The Homelessness Conundrum

[DGS49]

Mayor Ed Gainey addresses homeless issue as protesters picket his house

During a Monday afternoon news conference, Mayor Ed Gainey addressed concerns about decommissioning homeless encampments and ensuring adequate shelter...

www.post-gazette.com

Here in Pittsburgh, the homeless "crisis" is steadily increasing in magnitude as the civic officials fret over how to "solve" it. It is a little more urgent here than it is in, say, Los Angeles, because we will have a few days this Winter (thanks to Global Warming) when it could actually be life-threatening to be sleeping out on the streets.

My son recently sent me his thoughts on the matter, expressed in "music."


But the homelessness conundrum is, in my opinion, the more painless "we" make life for the homeless, the more people will simply decide that homelessness is a better option that their alternatives, e.g., working a lot of hours to rent a hovel. To illustrate, imagine that Elon Musk had his engineers devise an inexpensive retrofit for excess ocean shipping containers, making them into livable sleeping rooms with minimal but complete facilities. He makes them available to municipalities at a reasonable cost to address their respective homeless crises, and guess what? A LOT of people on the edge of homelessness decide to jump off and avail themselves.

In California, they spend BILLIONS on the "homeless crisis" and it never gets any better. Indeed, there are armies of NGO workers who would be - dare I say it - homeless themselves if the problem were solved because they would not have jobs.

In the face of this matter, as we, the general public, ponder what should be done, I think the relevant question to ask is, "Why is 98% of the general public NOT homeless?" And the answer is, Because we go out to work every day in order to put a roof over our heads. Nobody is giving us a place to sleep; we have to WORK for it. Aside from the "Deserving Poor" (mainly widows, orphans, and crazies), why should "we" fret over the lives of those who simply won't do what WE are doing in order to stay warm and dry There are a shitload of jobs out there for anyone who wants one.

I just don't care as much as I'm supposed to. Sorry.

 

[sparky]

demographics reveal homelessness......~S~

 

[Polishprince]

What Pittsburgh mayor Gainey needs to do is to look at what leaders of other cities that don't have the same problem are doing, and just emulate them.

My nephew lives in the city of Imperial, adjacent to Pittsburgh and works in the city of Moon.

Neither of those cities have the homeless problem that their liberal neighbors do.

 

[EvilCat Breath]

Solving the homeless problem isn't as easy as just giving people a place to stay. People are homeless for a reason and there are a lot of reasons.

San Francisco once planned to turn a decommissioned cruise ship into housing for the homeless. Many refused to stay because of a prohibition on drugs and alcohol. Women could not be protected from attack. There were fights constantly. The idea was clearly unworkable.

There is a false idea that the homeless are just ordinary people a bit down on their luck. It's not true. While there are people who are just having a bad time of it, the vast majority cannot be housed. They are drunks, addicts, violent. Some, like my parents just prefer the freedom homelessness offers.

The one thing that will always be true, the easier you make it, the more you will have.

 

[1srelluc]

If you build a "homeless" shelter or accommodate them in any way, they will come.

It's really as simple as that.

 

[sparky]

Homelessness in the United States by state - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

~S~

 

[1srelluc]

Homeless Population by State 2024

worldpopulationreview.com

 

[martybegan]

Mayor Ed Gainey addresses homeless issue as protesters picket his house

During a Monday afternoon news conference, Mayor Ed Gainey addressed concerns about decommissioning homeless encampments and ensuring adequate shelter...

www.post-gazette.com

Here in Pittsburgh, the homeless "crisis" is steadily increasing in magnitude as the civic officials fret over how to "solve" it. It is a little more urgent here than it is in, say, Los Angeles, because we will have a few days this Winter (thanks to Global Warming) when it could actually be life-threatening to be sleeping out on the streets.

My son recently sent me his thoughts on the matter, expressed in "music."


But the homelessness conundrum is, in my opinion, the more painless "we" make life for the homeless, the more people will simply decide that homelessness is a better option that their alternatives, e.g., working a lot of hours to rent a hovel. To illustrate, imagine that Elon Musk had his engineers devise an inexpensive retrofit for excess ocean shipping containers, making them into livable sleeping rooms with minimal but complete facilities. He makes them available to municipalities at a reasonable cost to address their respective homeless crises, and guess what? A LOT of people on the edge of homelessness decide to jump off and avail themselves.

In California, they spend BILLIONS on the "homeless crisis" and it never gets any better. Indeed, there are armies of NGO workers who would be - dare I say it - homeless themselves if the problem were solved because they would not have jobs.

In the face of this matter, as we, the general public, ponder what should be done, I think the relevant question to ask is, "Why is 98% of the general public NOT homeless?" And the answer is, Because we go out to work every day in order to put a roof over our heads. Nobody is giving us a place to sleep; we have to WORK for it. Aside from the "Deserving Poor" (mainly widows, orphans, and crazies), why should "we" fret over the lives of those who simply won't do what WE are doing in order to stay warm and dry There are a shitload of jobs out there for anyone who wants one.

I just don't care as much as I'm supposed to. Sorry.

The simple fact is when you subsidize bad behavior, you get more of it.

We have also removed shame from the equation.

 

[ReinyDays]

Aside from the "Deserving Poor" (mainly widows, orphans, and crazies) ...

So you agree we need to house the mentally ill in residential treatment facilities? ... how about drug addicts? ... it's these two groups that make housing the homeless so difficult ... and dangerous ...

Our local senior center opened up during super cold nights, but then the police had to come and shoot dead a crazy ... the senior center is no longer opening on cold nights ... too dangerous ...

Affordable housing is a myth ... it doesn't exist ... there's minimum standards in this country, such that it's illegal to rent a hovel ... landlords will never get fire insurance because crazies like to burn ... and wrongful deaths lawsuits run into the millions ...

Environmentalists saved the forests ... now we have a housing crisis ... simple cause-and-effect ... if we want to house the homeless, we must murder trees ... bunch of sap-thirsty floracidal maniacs ..

 

[1srelluc]

The simple fact is when you subsidize bad behavior, you get more of it.

We have also removed shame from the equation.

That and they network better than the hobos of the depression era.....All of them seem to have a smart phone.

They know where all "the big rock candy mountains" are.

 

[martybegan]

That and they network better than the hobos of the depression era.....All of them seem to have a smart phone.

They know where all "the big rock candy mountains" are.

Those networks are probably perpetuated by the homeless advocates, who have no real incentive to end homelessness, but plenty of incentive to perpetuate it.

 

[1srelluc]

Those networks are probably perpetuated by the homeless advocates, who have no real incentive to end homelessness, but plenty of incentive to perpetuate it.

Yep, they certainly are. The grift to NGOs has to stop.

 

[martybegan]

Yep, they certainly are. The grift to NGOs has to stop.

That, and the massive "homeless departments" in big blue cities.

 

[Woodznutz]

If you build a "homeless" shelter or accommodate them in any way, they will come.

It's really as simple as that.

"The Homeless are coming, The Homeless are coming!" YIKES!

 

[rightwinger]

But the homelessness conundrum is, in my opinion, the more painless "we" make life for the homeless, the more people will simply decide that homelessness is a better option that their alternatives, e.g., working a lot of hours to rent a hovel.

So the homeless don’t suffer enough.
The poor always do better when you give them less

 

[Woodznutz]

The Dems are just trying to cultivate another demographic that will vote for them. That's all homelessness is.

 

[Zincwarrior]

That and they network better than the hobos of the depression era.....All of them seem to have a smart phone.

They know where all "the big rock candy mountains" are.

My daughter used to sing that as a wee one (I had the O Brother CD).

 

[Polishprince]

If I wanted to be a homeless bum, I'd move to LA.

The weather is ideal to stay outside, they don't care if you shit on the sidewalk, and plenty of rich people with change to spare.

 

[Woodznutz]

So the homeless don’t suffer enough.
The poor always do better when you give them less

You'd be amazed at how little a person actually needs.

 

[Woodznutz]

If I wanted to be a homeless bum, I'd move to LA.

The weather is ideal to stay outside, they don't care if you shit on the sidewalk, and plenty of rich people with change to spare.

Weather. That's the big attraction.