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Million-Dollar Murray: Homelessness may be easier to solve than to manage

gladwell.com

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Re: Million-Dollar Murray: Homelessness may be easier to solve than to manage

#41

Post by statictype »

petercooper wrote: post #3

The crux of the matter: The cost of services comes to about ten thousand dollars per homeless client per year. An efficiency apartment in Denver averages $376 a month, or just over forty-five hundred a year, which means that you can house and care for a chronically homeless person for at most fifteen thousand dollars, or about a third of what he or she would cost on the street. I believe similar observations have bee…

I believe similar observations have been made in subsidizing the price of fruit and vegetables (or even bikes and gym memberships) vs the medical costs of bad diets and lack of exercise, too.

Not sure if you were trying to make this point but:

The reason many people don't eat enough fruit or go to the gym isn't because its too expensive.

Re: Million-Dollar Murray: Homelessness may be easier to solve than to manage

#42

Post by hga »

drenei wrote: post #39
hga wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

" the right, because they involve special treatment for people who do not deserve special treatment " What amazing garbage. Well over half the homeless are such because they belong in a mental institution, the closing of which was a major successful crusade of the left through the '70s or so (many libertarians and some members of the right like Jerry Pournelle joined them in this and the more honest of them like Jerr…

You gloss over the treatment of patients at the "mental institutions". It was truly horrendous and deinstitutionalization arose out of that. I don't think anyone would argue that we've arrived at a solution. Also, "the right" today is much changed from the 70s.

"truly horrendous" was worse than dumping them out on the streets?

I'd say we've "arrived at a solution" since any attempt to limit the "personal autonomy" of the severely mentally ill gets absolutely nowhere, unless of course they end up in jail as they all to often do.

"much changed from the 70s"???

Could you be more specific? Note that I came of age in the '70s so I lived through that and subsequent periods in the evolution of "the right".

Here's one good essay to look at WRT to a thesis it touches upon WRT to three generations of activists on the right (e.g. Buckley/Rush/Drudge): http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/07/nobody_can_fire_andre...

Re: Million-Dollar Murray: Homelessness may be easier to solve than to manage

#43

Post by gyardley »

drenei wrote: post #39
hga wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

" the right, because they involve special treatment for people who do not deserve special treatment " What amazing garbage. Well over half the homeless are such because they belong in a mental institution, the closing of which was a major successful crusade of the left through the '70s or so (many libertarians and some members of the right like Jerry Pournelle joined them in this and the more honest of them like Jerr…

You gloss over the treatment of patients at the "mental institutions". It was truly horrendous and deinstitutionalization arose out of that. I don't think anyone would argue that we've arrived at a solution. Also, "the right" today is much changed from the 70s.

I'd argue that institutionalization was simply reintroduced in many cities through 'quality of life' policing. For example, there's a reason why Manhattan in 2010 is pleasant and safe - it's because Giuliani's policies turned Rikers Island into the de facto mental institution for New York City.

Heather McDonald's 'The Jail Inferno' has some information on this, although it's not the primary focus of the article:

http://www.city-journal.org/2009/19_3_jails.html

I suspect that Rikers Island is not much better for the mentally-ill than the mental institutions of the 70s, although I haven't researched it and may be wrong. I strongly suspect that one way or another, the mentally ill will remain institutionalized in New York. The improvement in quality of life is so stark, not even the most liberal New Yorker will support relaxation of law enforcement.

Re: Million-Dollar Murray: Homelessness may be easier to solve than to manage

#44

Post by gaius »

petercooper wrote: post #3

The crux of the matter: The cost of services comes to about ten thousand dollars per homeless client per year. An efficiency apartment in Denver averages $376 a month, or just over forty-five hundred a year, which means that you can house and care for a chronically homeless person for at most fifteen thousand dollars, or about a third of what he or she would cost on the street. I believe similar observations have bee…

Here in the UK the welfare budget is nearly 6x the defense budget. Healthcare is around 3x. We're talking serious money here. Probably we spend as much on welfare and healthcare as the US spends on the military. And the results speak for themselves: chucking money at it is not the solution.

Often in London a homeless person will ask for money to stay in a shelter overnight, but the shelters are free, funded by the local councils, and always have spare beds.

Re: Million-Dollar Murray: Homelessness may be easier to solve than to manage

#45

Post by yummyfajitas »

gyardley wrote: post #40
commanda wrote: post #6

"Power-law solutions have little appeal to the right, because they involve special treatment for people who do not deserve special treatment; and they have little appeal to the left, because their emphasis on efficiency over fairness suggests the cold number-crunching of Chicago-school cost-benefit analysis." This is exactly why programs like these won't take off. It's hard to present this kind of complex analysis of…

Power-law solutions have little appeal to the right, because they involve special treatment for people who do not deserve special treatment; and they have little appeal to the left, because their emphasis on efficiency over fairness suggests the cold number-crunching of Chicago-school cost-benefit analysis. What a bizarre thing for Gladwell to write. He's inexplicably generalized from one particular power-law solutio…

That solution would aggravate people who view the police as being part of their "tribe". Assigning some police officers to admin work lowers their status, and in effect the status of your entire tribe. This would aggravate authoritarians on both the right (e.g. Gonzales) and left (e.g. Biden).

This is also the objection to giving free stuff to the homeless - it elevates the status of another tribe (do-gooders/bleeding hearts, the people handing out the free stuff) at the expense of your tribe (hard working/god fearing).

You could almost certainly get conservatives behind such a plan and get liberals to oppose it, if you did it in a way that elevated the status of a right-leaning tribe (e.g., boot camp/military living for the homeless).

Re: Million-Dollar Murray: Homelessness may be easier to solve than to manage

#46

Post by anamax »

> An efficiency apartment in Denver averages $376 a month, or just over forty-five hundred a year, which means that you can house and care for a chronically homeless person for at most fifteen thousand dollars, or about a third of what he or she would cost on the street.

That assumes renters who don't try to destroy the place. However, some renters are considerably more destructive than others.

However, the big problem is that it assumes that homelessness is solely due to a lack of resources to obtain a home. If that were true, SF would have far fewer homeless and the shelters would be full.

Yet, many of SF's shelter beds are empty and folks who could be in the are on the street. Yes, they know about the beds - they prefer the street.

Are you really sure that they'd take an efficiency apartment? Are you sure that they wouldn't try to destroy it?

Someone pitching that as a solution should not only be aware of the possibilities but have reasons better than "an apartment is better than the street" because that's clearly not true for a large fraction of the relevant population.

Re: Million-Dollar Murray: Homelessness may be easier to solve than to manage

#47

Post by andrewvc »

anamax wrote: post #46

> An efficiency apartment in Denver averages $376 a month, or just over forty-five hundred a year, which means that you can house and care for a chronically homeless person for at most fifteen thousand dollars, or about a third of what he or she would cost on the street. That assumes renters who don't try to destroy the place. However, some renters are considerably more destructive than others. However, the big probl…

I think part of the point was that an apartment creates a sense of responsibility and pride in ownership a shelter bed does not.

I don't think anyone's saying this is the one true solution, but it makes sense, and perhaps should be given more of a shot than it has been to date.

Re: Million-Dollar Murray: Homelessness may be easier to solve than to manage

#48

Post by spoiledtechie »

anamax wrote: post #46

> An efficiency apartment in Denver averages $376 a month, or just over forty-five hundred a year, which means that you can house and care for a chronically homeless person for at most fifteen thousand dollars, or about a third of what he or she would cost on the street. That assumes renters who don't try to destroy the place. However, some renters are considerably more destructive than others. However, the big probl…

It is a pitch and would only be an experiment, but what if it works on a small portion of the population of homeless. Then I think its worth it especially to those hardcore offenders.

Re: Million-Dollar Murray: Homelessness may be easier to solve than to manage

#49

Post by barrkel »

andrewvc wrote: post #47
anamax wrote: post #46

> An efficiency apartment in Denver averages $376 a month, or just over forty-five hundred a year, which means that you can house and care for a chronically homeless person for at most fifteen thousand dollars, or about a third of what he or she would cost on the street. That assumes renters who don't try to destroy the place. However, some renters are considerably more destructive than others. However, the big probl…

I think part of the point was that an apartment creates a sense of responsibility and pride in ownership a shelter bed does not. I don't think anyone's saying this is the one true solution, but it makes sense, and perhaps should be given more of a shot than it has been to date.

Have you considered the possibility that many homeless people are specifically uninterested in the responsibility of an apartment? We're not talking about children or immature teenagers here. IMO the bigger risk with homeless people is treating them with condescension, thinking you know best what they should do. Maybe you don't.

Re: Million-Dollar Murray: Homelessness may be easier to solve than to manage

#50

Post by barrkel »

spoiledtechie wrote: post #48
anamax wrote: post #46

> An efficiency apartment in Denver averages $376 a month, or just over forty-five hundred a year, which means that you can house and care for a chronically homeless person for at most fifteen thousand dollars, or about a third of what he or she would cost on the street. That assumes renters who don't try to destroy the place. However, some renters are considerably more destructive than others. However, the big probl…

It is a pitch and would only be an experiment, but what if it works on a small portion of the population of homeless. Then I think its worth it especially to those hardcore offenders.

Being homeless is offensive?
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