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Comment by flashdance | Hacker News Reader

> That money's not going to the homeless people. It's going to the people who run the services to support them. You think they'd want to see homelessness end?

Yes, I think those people want to see homelessness end. Why else would you want a career in that field?

Climate scientists also want action to be taken to fight climate change, even if it might put them out of a job. Folks who work for the UN to tackle world hunger want world hunger to end, even if it puts them out of a job.

I don't think rank-and-file workers are psychopaths.

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> Do you think the Police would like to see crime go to zero?

Yes, any proper non corrupted police would love to see that.

Do you think the Police would like to see crime go to zero?

There's an estimate of 10.000 homeless people in SF. And the budget is in 400 million.

At 40k a year per homeless person..how are they homeless. Answer: they aren't getting 40k of benefits.

What's the homeless person to bureaucrat/middleman ratio? I'd be very curious to see a breakdown of what sort of organizations are involved, how many people are involved, and where all that money is actually flowing.

Its VERY high.

SF's budget is basically $40-50k per homeless person yet each person receives a fraction of that, maybe 10%, its incredibly inefficient. Its even been called "The Homeless Industrial Complex" by a variety of outspoken locals.

Much of that money is spent on housing and services for people who would be considered homeless if not for those very funds paying their rent.

A huge portion of that $400M is spent getting people off the streets - they aren't spending $400M on 10,000 homeless people. They're spending 400M on tens of thousands of housing insecure people and after all of the rent support, healthcare, and mental health expense, there are still 10,000 people that they haven't been able to get off the streets.

This is the SF housing project's self-defense argument. But the budget has doubled and homelessness has increased. It's also a sorry defense of the city gov to say that such a small city actually has much higher homelessness numbers that are masked by ludicrous spending.

I mean.. have you seen what has happened to rents at the same time? The core problem is that housing costs way too much here. Obviously more people are going to become homeless when rent prices increase by 20% per year, and obviously it is going to cost more to service homeless people when the prevailing rent has increased as much as it has. None of these things are mysteries.

The cost of housing isn't the problem, this has been proven over and over again in SF. Yes, housing helps, but its not a cure. During the CV outbreak SF has had a hard time getting people to go into hotels when offered, because people had to abstain from drinking/drugs and to take their medication.

There's a really interesting character from SF who posts on twitter (@MyTwolffamily) about his personal experience of being a homeless drug addict, it might be enlightening to read some of his posts.

If you cut a 40k check annually to every homeless person and handed it to them on Jan 1st, I would bet the majority would be back on the streets by April, most of them earlier.

> Why else would you want a career in that field?

The people who want a career in that field who actually interact with the homeless are pretty detached from the big decisions.

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