Tax the Wealthy
It is very easy to view homelessness as an issue simply about the supply and demand of housing, but I believe that it is a more complicated wealth vs. poverty issue. Real estate and access to it is one of the most tangible, dramatic, and visible symptoms of the “equality gap” between wealthy people and poor people, in the US of A, these days. HUD has been an agency of the US Government that has supervised the redirection of a portion of America’s vast wealth towards the housing needs of poor people in America. However, HUD did not create its own wealth, nor was it ever structured to generate revenue: It was dependant on funding from the Federal budget. As the amount of wealth HUD was allowed to receive was reduced, HUD’s ability to house poor people was reduced. This is where, at the institutional level, contemporary mass homelessness began, and is allowed, by our elected leadership, to continue.
The response of San Francisco’s government has been sadly inadequate, inhumane, and stupid. For example, when it was discovered that poor people were taking refuge in the parks at night, the City’s knee-jerk reaction was to make it illegal to be in the parks at night. This one abusive action arbitrarily criminalized an entire segment of the community that had done nothing wrong—a segment of the community that really needed some aid. This one punitive act brought no help at all to this segment of the community. What it brought
- the police waking you from your sleep;
- the police forcing you to break camp and relocate in the middle of the night;
- the police demanding to see your identification and searching your property;
- the police requiring you to make important decisions and sign official documents before you have had a chance to change into clothes or drink your coffee and wake up; or
- the police arresting you because you did not comply quickly enough with some instruction,
in all of thse cases likely leaving the larger parts of your personal property primed to be pulled apart as “unattended property” by the appropriate jurisdiction’s thieves and janitorial staff. This was one of an assortment of dog-in-the-manger selfish acts, which have made it de facto illegal to live in San Francisco, unless you can pass a background check and afford to rent an apartment.
TAX THE WEALTHY. Provide for the needy. It costs less to have a heart. It is a documented fact that it is less expensive to give people housing than it is to prosecute people for not having housing. This is, therefore, a better business policy AND a more humane social policy for all of the people of San Francisco.
Karl