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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

#311

Post by jrumbut »

leetcrew wrote: post #296
klodolph wrote: post #267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Going to dissent here—we need psychiatrists doing medication management because there are so many medications today, and so many previously untreatable conditions which are treatable with modern medications. If we switched to one-stop therapy + meds, the psychiatrist shortage would be worse.

the problem with this approach is there's not an obvious person to consult with to decide whether to start with therapy, medication, or both. I find that therapists tend to consider themselves unqualified to even suggest that their clients look into medication (or perhaps they are explicitly prohibited from doing so, idk). psychiatrists can either give you drugs or say no, but they tend to offer you something if ther…

The problems with this approach are probably even bigger than that, but given they're already stretched this thin and there are years long waiting lists for new patients it will probably be some time before we can really address the more nuanced issues of phychiatry.

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

#312

Post by gfxgirl »

Lots of random thoughts but no conclusions

* How much does the government have to spend per person?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_governmen...

* What are the government's expenses?

From that wikipedia article the USA has 80% of what Finland has per person. But I'm only guessing 50% of that 80% goes to the military (we can argue if that's good or bad. I'm just guessing that most countries get to use more of their $ per person for other things?)

* How much does weather play a role?

Being homeless in Los Angeles is probably much more doable than Finland? Does this influence the number of people who are homeless?

* Does Oil play a role?

I think for Finland no? But Norway and Denmark apparently get lots of their budgets from oil. What happens to their social programs as we switch to renewables? (not sure it's relevant to a story about Finland but also not sure if there is some similar way government gets money or not. It does seem relevant to the general stereotype of countries in that area doing well for their citizens. If they've got a free money supply. Of course I'm totally uninformed about any of this.

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

#313

Post by cabalamat »

WarOnPrivacy wrote: post #206

I'm in the US. I was homeless as a teenager (not by choice). I live adjacent to a major homeless community (not by design). My ex left our family to join the homeless community (she struggles with mh issues). I have some observations. We could sharply reduce homeless numbers here if we had in-patient mental health facilities (for non-wealthy), comprehensive housing aid and politically powerful job placement programs.…

> politically powerful job placement programs

What do you mean here?

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

#314

Post by esperent »

darth_avocado wrote: post #241
deadbunny wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A better way to deal with this is to allow people to reject welfare, but if they do, they still need to live as a decent member of the society. And if they refuse to "live as a decent member of society"?

Apply the same set of rules that apply to the larger society. If I throw trash around in the society, I would be fined hundreds of dollars, and failing to produce the amount, will face punishment and even jail. No reason these set of rules should not apply to everyone. Rehabilitation, reeducation and basic assistance should always be the first step (Welfare). But if you opt out and willingly chose to continue to dama…

> If I throw trash around in the society, I would be fined hundreds of dollars, and failing to produce the amount, will face punishment and even jail.

You, presumably, are not mentally ill, mentally disabled, or suffering from severe substance addiction. The majority of homeless people (besides Roma) in most European countries are some mix of these.

When you say "just fine/jail the homeless for bad behavior", what you are really saying is "mentally ill/disabled people should not be helped, they should be jailed". Do you still stand by that statement?

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

#315

Post by WarOnPrivacy »

cabalamat wrote: post #313
WarOnPrivacy wrote: post #206

I'm in the US. I was homeless as a teenager (not by choice). I live adjacent to a major homeless community (not by design). My ex left our family to join the homeless community (she struggles with mh issues). I have some observations. We could sharply reduce homeless numbers here if we had in-patient mental health facilities (for non-wealthy), comprehensive housing aid and politically powerful job placement programs.…

> politically powerful job placement programs What do you mean here?

From what I have seen, job placement programs flounder due to lack of strong, consistent interest from elected officials. Without sticks or carrots from local Govs, area employers ignore employer services in favor of whatever hiring practices they're already using.

source: Five years as employment service specialist and another five years trying to help my kids get jobs in spite of first-time hires being algorithmically blackballed by default.

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

#316

Post by esperent »

collyw wrote: post #120
ido wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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).

I don't think anyone is particularly bothered by their race, rather their behaviour. (In the UK there are both Irish gypsies and Romani gypsies, both have a bad reputation).

On the contrary, in the UK (and Ireland) people are extremely racist towards both Travellers and Roma. They treat both races with equal contempt.

I'm not saying this to excuse the negative behavior of the Traveller or Roma communities which I've been on the receiving end of several times.

However, we need to look at this from both ends and accept that us (the ethnic majority) automatically treating members of a particular ethnic minority as scum doesn't help to change their behavior.

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

#317

Post by WarOnPrivacy »

eznzt wrote: post #227
nabla9 wrote: post #19

Related news: European Court of Human Rights just made important ruling that decriminalizes begging. Making it criminal to be poor is against human rights. ----- ECHR 021 (2021) 19.01.2021 (Judgment Lacatus v. Switzerland) The penalty imposed on the applicant for begging in public breached the Convention In today’s Chamber judgment 1 in the case of Lăcătuşv. Switzerland (application no. 14065/15) the European Court o…

> Related news: European Court of Human Rights just made important ruling that decriminalizes begging. Making it criminal to be poor is against human rights. Equating begging with being poor is wrong. Bothering others is not a human right.

> Bothering others is not a human right.

The ruiling doesn't mention bothering others. That was something you introduced to the conversation, just so you could dismiss it.

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

#318

Post by WarOnPrivacy »

SaintGhurka wrote: post #203
vkou wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you have no homeless people, or were they still sleeping rough, just without a tarp to keep the wind and the rain off their heads?

It's more homeless people [1]. I mean, it's really a lot of people. It's pretty unmistakable. The tent cities do make them more noticeable, though. Also, the police used to be able to roust people illegally camping, so if you had somewhere else to go, you'd have to go, or else go to the shelter. Now people have the option to refuse the alternatives. So maybe visible homelessness has climbed more than actual homelessn…

> if you had somewhere else to go, you'd have to go, or else go to the shelter.

You left out the dominant reality - people who have no shelter option and nowhere else to go. Given that likely realty, what does one do?

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

#319

Post by WarOnPrivacy »

gamblor956 wrote: post #167
jseliger wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most American cities will do absolutely anything to reduce homelessness except build more housing: https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/i-will-do-anything-to-en... California cities are probably the worst offenders: https://seliger.com/2017/08/30/l-digs-hole-slowly-economics-... , but even Austin is underbuilding relative to demand.

One of the very liberal reporters at the LA Times did a series of articles on the homeless crisis in LA a year or two ago. He actually had difficulty finding a homeless person who was from Southern California. Nearly all of the homeless were from other states or other countries. It's not California's failure so much as it is that the rest of the nation is using California to warehouse their homeless so they can feel…

Someone moves to California and later becomes homeless - is evidence of what?

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

#320

Post by darth_avocado »

esperent wrote: post #314
darth_avocado wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apply the same set of rules that apply to the larger society. If I throw trash around in the society, I would be fined hundreds of dollars, and failing to produce the amount, will face punishment and even jail. No reason these set of rules should not apply to everyone. Rehabilitation, reeducation and basic assistance should always be the first step (Welfare). But if you opt out and willingly chose to continue to dama…

> If I throw trash around in the society, I would be fined hundreds of dollars, and failing to produce the amount, will face punishment and even jail. You, presumably, are not mentally ill, mentally disabled, or suffering from severe substance addiction. The majority of homeless people (besides Roma) in most European countries are some mix of these. When you say "just fine/jail the homeless for bad behavior", what yo…

In case you didn't read my comment at all, "Rehabilitation, reeducation and basic assistance should always be the first step (Welfare)."

> The majority of homeless people (besides Roma) in most European countries are some mix of these.

The number is less than half for mental health patients and about half if you account for substance abuse. That number is lower in the US.

But regardless of the number, in your hurry to virtue signal someone over the internet, you completely missed the point. The argument was pretty simple, rehab and assistance is the first step, the rest was for people who actively refuse that.

For the mentally ill who refuse help, would you rather have them live a life of abuse and then die in misery on the streets or have them institutionalized? And for the drug abusers/alcoholics who refuse rehab, at what point does individual accountability start kicking in? Society is willing to help you, but if you still reject it, at some point you need to face the consequences.

I stand by my statement.

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