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The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

moneywise.com

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Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#681

Post by gs17 »

effingwewt wrote: post #351
beretguy wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My mom was homeless for years > I wasn't financially able to help her much but managed to buy her a "clunker" of a car which she later slept in before getting housing Ah… So… If you had a place to live couldn’t you let her live in that same place too, instead of her being homeless? My parents lost their jobs due to covid, and even though they treated me bad when I was a kid I still let them in my house. How can you…

OP may not live alone- you are making a lot of assumptions. Maybe their mother was a proud woman who didn't want to impose/intrude more than she already was. Their mother may live in another state, in which she is more comfortable. Rather than reprimanding OP, try having some empathy. If not for OP then for their mother. No one should have to be homeless, it's a special kind of hell. I speak from personal experience.

>Maybe their mother was a proud woman who didn't want to impose/intrude more than she already was.

And sometimes it's impossible to convince people that it really is less of a burden. My grandmother is that type of woman and it can be very frustrating to balance.

Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#682

Post by c_crank »

kjkjadksj wrote: post #679
c_crank wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It does not take professional training to see the price tag of a student loan and to question if one can reasonably pay it off in the future. Certainly, someone equipped with the skills needed to be accepted into a college that costs so much should be able to do the math required on that calculation.

Covering compound interest isnt even a requirement in high school

Compound interest shouldn't be the primary factor in rejecting a four to five digit loan when you have low or zero income.

Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#683

Post by cscurmudgeon »

cornercasechase wrote: post #610
GenerocUsername wrote: post #600

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Available transit needs to include safe transit. The current bus and light rail situation has turned off swaths of the working class to support the dredges of the drug-addict class by their lack of fare-enforcement and other low-end enabling schemes that sound great on paper, but lead to complicated downstream chilling effects on the entire region.

Public transit is much safer than driving in your car. Someone skipping fare does not compare to even a light fender bender.

That’s a dishonest comparison. Skipping fare not same as a drug addled person hassling commuters.

Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#684

Post by eep_social »

lambdasquirrel wrote: post #637
gavin_gee wrote: post #594

Some good commentary in this thread, however one topic thats never raised in the topic of affordable housing is fast cheap public transit. I could never imagine being able to buy a house in London. but the train network makes it possible to live in a more affordable neighbourhood and commute as needed. In the US we seem to think that cities can continue to have affordable housing in the most desireable areas. this is…

I don’t know about that. There’s a whole lot of people in Bellingham who’ve been saying it’s unaffordable for them now.

Yep, I have family there and heard the same. The game changer is the stops that would inevitably be put up in places like Burlington, Mt Vernon, or Conway between Seattle and Bellingham. Smaller towns which are connected to the big city should be able to attract folks gp has in mind.

Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#685

Post by mholm »

frozenport wrote: post #661
GenerocUsername wrote: post #600

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Available transit needs to include safe transit. The current bus and light rail situation has turned off swaths of the working class to support the dredges of the drug-addict class by their lack of fare-enforcement and other low-end enabling schemes that sound great on paper, but lead to complicated downstream chilling effects on the entire region.

SF problems

This is not just SF problems. These problems are _everywhere_ in the US, with just a reduction in other major hubs where transit is effective for the middle class.

Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#686

Post by jpadkins »

pierat wrote: post #495
jpadkins wrote: post #401

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Time to de-profit-ize housing. Can you cite an example of where this policy has worked out well? It seems counter intuitive because removing the profit incentive seems like it would remove investments + labor and therefore reduce housing construction.

"Can you do the dirty job of recreating the housing market, and cite your sources in what amounts to a blog post?" Sure. Let me get right on that, after I get elected to be a Congresscritter.

Can you at least try it locally on a small scale first?

Also, what do you mean by de-profit-ize housing? Do plumbers and tradesmen no longer get to profit from building homes? Surveyors? Architects? Electricians? Financiers? How do you get homes built if no one is allowed to profit from their trade?

Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#687

Post by cscurmudgeon »

lapetitejort wrote: post #651
nomel wrote: post #634

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Someone skipping fare This, obviously, isn't what raises fear in people. "Safer" for some statistics, like a car crash, but also much less safe for things like getting stabbed, spit on, confronted. Sure, it's somewhat rare on public transport, but they're exactly zero in my car, at freeway speeds. edit: A quick google search shows two stabbings, one slit throat, and a page full of fights, in my area, over the last…

I may never get stabbed in my car, but I will get brake-checked, cut off, buzzed, rammed, and shot at [0]. Driving is stressful and I dread every getting on the highway. [0]: https://everytownresearch.org/reports-of-road-rage-shootings...

You can still get shot on a train.

Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#688

Post by throwaway5959 »

postalrat wrote: post #523
rmk wrote: post #515

Ah, so all the boomers who want to use their houses as nest eggs and have driven up prices making housing unaffordable for future generations have also wrecked the prospects of those less fortunate in their own generation. What's more unconscionable is the fact that young people are not forming families, not that some boomers are facing the consequences of their actions. It would be nice if all boomers faced the musi…

Anyone who buys a house wants to use it as a nest egg. Its not just a baby boomer thing. You want cheap housing? Figure out a way to build houses for cheap. That's how it was done in the past.

Smaller houses might help.

Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#689

Post by Draiken »

carom wrote: post #612
cogman10 wrote: post #559

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In 2010, I had a $600/month rental with a kitchen, living room, bedroom, bathroom, in apartment washing machine/dryer and a fairly large walk-in closet. With 13 years of inflation, that'd be $850/month. That apartment now goes for over $1200/month (Almost certainly hasn't been renovated). [1] The issue is oligopolies. Few large businesses that own the majority of available rentals and thus can set prices to whatever…

It is government policy. Specifically, it is restrictive zoning. Landlords do not get to set prices to whatever they want, they set prices to what the market will pay. If rent has gone up faster than inflation it just means that demand has increased or supply has decreased in that time. You can build apartments for ~$250 per sqft. The issue is that local governments make it really hard to build more apartments. If yo…

Isn't that what lobbying is all about? You effectively have companies paying politicians to keep these zoning laws that keep the rents as high as possible. Profit above all else.

Arguments that boil down to "government policy" can basically be translated to "big companies policies". Whether it's through illegal or legal bribing (lobbying), it's what we see after decades of influence.

Re: The elderly are becoming homeless at a rate not seen since the Great Depression

#690

Post by thorncorona »

rg111 wrote: post #645
blairbeckwith wrote: post #620

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think when most people use "safe" in this context, they mean "comfortable" or "psychologically comfortable". Nobody enjoys sitting beside someone tweaking and shitting themselves, even if it's perfectly safe.

Exactly. I don't ever mind public transport. I have used public transport in multiple areas of the planet. There are two quips: 1. You have to be there in someone else's time. You can't have 5 or 10 or 30 minutes if something comes up. 2. What you say. I don't want to rub my body with people who are wearing dirty clothes, smell, and has god-knows-what liquid on their clothes who might choose to cough without using th…

> 1. You have to be there in someone else's time. You can't have 5 or 10 or 30 minutes if something comes up.

There's this cool thing you can do in the 21st century where if you go into Google maps, or Apple maps, or any other map app, you can check how long it takes to get to your destination

> 2. What you say. I don't want to rub my body with people who are wearing dirty clothes, smell, and has god-knows-what liquid on their clothes who might choose to cough without using their hands. (This has happened to me) So, I avoid public transport where there is this kind of intermingling. Fine with me where there are upper classes or similar in transport and it is enforced strictly.

Oh no! How will the upper class in every other society that uses public transit deal.

There is something to be said about fare enforcement, the homeless, and societal norms, but this certainly isn't it.

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