Interviews With The Homeless

[Smith1776]

https://youtu.be/CPoKlwl8_K8

The CBC (our national public broadcaster) did a piece recently where they didn't just write a story about homelessness in my city, they actually did lengthy interviews with those in encampments.

Even though I know none of you live in the same city I do, the interviews are still eye opening and very much worth watching. It's short, but a really good window into how life is for some people.

My life isn't perfect, but after watching I immediately became much more grateful for what I have.

[dualstow]

The aging woman was the saddest. Used to have a normal life.

[Smith1776]

The aging woman was the saddest. Used to have a normal life.

Yeah.. the part where she said her husband died in a tent with her was really heartbreaking.

That encampment is only about a 10-minute drive south from my house.

[boglerdude]

Needs to be easier for people to move to lower cost-of-living areas. Feds should subsidize movers and manage a national jobs database.

No minimum wage = no unemployment. Make it easy to get food stamps for healthy food. No one is going to abuse it and eat too many vegetables. Maybe me and Vinny.

FEMA needs to set up RV campsites outside cities and give them free methadone and let them go Mad Max. Either that or bring back asylums and forced rehab, which is worse.

[D1984]

Needs to be easier for people to move to lower cost-of-living areas. Feds should subsidize movers and manage a national jobs database.

No minimum wage = no unemployment. Make it easy to get food stamps for healthy food. No one is going to abuse it and eat too many vegetables. Maybe me and Vinny.

FEMA needs to set up RV campsites outside cities and give them free methadone and let them go Mad Max. Either that or bring back asylums and forced rehab, which is worse.

Moving people from higher income higher productivity areas (which BTW tend to be very correlated with higher COL) to lower income lower productivity areas (which again, highly correlated with lower COL) is just so mind-bogglingly counterproductive I don't see how anyone can suggest it in good faith...and yet you seemingly did. Better would be to lower COL in higher COL areas by building much more housing (for a country the size of the US, a few dozens of millions of units should do it) in order to lower rents/housing prices and if the NIMBYs don't like it too f'ing bad. When housing again costs (in inflation and size/quality adjusted terms) what it did in the 1950s and 1960s you will know things are on the right track.

And while we are at it, no minimum wage does not equal no unemployment. That is pure wishful thinking. The US had no national minimum wage until 1938 (and it didn't even apply to all industries until the late 1950s/very early 1960s) but we had several periods from the 1830s to 1930s when unemployment was in the high single digits to double digits--sometimes close to 25% at times such as 1932-33--range. Recessions still happen and people still lose their jobs even in a country where there is no minimum wage.

TBH the whole "the minimum wage is the main cause of unemployment" line of argument has been so thoroughly debunked I'm surprised you still cite it. That's the problem with most neoliberals and conservatives, though....when actual real life disagrees with the pretty theories in an economics textbook, they refuse to accept reality and go with what the theory says instead.

Finally, food stamps for vegetables? WTF? That won't solve much hunger; people are not like other primates and we can't get enough calories from vegetables (our digestive systems aren't built to digest fiber and convert it in large quantity to sugars or fats); the food stamps would need to cover items like fruits, legumes, tubers, meat, bread, grains, beans, fats, etc. Besides, a UBI is better anyway as it lets people actually choose what to buy with it rather than being restricted to only certain items some government planner thinks they should have.

[dualstow]

Interested to hear how Canada’s addressing the problem.

[Smith1776]

Interested to hear how Canada’s addressing the problem.

"Have you tried dying?"

https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/ca ... e-homeless

[dualstow]

Yikes. I have heard from a friend about how easy assisted suicide is in Canada and how a lot of people have lost their teenagers to what might’ve been teen angst.

[Xan]

Yikes. I have heard from a friend about how easy assisted suicide is in Canada and how a lot of people have lost their teenagers to what might’ve been teen angst.

Horrifying!

[dualstow]

Horrifying!

I should add that I never checked up on it. I would like to think there’s a minimum age that is above that. (Not old enough to drink, old enough to end one’s life?) But, I do know for a fact that the process is not difficult.

[dualstow]

Follow up:
According to this documentary, you must be over 18. There is a 23-year-old featured early on.
https://youtu.be/plinQAHZRvk