Homelessness was on the rise even before the pandemic

Homelessness has nothing to do with economics. It's human failure.

 

Well, that's not true either.

There are different components to the problem. One of these component is economic. Why would you think the rate of homelessness would have been increasing over this time period if economic factors were not operating as one of the causes?

 

You may have a point, but crank obviously has no understanding of macroeconomics at all, hence her false claim to be "Leftist" while hating government intervention.

Meanwhile your assertion that the paradox of thrift is a fallacy, is itself wrong for the reasons I outlined.

Btw, here is article showing why governments of nations in which external deficits are the norm, MUST run fiscal (government) deficits at home:

MMT: overcoming the political divide. | Page 36 | PoliticalForum.com - Forum for US and Intl Politics

Post #898, page 36.

Excerpt:

"Fiscal (govt) Deficit + Net Exports = Net Private Saving

If domestic businesses sell more goods and services to foreigners than domestic businesses and households buy from overseas, export revenue will exceed import spending and there will be a build up of private-domestic financial assets. So, in an open economy, private net saving can come either from government deficit expenditure or net exports.

In many countries, though, including the US, net exports are typically negative, which means the external sector subtracts from net private saving. This leaves the fiscal deficit as the only source of net private saving. For trade-deficit countries such as the US, in other words, it is impossible for the private sector to net save unless the government runs a fiscal deficit."

.....which of course relates to the capacity of the government to intervene in the free market in order to provide public housing......a capacity you either did not, or do not want to consider, in the OP.

 

Good point....crank in effect claims people"choose" homelessness, in economic downturns.

 

You're basically saying that the country has a savings problem caused by long term chronic trade deficits and that the only way to solve the problem is for government to take over the role of debtor instead of private citizens. Maybe, just maybe, did it ever occur to you that the real problem might be those national trade deficits to begin with??

I don't want to get too much into an argument about you with this, because that is not the main topic of this thread.

 

I won't engage in diatribe...

 

You or I cannot solve homeless issues...therefore it absolutely requires government! Of course government is not the cause of homeless issues but government is the only entity that can make policy and create laws and provide assistance. There are myriad reasons for homelessness and mitigation of homelessness will require the public address ALL of the root causes and possible solutions...

 

Economics is one of the main reasons for homelessness. People simply not being able to afford their current housing. Lost their job, experience health issues, divorce, etc. can lead to homelessness. There can be other root factors like gambling, drugs, alcohol, reckless decisions, etc. all of which can exacerbate the economic issues.

You sighing 'human failure' is disrespectful to people and scenarios you are clueless about. How is a person losing their job 'human failure'? How is a person dealing with catastrophic health issues 'human failure'? How is a woman losing her husband to divorce, in which she was a homemaker and he the bread-winner, 'human failure'? Judging others when you know nothing about their personal plight says more about you than about them...

 

I just think it's important to realize that the economic situation in a country carries a real human toll.

And that these things like homelessness can be used as an indicator of the health of the economy, and be able to compare two different times. (whether things are worse, or whether things have really gotten better)

 

Just look at the US economy from 100K feet; the median wage is about $35K, with most people carrying more debt than they should, living pay check to pay check, with many jobs in high cost of living areas of the US, most teetering on the brink of financial ruin with the slightest hiccup, and the surprising thing is that we don't have more homeless?! Yes we have homeless issues today but just think how many more are little more than a side-step from becoming homeless? The US is the greatest nation on Earth but the average American worker in today's economy are the 'human toll' you mention...

 

Homelessness is really just the tip of the iceberg.
An indicator of a more widespread problem.

 

I think this can be analyzed with statistics. When you have a big enough population pool with a risk, a set fraction of those people are inevitably going to experience the mishap. It's probability.

It would be like if you dropped 100 people into the ocean who had been given only one swimming lesson but never knew how to swim before that. 3 or 4 of them would drown.

There are a lot of people in the economy treading water.

 

Homelessness is 100% a choice. There are multitudes of federal, state and local programs to assist someone when they lose their job. Remaining homeless is entirely a choice.

 

You seem to be extremely ignorant about this issue.

 

Pointing out that mainstream Friedman supply-side economics is obsolete is not diatribe.

It's a statement of fact.

Just as the gold-standard era had to be abandoned (by Nixon) because there was not enough gold in the world (to accommodate global trade), so the idea that governments must balance their budgets in the long run, will also have to be abandoned, to deal with the emerging social problems including that identified in the OP.
eg,
"So long as the private sector as a whole desires to spend less than its income, government deficits are the normal requirement, not an aberration" .

and

"At the global level, net exports cancel out to zero. Not every country can have a trade surplus."

Just a couple of fun facts for you to tackle...

 

I'll try saying it another way:

It's not the economic factors themselves which are directly responsible (after all, economies change), it's the failure of individuals to adapt to changed ecnomic factors. A good example being the large number of people who don't adjust their lifestyle as much as they should before/during/after uncertain times. They just continue doing what they've always done, and simply hope things get better. This is a problem of First World culture, arising out of a long run of certainty and safety post war. Before the war we were much better at adaptation. After all, the first 40 years of the 20thC visited two world wars and a Depression, so we knew we had to stay agile to weather those frequent storms.

 

Of course we can. In fact we're the only ones who CAN solve it. All we have to do is be individually determined not to fail our children (by being the sort of rubbish parents that create highly dysfunctional adults), or ourselves (by being highly dysfunctional), or our loved ones (by failing to materially support them in times of need). If the majority of us did that - as we used to, and as many other cultures still do - the majority of homelessness would disappear. The remaining tiny percentage would be just the functionally insane without family, and these belong in institutions in any case.

In the meantime, I can't even begin to respond politely to your insistence that the human population of the planet, and the planet itself, can somehow afford to funnel endless resources into the 'myriad causes of homelessness' in the richest nations on earth. Even if that approach worked (and it NEVER does, because First World homelessness is a choice) it would be grotesque, but that it doesn't work, and will never work, just makes it truly an abomination.

There are seven billion of us, most of whom are dirt poor. If basic, responsible, adult life in the richest and safest place on earth is all just too much responsibility and effort for your (general you) precious self, you deserve everything you get. Context is everything, and the only context is the big picture.

 

1) No, it is not the cause. You have a completely misguided perspective on this. Let's say you live in subsistence agrarian village somewhere remote. Let's say you depend upon a certain spring to survive, and that that spring gradually dries up. What do you do? Do you pack the mules and carts and move the entire village three days journey to a large lake? Or do you stay in your dry village and hope - because the thought of all that packing, discomfort, effort, and necessary compromise is too unpleasant? The dry spring is merely the trigger for the adaptation.

2) I'm not condemning the challenging circumstances (as long as they are beyond our control of course - job losses, COVID, natural disasters, death of a spouse, accident, etc), I'm condeming the failure of people in challenging circumstances to ADAPT to those circumstances. EG, a woman losing her husband after a lifetime at home raising children, should not be trying to continue a lifestyle she can no longer afford - obviously. She should not even be trying to live alone (as in, as the sole resident - whether just her, or her and her kids). She should be living with family until she can afford to live alone again. And her family should welcome the opportunity to be of service to her! These are simple and ordinary decisions - they're not mysterious or hidden ideas, and we all know this stuff is completely logical. The problem is that we refuse to compromise ourselves in any way - either as victims, or as family members of the victom - and would rather risk financial ruin upon ourselves or our loved one, than do the hard yards of adaptation.

 

Well it's certainly that. Where we differ is on what that widespread problem actually is.

 

because I correctly pointed out homelessness is a choice? ok.

 

You haven't seen those photos of tent cities of the unemployed, in the GD?

 

Note the difference between "remaining" homeless, and becoming homeless. In the latter case, the available government welfare will not cover all personal-debt-related issues associated with sudden unemployment.

And in the former case, that's a systemic problem associated with the chronic underemployment characteristic of the current neoliberal NAIRU economies, for which the only solution can be subsidized public housing.

 

Unemployment and underemployment, like homelessness, is entirely a choice.

 

Have YOU seen the difference between this pic, and the average homeless encampment circa 2021?

The pics you post show people ADAPTING, not people indulging dissolution. They were clean, decent, hard working people .. and it shows in the fact that they built small semi-permanent dwellings, and kept their homes and communities as tidy and orderly as they could. There is a universe of difference.

Someone as smart as you can't be this silly, ABW.

 

(I just quickly grabbed that first photo and then wondered....so I added the second, which you omitted.....)

"semi permanent dwellings"


....the result of forced "adaptation" to a dysfunctional economic system.

Exactly how "adaptive" to dysfunctional economic systems do want individuals to be?

[At the time, there was no sudden lack of skilled workers or materials that actually caused the GD, but rather a dysfunctional economic system itself.
eg, Ford's workers were clamoring to go back to work, all Ford had to do was say "yes", and press the "start" button on the assembly line...the fact he could not/did not is the very definition of a dysfunctional economic system].