>'The city of San Francisco (a city of a million people) spends over $150 million a year on the problem. That works out to $34 per homeless person per day.[1]'

>'The city of San Francisco (a city of a million people) spends over $150 million a year on the problem. That works out to $34 per homeless person per day.[1]' My loose Wikipedia-driven math puts that at <0.5% of income working to support >1.3% of population to the tune of a not terribly luxurious $12k per year. I don't know how that compares to elsewhere, but it doesn't seem like a horrible deal at face value. Still, the important question is always going to be how that money is spent, not how much is spent. Everyone seems to agree that it could be more effective. Thankfully, some of the issues sound like things the tech community would quite able to assist with: "By highest-end users, Bamberger means the hardest of the hard-core homeless, who use far more emergency services, such as ambulance rides, than other homeless people. To figure out which ones those are, Salt Lake City uses a data tracking system that shows every time a homeless person gets shelter, counseling or other services from a government or nonprofit agency. Then counselors can tailor housing and services to the person's needs. This also makes it much easier for government and nonprofits to quickly coordinate their efforts. San Francisco doesn't have such a system. Its service providers have wanted one for a decade - and this summer, they plan to participate in a pilot project for just such a data-tracking system, led by the Human Services Agency and other city departments involved in aiding the homeless." 1: http://www.sfgate.com/nation/article/Salt-Lake-City-a-model-for-S-F-on-homeless-5587357.php http://www.sfgate.com/nation/article/Salt-Lake-City-a-model-...