I think in places in San Francisco, it might not just be "inequality", but also homeless people flocking to places with spare money and mild climate. Why else would you choose to be homeless in one of the most expensive places on earth?
this myth gets repeated and has no basis in reality. people in every city that offer any kind of service for the poor think that this attracts poor people. i guess it’s easier to believe that people are choosing to cheat society than society failed to provide for them
I said nothing about "choosing to cheat society". Perhaps check your own biases? I also didn't say anything about "offering services".
From the charts in your article it still doesn't seem unlikely that many homeless people migrated there for the jobs, a ka money - 30% in the "1 to 4 years" bracket, 48% if you go to "up to 9 years".
In my city (Berlin) it certainly seems to be the case that it is often immigrants who end up homeless, presumably because the social net for citizens doesn't fully apply to them.
That's a poor choice of words that betrays your lack of knowledge on the subject. Instead of guesses about what is happening backed up with with "why else" reasoning, why not just do a little research on your own first? Or at least start with a question instead of a claim?
> homeless people flock to places with spare money and mild climate.
Here is what it would look like as a question:
Do homeless people move to places with spare money and mild climate?
The "why else" construction is not a literal question. It's rhetoric device used to make a claim about reasoning. It implies that you've thought through all the possible reasons and you've come up with the obvious answer.
But if you were really making a sincere question, the answer to "why else" is: that is where they lived when they became homeless.
I wrote the reason MIGHT be spare money and mild climate, and in that context my question is an actual question, not rhetoric.
"It implies that you've thought through all the possible reasons and you've come up with the obvious answer."
No, me writing "MIGHT" literally implies the opposite of that.
It is also an aspect to consider, in any case - it is a valid question of why there are many homeless in a rich place. Merely claiming "inequality" is not actually an answer. In theory, the rich place should offer more job opportunities than poor places elsewhere.
> In theory, the rich place should offer more job opportunities than poor places elsewhere.
Which theory? Because trickle down doesn't have much support in terms of evidence. Often it's actually the wealth that causes the homelessness. As wealthy people move into an area and rents skyrocket, people who once could afford to live there end up on the street.
And where are homeless people getting all this money to relocate a thousand miles away based on the hopes that they might get a job in a city with a much higher cost of living? None of this even passes a quick common sense test.
> Is there any evidence for people becoming homeless because of skyrocketing rents?
Plenty of it, it is one of the primary causes. But just to put it in concrete terms that should scare anyone, the average rent in San Francisco in 1994 was about $1000. By 2001 the average rent was $2300. [1]
Consider that other living costs go up along with rent.
> Are there no renter protections in the USA, anyway?
Sometimes. But what happens when you lose your job, and then lose your apartment as a result? How are you going to afford the much higher rents now at a new apartment even if you can find a new job? At minimum wage?
If you ever decide to work with homeless people (you should) you'll hear two types of stories over and over: 1. Diseases such as mental illness and addiction. 2. People who are pretty much just like you and me. And then something unexpected happened. These stories are humbling, because after hearing enough of them you realize that a lot of what's keeping a roof over your own head is luck. Add medical bankruptcy to the mix and you've got the USA.
> The theory is simple that where the area is rich, there are more jobs - catering to the rich people.
So your theory is that rich people hire homeless people off the street to cater to them? NYC has loads of rich people - the most in the world [2]. NYC also has a huge homelessness problem. Maybe that will get solved when and if NYC gets just a few more billionaires?
NY state itself has the highest per capita homelessness rate in the USA [3]. Trickle down doesn't work.
> but also the jobs that make the rich people rich.
This is along the lines of saying "stop being poor, just get one of those jobs that the rich people have".
I would encourage you just read up on the subject instead of inventing theories that sound good to you. Homelessness is a well researched topic, and there is no lack of studies and data around it.
Rising rents are not evidence that rising rents are a major cause of homelessness.
"what happens when you lose your job, and then lose your apartment as a result?"
Then losing your job is the cause, not the rising rents.
"So your theory is that rich people hire homeless people off the street to cater to them?"
I could imagine many people migrate to those places to try to make their luck, because there are many opportunities. Many people trying their luck means also many people failing.
Pretty sure that a couple of dozen Billionaires do NOT cause homelessness.
"Trickle down doesn't work."
People living in New York are probably quite well off in general. A bunch of homeless people don't contradict the trickle down effect. You yourself mentioned mental illness, addiction, and unforeseen events as major causes of homelessness. Notice how rising rents and high paying jobs are not on the list.
"> but also the jobs that make the rich people rich.
This is along the lines of saying "stop being poor, just get one of those jobs that the rich people have"."
Not at all, and this is becoming silly. All I said is that there are presumably the jobs that made the rich people rich, which will usually be a lot of jobs, because rich people will usually have sold a lot of things. Building lots of things requires many workers.
"I would encourage you just read up on the subject instead of inventing theories that sound good to you."
If you are so well read, then provide some convincing evidence for your claims. None of the three links you provided tell us anything about the cause of homelessness. I noticed in the last one that California has very low youth homelessness, though.
Frankly, your "well researched" theories about homeless sound mostly like leftist anti capitalist propaganda to me.
Yes, that's the entire problem I've been encouraging you to stop doing. You don't need to imagine. It's an extremely well researched subject.
I was sincerely hoping you'd put a little work into the research yourself (like I asked you to) instead of continuing to create mental fantasies about why homelessness might happen. We already know why it happens. Without any cherry picking on my part, here are the top five search results from "causes of homelessness". Is it really going to surprise you that "lack of affordable housing" shows up over and over? When average rents goes from $1000 to $2300 in a few years, that's a specific example of "lack of affordable housing" isn't it? It's plain common sense that skyrocketing rents are going to put some people on the street. If you don't believe the articles, talk to some real homeless people, like I have during my volunteer work to help them.
> If you are so well read, then provide some convincing evidence for your claims. None of the three links you provided tell us anything about the cause of homelessness.
I gave you five articles listing the causes of homelessness. Now you're claiming the articles aren't enough.
> If you could give everybody a free house, there would probably be less homeless people.
In many cities they have in fact done this and it works pretty well. It's significantly cheaper than the hospital visits and the extra burden on the police force.
You want to keep inventing theories out of your own imagination, while I have actual experience working with homeless people, in several major cities around the world. If you don't want to believe that gentrification in general and specifically rents going from $1000 to $2300 in a few years causes homelessness for those who were barely able to afford rent in the first place, that's certainly your choice. You can have the last word as I don't see this going in a useful direction.
"I gave you five articles listing the causes of homelessness. Now you're claiming the articles aren't enough."
Um yeah, because they are not? They don't say anything about rising rents causing homelessness, they only mention the same correlation you also mentioned (rich city has many homeless), which doesn't provide any causation. In fact most of them don't provide any evidence at all. Some web site claiming "x causes y" is not actually evidence for anything.
"In many cities they have in fact done this and it works pretty well. It's significantly cheaper than the hospital visits and the extra burden on the police force."
Sure, but that was not what we are discussing. We are discussing the claim that rising wealth increases homelessness. That's an entirely different question. In fact wealthy regions would probably be better able to provide free housing for homeless people than poor places.
If you have actual experience working with homeless people, give us some real information.
