Comment by wesselbindt | Hacker News Reader

Comment by wesselbindt | Hacker News Reader

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You mentioning helping the homeless in this convo has the same kind of vibe to me as conservatives only mentioning mental health when talking about gun control. They only ever mention mental health as a distraction from issues they do actually care about (like gun control), and have no interest in actually solving mental health issues. It's a typical way of bad faith arguing. That's just vibes though; there's a good chance you'd actually in earnest like to divert library funds toward helping the homeless. It's an issue that's very close to my heart too, so I get the sentiment.

Still, I disagree. Just because one of two problems is worse (e.g. literacy and homelessness, or murder and burglary) doesn't mean we can just ignore one problem in favor of another. Just because murder is worse than burglary doesn't mean we should divert all police attention and money currently being spent on burglary to solving murders. Just because women's rights in the US by far surpass those in Saudi Arabia doesn't mean we should take the efforts we put into women's rights issues in the US and divert them to solving women's right's issues in SA. Just because homelessness is in some sense worse than illiteracy and low education doesn't mean we should divert funds from libraries to solving homelessness.

Having written all this out, it feels far too obvious for you to not know this. Maybe it's not just vibes.

I volunteer at my local food bank to help feed to homeless. I understand just how dire the need is. Libraries are a luxury we cannot afford right now, and frankly nobody uses them. Any 'feel good' purpose like 'literacy' is already met by public schools. There's already federal subsidies for internet and telephone for the needy, and the people that live too far away to get internet definitely don't have the money or means to drive into town to use the library.

I would be willing to compromise on small buildings that function as internet cafes that are free to use for the public, we can get rid of all the excess staff and books, though.

>and frankly nobody uses them

Random stat from my Oregon county (pop. 600k) library collective of 16 local libraries: 2023 saw 10.8M items checked out, up 4% from 2022

> I volunteer at my local food bank to help feed to homeless. I understand just how dire the need is.

If you spent much deal actually dealing with the homeless themselves, you'd know how crucial a resource a library is for homeless people. For something you see as "dire", you don't seem to have even done anything as simple as google "libraries help homeless."

> Libraries are a luxury we cannot afford right now,

Completely false. Libraries are one of the areas of public spending where the return per dollar spent is highest. Libraries are social institutions we cannot afford not to fund.

> and frankly nobody uses them

Again, you seem to have failed to do basic research as libraries get a ton of use and genetally suffer from a lack of funding relative to their usage rates.

> There's already federal subsidies for internet and telephone for the needy, and the people that live too far away to get internet definitely don't have the money or means to drive into town to use the library.

Most poor people are urban and in dense enough areas to that easily access libraries could be (and often are) available.

> I would be willing to compromise on small buildings that function as internet cafes that are free to use for the public, we can get rid of all the excess staff and books, though.

Oh, how generous of you. Why don't you go meet some librarians and learn about what they actually do before you write off their usefulness.

What do you think you've done to sway my opinion on the matter? There's a finite amount of money, and more pressing needs than letting people checkout paper books.

Let's look at it like this: Current budget: $100; $90 going to library, $10 going to feeding the needy. We can assume that even the entire library's budget won't overcome the shortfall in feeding the needy.

You're choosing to let more people be unfed in order that a handful of people can read Harry Potter or whatever is popular these days. Bad trade off.

Libraries have more than Harry Potter books. They have books that allow people to learn skills that would be valuable in getting a job. There are meeting rooms and events. My local library has a ESL program to help people with their English skills, which can help make them more employable. During the heatwaves last summer they were telling people who couldn’t afford AC to come to the library to escape the heat, which may have saved some lives.

Libraries can help get people to the point where fewer people need the food bank. Maybe you should see what the library actually has to offer before you try to cut it from the budget.

There are so many other areas to find room in the budget without cutting libraries.

You do realize that library budget cuts wouldn't automatically go to housing and feeding the homeless, right? And considering most municipalities seem to treat homeless people as cockroaches, the money would probably go to fund a new sports stadium or as a tax break for some new business.

> What do you think you've done to sway my opinion on the matter?

I thought correcting your facts would have that effect. If your opinion isn't fact based, I doubt there's anything I can do to change your opinion. All I can do is callout the misinformation you are spreading.

> Let's look at it like this: Current budget: $100; $90 going to library, $10 going to feeding the needy. We can assume that even the entire library's budget won't overcome the shortfall in feeding the needy.

Or... set tax rates sufficient to do both? Neither actually costs that much. Lack of funding for either has to do with politics, not practicality.

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