Personally? To me "heavily progressive "is anything that targets the working poor (under $40k per year). People in the $30k range need to be able to see the results of working more. Thus, to me any claw backs in government programs work as a progressive income tax, each dollar earned brings in less.
If we want to break the poverty cycle we need to make it so that people see the benefit of working more to get themselves out of a bad situation. Working more should be seen as a reward, that results in a better life. So in my view the fewer services that have income cut offs the better, at least below $50-60k per year–establish what it means to be solid middle class and let people get up and into that category.
This requires targeting the working poor by providing real benefits, not crappy hand outs or petty gestures. Like I said, UHC, tax deduction for renting, low to nil income tax. If you want cuts offs don’t make it on income, make it on value. Let the first $100 of home heating costs be deductible (as a random example not a real number) that everyone gets. If you have a bigger house, or choose to be wasteful, you pay more.
Fund all of this with consumption taxes that provide scaleable rebates. That way you discourage consumption in the lower income range, and reward those that save instead of spend. Set up a viable public transit system and discourage car ownership. You’d be amazed how many people take on debt as a result of home and car expenses that they didn’t plan for. Get rid of that mentality.
I was responding to “homeless people dying on the street” and having to step over them at bus stops, etc. And honestly, while your sister and people like her are technically homeless, I wouldn’t consider them in the same way as those who have no place to go. If you start including people who have friends and family they can fall back on, you would end up with a LOT more homeless - maybe that is why the numbers are so high, but the reality seems to be low.
It probably is. I did live near lazy poor folks in the country, but for the most part is seems like the ones that are satisfied to live off the state are in the cities.
I can’t imagine they would be able to spread out all that much on the amount of money you propose giving them, except for those who are already living out in the sticks. In some places, “affordable housing” costs well over $1000 a month.
Really does seem to be an eastern thing. Maybe because the population density is higher there?
I really don’t think so, unless you can also somehow contain these addicts so when they ran out of money/drugs/booze they could get more without having to go steal a stereo. It’s not like you could count on them planning ahead and budgeting themselves so their money or fixes would run out before the next scheduled payment.
Do we have any idea how many non-functioning addicts we have?
I know that. I’m not hung up on the amount I’m giving them, honestly, and I’m also kinda hoping to encourage a bit of a movement out of the cities.
I think it’s partially that, and partially that the western states (just from a cursory Google search) appear to have more advertising homeless shelters per capita.
There’s also the idea that homeless people are less noticeable when they’re not congregating, and the biggest excuse for that is “winter”, which isn’t as much of a problem in California as it is in New England.
Too damn many, certainly. As I said to emacknight, I’m just going on my understanding that the $211 I propose to give them per week is enough to either have them not steal for enough hits for a day or two, or else overdose right away and end up in treatment or dead.
Or they’ll upgrade to more expensive drugs (ie cocaine).
But wouldn’t this also cause massive inflation in the drug trade?
If you give a drunk $5 a day he’ll get wasted on really crappy vodka. Give the same drunk $500 a day and he’ll get just as wasted on a really great vodka. Addiction is funny that way.
I’d think that would be counter productive? Wouldn’t it be harder for them to find a job if they were living away from commerce centers?
We had winter in Seattle…
Damn, I thought drugs were more expensive than that!
I still think the money would be better spent trying to confine them somehow, so there could be no way they could steal your stereo should their drug money run out before the next payment. Lock 'em all in a barn and keep them loaded out of their minds and they should be happy!
A knock-on effect that can be dealt with elsewhere–this thread isn’t “Why Zeriel should be dictator” but if it was, I’d mention that I would prefer legalizing just about every drug and currently illegal drugs (plus alcohol and tobacco) would be folded into a “committed a crime while under the influence” charge.
You must know different drunks than I do. Most of the ones I know would use windfalls to maybe buy one level higher than normal and spend the rest on other stuff.
Possibly. It might also induce a bit more spreading out of certain kinds of commerce. Many small towns provide enough jobs for all residents.
Average temperature in Seattle in January: 40.9 F
Average precipitation in Seattle in January: 2.9"
Average temperature in Boston in January: 31.5 F
Average precipitation in Boston in January: 12.8"
I wish. Cocaine can be, but that’s about right for heroin and crack. I have no damn idea about marijuana, it’s all over the map due to wide variations in quality.
There have been some experimental alcoholism treatment centers set up like this–they just provide a roof and a bed and a cafeteria, and as long as you don’t commit crimes they don’t care how much you drink on your monthly allowance. Interestingly, studies suggest that people in such shelters drink less over time.
I guess this is a reference to a movie, but since I haven’t been to a movie in - lessee, the first Star Trek movie? :smack:
That’s something that is different from my experience with small towns, since most of the ones I’d lived in kinda went to hell as all the jobs moved to Seattle, Everett or Renton.
The homeless have a cold/precipitation threshold for flocking?
Because Americans assign a moral value to not drinking too much and many other behaviors. Since these people have failed the “good person” test, because they drink “too much”, they are undeserving of help, shelter, food, or a safe environment. Americans tend to hang assistance on behavior requirements. Want into the local homeless shelter? Sign a drug-free contract. Certainly don’t dare to need assistance and be overweight, pregnant, non-Christian, a poor budgeter, someone who declared bankruptcy, a single parent, unmarried, diseased, tattooed, pierced, altersexual, or non-traditional in any fashion if you want help. You’re also not permitted to receive gifts of any kind, wear decent clothes, receive decent healthcare, have a late-model car, use a cell phone, wear jewelry, act less than obsequiously grateful at any time to any “decent, hard-working, tax-paying citizen”, or do, have, or be anything else that doesn’t broadcast “undeserving charity case”. Then you must work extremely hard for minimum wage and be damn grateful you have any job at all.
Most of my small-town experience is not even close to within driving/commuting distance of any decent city, so that’s probably part of it.
I wouldn’t be surprised. The difference between 40 and 30 degrees is pretty significant in terms of whether or not you can survive sleeping outside or not, so the latter makes homeless folks more visible IMHO.
Actually, they apparently do have them in Seattle. However, **StaudtCJ **is right–most of the assistance in this country, public or private, is predicated on the recipient proving that they deserve it, in both a financial way and a very crypto-Christian moral way.
Uh, there is all sorts of help for the pregnant and single parents. I dunno about those who have declared bankruptcy, but I hear ads to help people push their credit card debts off onto others all the time.
Yes, that would make a lot of difference. I’ve never lived more than 30-45 minutes away from a big city.
Wouldn’t it be less visible, as in the colder it gets the more likely they would be inside someplace?
That doesn’t make sense given all the help that is available to anyone with children - it doesn’t seem to matter how the children came to be, how they are raised or what conditions they are currently in. I suppose these crypto-Christians have decided that the presence of children means that any adults surrounding them have proven they “deserve” help.
It’s kind of stupid too - it would be in everyone’s best interests to contain addicts so they cannot be running about committing crimes to get their next fix, so whether or not they “deserve” help shouldn’t enter into it.
Whereas I’ve never lived closer than 2.5 hours to a big city, and even that was Pittsburgh.
If you didn’t use public buildings, probably. The thing is, the colder it is, the more the homeless congregate on places that are open to the public and heated, like metro/subway stations and bus depots and libraries. Increases the population density in places I’m likely to be when I’m visiting a big city.
That’s very true–heck, it’s at the heart of the (sane) pro-life rhetoric–“Children are innocent and don’t deserve to suffer for the crimes of their parents”. I’m sympathetic to this viewpoint myself, granted–but it leads to weird situations where you can ONLY get help if you have kids, rather than getting help for yourself AND additional help for each dependent. Again with the perverse incentives.
Amen, amen, but try telling that to the law-and-order-and-virtue types. “I won’t give you a dollar, you’ll just buy cheap booze.” “You’ve committed felonies in the past, so you’re not eligible for our program.” “You’re merely the gay partner of someone, you shouldn’t be allowed to get family insurance rates.”
Or, for that matter, the fiscal types: “I shouldn’t have to give you assistance–you could sell your house/car/pension/401k and move into an apartment and live on the proceeds.”, regardless of how stupid, short-sighted, or crippling of a decision any of those might be.
I can take a $75,000/year rent deduction personally and engineer a modest (less than $75,000) annual corporate income and still come out ahead.
Why can’t a doctor own the home through his practice and rent it to himself?
If you’re saying that they are using overregulation to dissuade this sort of behaviour then you aren’t really shoring up your argument for this system very well.
Huh. I always thought the east was more densely populated than that!
I used the bus depot, which was underground at the point that I was picking up the bus, but I don’t think it was heated. Too long ago, and too much time trying to bury all memories of Washington…
Exactly. You have folks who are already needy but the only way these “Christians” will give them any aid is if they make MORE needy people. Way to make sure they will always be needy.
This one I’m not sure about - I suppose it depends on how much equity is in the house and where the person would have to go to get an apartment with decent rent. A house is usually a big asset and in many cases should be considered when deciding if someone should get long term aid. Houses can also be big liabilities, as the folks who are upside down on their mortgages have found out.
