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Comment by Johnny555 | Hacker News Reader

Where have you seen the poor and homeless treated better? It's a hard problem to solve, even by throwing a lot of money at the problem. Part of the problem is that some people want to be homeless (for a variety of reasons (or a combination of reasons) like not losing their independence, not trusting the system, wanting to continue a drug/alcohol habit, bad experiences with the system previously, mental illness, etc).

In a country that values individual rights, it's not clear how you help that person get off the streets without forcing them. In a city with relatively mild climate like LA or SF, it's even harder to get the homeless into shelters where social services can more effectively help them.

Granted, there are plenty of people that do want to get off the streets, but not everyone living on the streets is willing to make the sacrifices to do so.

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> Where have you seen the poor and homeless treated better?

In most countries with functional social security networks. Canada, Germany and Sweden.

So while the above are leaps and bounds better, they aren't flawless. Canada has lots of mentally ill people on the streets due to _very_ poor mental health care available to them. And Germany and Sweden have people from Romania begging on the streets, since they're part of a group of people that have been historically (and currently are) mistreated in their homeland.

> In a country that values individual rights..

If you want people off the streets, offer them free housing. There is even (and remarkably so) an example of this from Utah, where free housing was provided to the ones in need. And the city saved money doing it, since fewer other services were needed as a result.

Also, separately, I find this argument to be a bit of a straw man, since the treating homeless people decently and having strong individual rights aren't fundamentally opposed. In America some things are done well collectively, in the interest of everyone, like providing roads.

There's some debate over whether or not Utah really did solve their homeless problem:

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/kevin-corinth/think-utah-solv...

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/apr/27/utah-homeles...

And even when a region does offer good homeless services, word gets out and more homeless move in:

https://www.heraldextra.com/news/local/more-homeless-move-to...

As someone who lived in Canada, I wouldn't agree they are treated better. Every winter there is a mad rush to get people out of the cold.

Vancouver has about as severe a homeless problem as SF.

Can't speak to the other two countries.

> Also, separately, I find this argument to be a bit of a straw man, since the treating homeless people decently and having strong individual rights aren't fundamentally opposed. In America some things are done well collectively, in the interest of everyone, like providing roads.

I believe he was making the argument that, due to principles of individual liberty, the government cannot compel someone who wants to be homeless not to be.

Frankly, despite your caveats, I think this is a reckless and hurtful thing to think and say. Unless you have sources, it's just a dismissive logical extreme. Sure we can find some non-mentally ill people who want to be homeless. But let's focus on getting the 2.5 million children off the streets rather than even looking at framing this as an individual freedom issue.

I've been to a lot of places for a prolonged periods of time. The only place that has ever made me think of LA was Seoul. Every other city, no matter how poor, was in considerably better shape.

One difference that I feel is key, are housing regulations. You can put up 4 cement walls, with a cement floor and corrugated metal sheet roof, meet no safety standard, but still have a home. An address, a place of safety, where you can cook, clean clothes, and have access to electricity and water (possibly not legally, and certainly not reliably). Where your kids have light and can read and do their homework. Often housing 3 or 4 generations and forming their own community.

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