Also, there are housing assistance programs for everyone who makes less than a certain amount of money, and I think everyone who advocates for more housing for the homeless would agree with more affordable housing in general. Mostly people who work in this space agree that housing costs are the primary driver of homelessness.
and the ironic thing is that housing-first measures would likely end up saving taxpayers money, but the awful fear of someone undeserving getting something counts for more.
Honestly, there are so many arguments around public housing, you could at least pick one that makes sense.
Source: I grew up in a housing project.
The amount of tax revenue forgone by the government for the capital gains exemption alone surely dwarfs the money it would take to provide affordable housing for many people. To salt the wound further, these benefits turn home ownership into a lucrative investment vehicle that drives up prices, worsening the crisis!
For me, it’s not about “getting something for free” so much as it is about being efficient or inefficient.
Housing people in San Francisco instead of cheaper locations is like solving the carlessness problem by only buying teslas instead of hondas.
And then complaining that you don’t have enough money to buy everyone Teslas.
The plan is dumb. It won’t work. It’s stupid to fund such a plan. It’s not “never give free stuff to people” and “don’t give expensive stuff to people when cheap stuff does just as well, and especially if by doing so you incentivize more people to come and ask.”
I don’t think they want to solve the problem. I think they want to generate funds for consultants and NGOs that pay lots of people.
All that said, the federal government in the US of course would also face all kind of pushback and obstacles in part due to the way it's set up.