We also have ample evidence that you can solve this sort of problem via UBI. As politically inconvenient as that result has proven to be...
And BI would be attacked for the latter - some ingrateful on-basic-income person committing vandalism for no financial benefit. It's the "workhouse"/"treadmill" argument - supposedly boredom breeds crime and people must be made to work, even pointless or below-poverty tasks, else the streets get taken over by criminals or worse.
Like tourists taking over the country.
Arguments acknowledging (and steering / manipulating) feelings weigh stronger here than economic facts, alas.
There's no financial gain in that. Doing this won't get you healthcare (we've got socialized healthcare anyway, and it's pretty much free for "the poor"), won't help you eat. It's just stupid, antisocial people. How would giving them money help any of that?
UBI was an experiment carried out during COVID and all it did was elevate prices and push a lot of people into Robinhood, while elevating the debt crisis.
I would not put the one-time covid cheques on par with the various rigorous UBI and/or free housing experiments that have been run over the last 30 years
Free housing is just another form of UBS that I was talking about.