMBYTown conference a few years back when she was a city councilor. Heck, the now-governor of Oregon, Tina Kotek, spoke at it, and continues to work on housing policy. Part of the puzzle is that reforms are better at the state level, where it's easier to say "yeah, we have a housing crisis, and these things will fix it" and you're not confronted by a local angry mob of NIMBYs intent on stopping homes from being built.
- amazingamazing 2y agoThis is wrong - search any major city and “blocked development” and you’ll see.
- FredPret 2y agoCauses, according to the article: - High rent > Research finds that where rents go up, so does homelessness - Illegal border crossings > HUD officials say another key factor was the recent increase in asylum seekers coming to the U.S. - Extreme weather & Maui fire It does not mention the opioid crisis.
- blindriver 2y agoWith regards to the Maui fire, no one is talking abt the crisis that FEMA themselves created. They didn’t care about how much or how negligently the money was distributed, so FEMA would offer 2X current rates (upwards of $7000/month) to landlords which incentivized them to kick out existing tenants and cause a bigger problem but no one talks about it. It’s gross incompetence but the media is silent about it.
- y-c-o-m-b 2y agoI had no idea about this, but did manage to find an article from this summer on it: https://abcnews.go.com/US/maui-strong-808-maui-fire-survivors-upset-living/story?id=110984642 https://abcnews.go.com/US/maui-strong-808-maui-fire-survivor... You're right though, not much mainstream media traction on this story. > FEMA has allocated $197 million to three companies, none of which are based in Hawaii, to administer the Direct Lease program Smells of borderline corruption from the get-go. What a shit show.
- davidw 2y ago> It does not mention the opioid crisis. Places like West Virginia have way less homelessness than places with high housing costs like the west coast. Homelessness is a housing problem. Drugs make it worse, but are not the primary cause. https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/everything-you-think-you-know-about https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/everything-you-think-you-know-...
- jonwachob91 2y ago>> Places like West Virginia have way less homelessness than places with high housing costs like the west coast. COLD towns without major homeless shelter capabilities always have lower rates of homelessness b/c the cold weather is literally life threatening. Warm(er) regions, like most of the West Coast that isn't known for blizzards, have higher rates of homelessness b/c there is little risk of death if a homeless person camps out in the woods. Note that a lot of homeless folks in warmer regions didn't become homeless in those warm regions - they often become homeless in northern regions and migrate to warm regions prior to winter. Comparing homelessness in WV to Cali doesn't seem fair since so much of the folks that become homeless in WV are forced to leave the state to survive.
- shadowbanned-00 2y ago[dead]
- mrtksn 2y agoIt appears that %6.9 of the houses for rent in USA are vacant: https://www.census.gov/housing/hvs/files/currenthvspress.pdf https://www.census.gov/housing/hvs/files/currenthvspress.pdf Is this efficient?
- micromacrofoot 2y agoamerican housing is optimized for investment, not living
- rcpt 2y agoLand Value Tax would solve it
- Retric 2y agoLand value taxes alone don’t do crap. You need a high enough tax burden to compel people to change, and those levels are extremely unpopular.
- amazingamazing 2y agoLand is already taxed on value
- rcpt 2y agoThere's no federal tax on Land. States often don't tax on current market value (Prop 13 for example)
- amazingamazing 2y agoVoters should remove that - California has more renters than owners.
- rcpt 2y agoAbsolutely. The opposition is strong and well organized. But the population is suffering.
- jncfhnb 2y agoQuadruple property taxes on any residential property that is not an active primary residence.
- jakeinspace 2y agoYes, but also we need some more direct incentive for new construction. Real estate as investment property at least used to drive supply. We need massive (tax/interest rate/zoning) incentives for high density construction, both in cities and towns/suburbs. Disincentivizing empty investment properties is the cheapest way for the government, but I think carrot and stick works best.
- asdff 2y agoWhich will be passed straight to the renter. The solution is upping the zoned capacity in constrained cities. Theres already enough carrot where these cities are built out to the limits of their zoning already even with all the hoops and red tape for development.
- riku_iki 2y agorenters already paying as much as they can be squeezed to pay. Raising prop taxes will push inventory to the market which will become primary residency.
- seanmcdirmid 2y agoIt will make life hell for anyone who can’t afford to buy their own house yet. It will also make labor markets less fluid because they are now stuck to their house and can’t take much advantage of flexibility. We might as well implement a Chinese style hukou system while we are at it.
- riku_iki 2y agoI don't understand why do you think so, more cheaper inventory on the market will move things in exactly opposite direction to what you described.
- bfrog 2y agoCrazy as there’s no shortage of land to build houses on. Of course there’s also not many great jobs in the empty west or endless fields of corn and soy (coated in cancer causing chemicals no less).
- gosub100 2y agoand most tech companies are making it clear they want your butt in a seat. I'm not saying full-remote jobs are a single cure for it, but it definitely moves the needle in the right direction, as well as reduces CO2 emissions.
- y-c-o-m-b 2y agoI'm pro remote work any day, but isn't there a case to be made for increasing gentrification due to remote work? I'm seeing this here in Oregon.
- seanmcdirmid 2y agoMississippi has a low homeless rate for a reason. It isn’t just about absolute housing availability, but housing in areas where people want to or have to live. People also either die or leave if they can’t survive there, you simply can’t exist at all on the margin.
- mullingitover 2y agoIt's going to get worse before it gets better. The pyrrhic NIMBY victory over new housing development that might threaten the value of their investment has led to the country eating its young. It's not just homelessness, it's a crashing birth rate because young couples are making the decisions they're guided into by the market: not starting families. Build mixed income public housing, Singapore style. Resurrect the Federal Works Agency and restore the powers of the Army Corps of Engineers to file eminent domain paperwork in the morning and roll bulldozers after lunch.
- swarnie 2y ago> mixed income public housing Maybe its just my country and the way we do things but these words dont make sense in this order. What do you mean by public housing?
- BadHumans 2y agoPublic housing is housing owned and managed by the government. It could be the same copy paste apartment blocks but owned by your city or state government. Despite public housing always being connected to affordable housing, it does not have to be affordable housing to be public housing.
- mullingitover 2y agoI'm talking about publicly subsidized housing construction, along the lines of Singapore model[1]. Public housing in the US is stigmatized because there's a focus on the deliberately ghettoized, designed-to-fail low income housing that was built in the 20th century. This is held up as the definition of public housing, but there are other version of it that were and are successful. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_housing_in_Singapore https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_housing_in_Singapore
- blackoil 2y agoSingapore also has "draconian" laws, so it may not be as easy to replicate.
- passwordoops 2y agoLack of affordable housing or depressed wages? https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2018/08/07/for-most-us-workers-real-wages-have-barely-budged-for-decades/ https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2018/08/07/for-most-...
- Avicebron 2y agoKind of both, if the money is the lubricant and the people are one gear and the other gear is all of the infrastructure needed to keep the other gear moving, once the money has been drained out of the assembly it stops working..
- asdff 2y agoProbably lack of housing. Fewer homeless in wv than you might expect with the depressed wages there because more people can afford housing. When you go to places like the rust belt its very hard to find homeless people at all. When you go to high rent/home price regions on the other hand, its hard not to see homeless people.
- BadHumans 2y agoThe answer is both.
- missedthecue 2y agoLack of housing. The poorest states in the US (Mississippi, West Virginia) have low homeless rates. The poorest countries in the continent have low homeless rates. Because it's easy to find cheap housing. If there are 100 houses and 110 people, (and there can't be room-mates), wages can go to infinity and the homeless rates won't be reduced.
- seanmcdirmid 2y agoPeople are also leaving both of those states for places where housing is less affordable. So we have 100 houses for every 90 people in Mississippi because 20 people had already left the state for Atlanta, Nashville, or Austin. Everyone knows that housing problems locally can be solved by making the places less desirable to live in. But it’s not a solution that anyone is interested in pursuing (rightfully so).
- davidw 2y agoA few months back, the author of "Homelessness is a Housing Problem" gave a talk where I live and it's quite worth watching if you don't have time to read the book: https://youtu.be/W4rBe1fGPZU?si=xV2Ai789WXZ548nG&t=442 https://youtu.be/W4rBe1fGPZU?si=xV2Ai789WXZ548nG&t=442 (linked to where he's about to start talking to skip all the intros and thanks and so on) There's this article, also, with the main points: https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/everything-you-think-you-know-about https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/everything-you-think-you-know-... We need to build a lot more housing - of all shapes and sizes - in the places where people want to live.
- seanmcdirmid 2y agoThis article isn’t really useful. If we are dumping almost 100% of our homeless resources on drug addiction then the fact that this is only 20-40% of the population is more of a travesty than a “so what”. You can’t solve their homelessness problems without figuring out a way to stabilize them (or they just burn down the housing you give them), and the fact that this minority overwhelms our support systems (and it’s immoral to prioritize non-substance abuse cases), means that we are stuck in a rut of throwing tons of resources at cases ($10k+/month/person helped) that go way beyond just subsidizing or covering their rent. If it were just a housing problem, it could be solved with more housing. But we’ve conflated it with drug addiction (at least here in Seattle) and it has become much less solvable as a result.
- rcpt 2y agoThe article is useful and the author specifically goes into the case of why drugs are not the reason.
- Der_Einzige 2y ago[flagged]
- Avicebron 2y agoI'm pretty sure the social safety were gutted when the US slipped right into company profiteering at all costs, busting domestic infrastructure and commerce and leaving people looking around with their hat in their hands wondering why no one can afford anything including houses. It's a capitol/labor split, but I don't love having to use that language.
- BadHumans 2y agoI live in a dense urban area and there are literally a dozen buildings that are empty and derelict because the property owners are just sitting on them hoping to flip them. They can't get the price they want so they will just let them sit empty and decay.
- aaronbrethorst 2y agoLabor is expensive. Maybe they can’t front the money to renovate them so people could live there. Interest rates are high. Maybe no one is willing to buy and renovate those lots because the cost of acquiring enough capital to do so is prohibitive. There can be lots of reasons why houses sit vacant. I don’t think we should assume ill intent.
- tossandthrow 2y agoIn that case: They should sell the units so other people can utilize it. In large parts of Scandinavia there is an obligation to have residents in an apartment. The only legal reason not to have an apartment occupied is that it is for sale, or on the market for finding a renter (within the market price). IMHO there is absolutely no reason to let units stay empty for any longer than what normal resident churn mandate.
- BadHumans 2y agoThese buildings have been vacant for years and a few of them are on the market for an absurd price. I don't think they have ill intent. I'm sure in their mind what could be ill intentioned about waiting for someone to pay them the right price? Doesn't mean there aren't very real consequences for letting these buildings sit empty.
- rcpt 2y agoWhich urban area?
- BadHumans 2y agoAt the risk of doxxing myself I very intentionally left it in vague. Lets say an urban area in the US west :)
- AlgorithmicTime 2y ago[dead]
- xnx 2y agoReally hard to get a sense of scale from this article. It mentions 5,200 in shelters from the Maui fire, but there have been an estimated 8,000,000 net new immigrants over the past four years: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/11/briefing/us-immigration-surge.html https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/11/briefing/us-immigration-s...
- amazingamazing 2y agoAnother factor is that it’s too hard to evict people. So you’re not going to give chances to those on the margins.
- MrLeap 2y agoAm I understanding you right that you believe that homelessness would decrease if it were easier to evict people? This strikes me as one of those gasoline on the fire suggestions. Made me laugh though! I never get perspectives like this anywhere but HN. I think self interest being what it is, easier evictions would raise rents.
- bdangubic 2y agoif we were to provide sensible landlord/tenant laws this idea could be helpful. BUT (big BUT) I lost faith than a senisble laws can be enacted in the USA. In more liberal places the laws are written so extreme that it makes you question your sanity if you are a landlord. in other more conservative places - the landlords are true Lords! I am a landlord in a place which is liberal. I will keep my place vacant for months against a mountain of applications until I find someone which I feel comfortable with signing a lease (that bar is HIGH). My place is dirt cheap, I have 3% interest on a place I bought after real estate crash and I only charge enough to cover my mortgage and condo fees (could easily charge additional $1.5k/month). I would be 100% more open to signing a lease with someone who needs an afforable place A LOT more than my current and former tenants but with the present laws I have to deal with there is absolutely no way that will ever happen
- tossandthrow 2y ago> I will keep my place vacant for months against a mountain of applications until I find someone which I feel comfortable with signing a lease. This should be illegal. If you want zero effort assets to put your money into, then real-estate really is not you. This behavior is highly immoral.
- MrLeap 2y agoThe perspective is understandable to me. It's easy to imagine rationally leaving a place vacant for longer if you're very picky about who you rent to. It's a timed binding commitment you make with your tenants, that puts you both on the same raft at least a little. That said, you're saying that you could charge 1.5k more for the place, but don't because you value other qualities in a tenant more, right? On mass, I'd bet dollars and donuts that what we'd find is people being evicted, or threatened with eviction, in order to raise rents. Situations like "property values have gone up 10% this year and I was too low to begin with. they've got 6 months left on their lease, but if I evict them I bet I have more cache to keep the deposit and I can ~fix my prices~. Business!" Maybe your principles wouldn't have you do that, but people statistically make self interested decisions like that more often than compassionate ones. Balance compassion for self and others oughta be the guide.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- anonfordays 2y ago[flagged]
- mmooss 2y agoOr could we say, during this Congress? They even worked out some laws, but then one party refused to pass them, openly saying they wanted to undermine their opponents.
- anonfordays 2y agoYou fell for the propaganda. The bill had funding for Ukraine and Gaza which is why it was DoA for Republicans.
- bdangubic 2y agoso did you if you think it was about Gaza and Ukraine ;-) GOP loves war in Ukraine more than a fat kid loves cake
- anonfordays 2y ago>so did you if you think it was about Gaza and Ukraine ;-) I fell for reality and facts, not propaganda. >GOP loves war in Ukraine more than a fat kid loves cake Not the current GOP, maybe prior ones, like the GOP of Dick Cheney, who supported... checks notes, Kamala and the current pro-war party.
- bdangubic 2y agostart here and then see where it takes you… https://youtu.be/slgsZnYnF3k?feature=shared https://youtu.be/slgsZnYnF3k?feature=shared you are almost too funny but I needed a laugh on this fine Sunday
- anonfordays 2y agoYou linked a video to a Dick Cheney era Republican, thus proving my point. Not only did the party overwhelmingly vote against what's stated in your video, the gentleman on question also went on to vote against that. Swing and a miss. Indeed, I needed a laugh.
- deepnotderp 2y agoWe need to move zoning to the federal level like Japan We must decide whether we’ll be a civilization that bows to NIMBYism and stays stuck in squalor or allow building the future.
- kayo_20211030 2y agoA bright spot. > One bright spot was a decline in the number of unhoused veterans. This year that actually fell to a record low, after years of intense investment in subsidized housing and support services. That decline was due to someone caring about the issue; planning, financing, and executing. But mostly, because someone cared about actually addressing the issue.
- GeoAtreides 2y agoService guarantees housing!
- therealdrag0 2y agoSubsidized housing doesn’t address the issue except for small interest groups. It just puts a bandaid on it.
- kayo_20211030 2y agoWhy is the approach not scalable? In general, everyone has interests, whether part of a small group, a medium group, or a large group. There's a homelessness issue amongst veterans. So, let's try subsidies and support to reduce the severity of the issue. It seems to work. What did we learn, and can we build on those lessons in general? It's better to use a bandaid than just bleed.
- therealdrag0 2y agoIf there are 10 cookies and 12 people who want to buy them the price goes up and some people go without. Giving 2 people enough money to buy the cheapest cookie allows them to buy it, but at the expense of someone else being able to buy it who didn’t have that free money. You can try to give everyone money, but that just puts us back where we started and now the baker can further raise prices to extract that free money from everyone. When there isn’t enough to go around, the solution is to make more cookies.
- greentxt 2y agoIt is literally impossible to satisfy infinite demand. Who is buying the houses? Figure that out and you can solve the problem. If we choose to ignore demand side, don't investigate what is driving demand, how it is distributed and so on, and continue to pretend real estate markets are perfect and we need merely deregulate to solve all problems, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary (bubbles, collusion rings, fraud and wreckless speculation), it will not end well.
- kindeyoowee 2y agolandlord pays for water the army is rising we formed a new religion lol