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Finland has slashed homelessness; the rest of Europe is failing

economist.com

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Re: Finland has slashed homelessness; the rest of Europe is failing

#151

Post by Eridrus »

cheph wrote: post #78
Eridrus wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to say the general approach is bad, but I think the cost side is overplayed. It depends a lot on what the cost/structure of your existing response is, and critically, whether you can actually realize any savings after the shift. Both because it is hard to reduce staffing/infrastructure, but also because many costs are not actually born directly by the city (eg medical costs are born by the hospitals).

> Not to say the general approach is bad, but I think the cost side is overplayed. Not sure why I, as an immigrant to Europe myself, should pay cover the cost for illegal aliens while I cannot provide properly for my own relatives in my home country. It is unconscionable.

We live in an imperfect world with many constraints and trade-offs. Why did you have to emigrate, while others were already born into lucky countries? Why are some people denied the right to emigrate?

Life is various shades of unfair and we're more likely to make a better world if we optimize for well being rather than fairness (of which there are multiple competing and contradictory definitions).

Re: Finland has slashed homelessness; the rest of Europe is failing

#153

Post by dang »

u678u wrote: post #123
austincheney wrote: post #7

The city of Austin, TX could be a case study of what not to do. I was remotely employed to company with offices in Austin in 2014-2015 and it was awesome to visit and walk around down town. I always had a blast. I visited Austin in 2019 and there were homeless people EVERYWHERE. Every green space and nearly every street corner seemed to be littered with homeless people. The difference crystal clear. Something in the…

Just another city run by Democrats. Seriously I'm a blue voter myself but its beyond parody how Democrats screw up their own cities like this.

Please don't take HN threads into partisan flamewar. Nothing good can come of this.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Finland has slashed homelessness; the rest of Europe is failing

#154

Post by thehappypm »

zehaeva wrote: post #135
giantg2 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not only do they tend to select larger cities, but also warmer cities. You mostly hear about the homeless population in places like San Francisco, Oahu, Austin, etc. If you're homeless, you might as well go to a place where you're less likely to freeze to death. Although there are some homeless in places likes Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, etc. Not to mention some cities will give them money if they take a bus to another…

You do hear about it more in warmer cities, but the city with the largest homeless population is actually NYC by quite a large margin. https://www.usnews.com/news/cities/slideshows/cities-with-th...

Per capita? NYC is 2x larger than any other city.

Re: Finland has slashed homelessness; the rest of Europe is failing

#155

Post by thehappypm »

u678u wrote: post #123
austincheney wrote: post #7

The city of Austin, TX could be a case study of what not to do. I was remotely employed to company with offices in Austin in 2014-2015 and it was awesome to visit and walk around down town. I always had a blast. I visited Austin in 2019 and there were homeless people EVERYWHERE. Every green space and nearly every street corner seemed to be littered with homeless people. The difference crystal clear. Something in the…

Just another city run by Democrats. Seriously I'm a blue voter myself but its beyond parody how Democrats screw up their own cities like this.

yawn

Re: Finland has slashed homelessness; the rest of Europe is failing

#156

Post by Nimitz14 »

ido wrote: post #82
empiricus wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

small addition which should clarify some more the issue: romani == gypsy

At least in the German speaking countries the word Gypsy ("Zigeuner" in German) is considered a racial slur similarly (if not quite as strongly) ill-considered in usage as N*gger is in English. There aren't a lot of Romani in the US, which I think is why Americans aren't aware this is a word you should avoid (but I'm pretty sure it is also considered a slur in English in Britain and Ireland).

Lol that's not true.

Re: Finland has slashed homelessness; the rest of Europe is failing

#157

Post by wsinks »

Cloudef wrote: post #26
Delk wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While there's truth to that, it's worth noting that most of those homeless people are suffering from ill mental health and/or substance dependence. You make it sound like they just shrugged and decided that that's the life they want, but I don't think that's how people end up homeless. There are decisions involved, but they're probably not quite as voluntary as that.

Those people are given help, but if they refuse that, there's nothing you can really do. People are only forced if they start being dangerous to other people.

For the record, welcome to San Francisco. (a joke, it's the similar here)

Re: Finland has slashed homelessness; the rest of Europe is failing

#158

Post by anewaccount2021 »

asdff wrote: post #150

Finland has 5.5M people and about 5 thousand homeless. Los Angeles county has 10.5M people and estimates are nearing 100,000 homeless. The situation is an order of magnitude different in Los Angeles, even by West Coast standards, and what works in Findland is unlikely to scale anywhere else, much less a place like the U.S. which has the bare minimum of a social safety net compared to the rest of the developed world.

Homeless in LA also won't freeze to death if they sleep outside in January.

Re: Finland has slashed homelessness; the rest of Europe is failing

#159

Post by paxys »

a3n wrote: post #113
giantg2 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not only do they tend to select larger cities, but also warmer cities. You mostly hear about the homeless population in places like San Francisco, Oahu, Austin, etc. If you're homeless, you might as well go to a place where you're less likely to freeze to death. Although there are some homeless in places likes Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, etc. Not to mention some cities will give them money if they take a bus to another…

> Not only do they tend to select larger cities, but also warmer cities. As a trucker, my view is mostly from the interstate. The most homeless I see in my travels all over the country is I-5 in California, Oregon and Washington, and CA 99. It's pretty cold in Washington and Oregon right now. Even California at night. Tents, tarps, sleeping bags, on both sides of the freeway fence, or inside interchange cloverleafs.…

In other parts of the country you will freeze to death sleeping outside at night, so west coast cold is definitely relative.

Re: Finland has slashed homelessness; the rest of Europe is failing

#160

Post by porb121 »

asdff wrote: post #150

Finland has 5.5M people and about 5 thousand homeless. Los Angeles county has 10.5M people and estimates are nearing 100,000 homeless. The situation is an order of magnitude different in Los Angeles, even by West Coast standards, and what works in Findland is unlikely to scale anywhere else, much less a place like the U.S. which has the bare minimum of a social safety net compared to the rest of the developed world.

what works in Finland (giving people housing) definitely works in Los Angeles - LA was the subject of a recent research paper demonstrating the massive success of such a program

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1H9oD3zeBPua7r5wFoHVrMZmmiqK...

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