[WildRose]

Homelessness is a growing problem in Canadian cities as well. Where I live, many of the homeless are chronically mentally ill, some are not ill but actually choose to be homeless, but a growing number can't obtain affordable housing in our booming economy. We just don't even have bachelor apartments for any less than $600/month in this city. It's not hard to imagine that as food and energy costs escalate, the numbers of homeless will increase, too.

I often see some of these people downtown where I work. They sleep under the overhang of the building where I work, especially when it's raining, with their shopping carts and large plastic bags (to use as tarps) in tow. Even in the residential area where I live with my family, you can see places under stands of spruce trees in our community park that are being used for people to sleep at night. Very sad.

[NEOPO]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('frankthetank', 'i')n this country...

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'C')alif., N.Y. lead nation
California was the state with most homeless people in 2005, about 170,000, followed by New York, Florida, Texas and Georgia, according to the report.

Nevada had the highest share of its population homeless, about 0.68 percent. It was followed by Rhode Island, Colorado, California and Hawaii.

“The driver in homelessness is the affordable housing crisis,” Roman said. “If we don’t do something to address the crisis in affordable housing we are not going to solve homelessness.”

She said many of the chronically homeless have mental health and substance abuse problems. Others, she said, simply cannot afford housing.

[TreebeardsUncle]

Hi.
Agree the situation is mostly due to high housing costs, but it is also due to the atomization of society. Have you noticed there are relatively few Hispanic and Asian homeless?
g

[Ayame]

They need 'tent cities' like in japan where the homeless live. At least the homeless are safe there at night.
http://www.outofthedoorways.org/article ... index.html

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('WildRose', ' ')Where I live, many of the homeless are chronically mentally ill.

[Doly]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ayame', 'I')t's not that they aren't working/trying hard enough or being lazy as most people wrongly assume. These people have real problems.

[emersonbiggins]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ayame', 'T')hey need 'tent cities' like in japan where the homeless live.

[SinisterBlueCat]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('emersonbiggins', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ayame', 'T')hey need 'tent cities' like in japan where the homeless live.

[emersonbiggins]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SinisterBlueCat', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('emersonbiggins', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ayame', 'T')hey need 'tent cities' like in japan where the homeless live.

[topcat]

If I ran onto tough luck and had to live on the streets for very long I would become chronically, mentally ill.

[Fergus]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('emersonbiggins', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SinisterBlueCat', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('emersonbiggins', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ayame', 'T')hey need 'tent cities' like in japan where the homeless live.

[BlisteredWhippet]

America should kick out illegal immigration which is helping to exascerbate conditions like this in America.

I am not a racist. Nor do I hate the homeless. Most homeless people are are not "comfortable" and I can't bring myself to say they deserve it either. They have to compete for low-paying jobs with immigrants who frequently have a much better social support system. They compete for housing with those same immigrants. As citizens they are subject to income taxes and federal scrutiny, all things the illegals successfully avoid.

The real tragedy is that the homeless have no political or social power to combat these conditions because the majority of middle class Americans are chronically self-centered. In their view, the historically accurate and consistent view, is that immgration will help the homeless pull themselves up by their bootstraps by giving them a "hardworking" example to live up to. If they cannot do it, they are just "lazy". The problem of immigration and homelessness have been intertwined from the very beginning in America. There has always been a pool of exploitable labor at the bottom of America's invisible class system. For centuries, the supply of domestic and imported landless serfs has been part of the American way of life. This shit has always been, to some degree "out of hand". It is endemic to the society and culture.

The background is that the middle and upper class profits handsomely from the exploitation of immigrants, and by extension, their fellow homeless Americans.

The American system is and always has been based upon the exploitation of an illegal class of worker against all others, with a permanent underclass which anyone can fall into.

Its a disgraceful mess and just another reason America Sucks.

[TreebeardsUncle]

Hi.
Have been reading The Oxford Illustrated History of Britain which goes along with things I have learned earlier. The enclosure movement in England started back in the 14th century, largely as a response of the landlords to the heightened bargaining power of peasant renters after the Black Plague had greatly reduced population and led to higher wages. In Shakepeare's time (in the late 16th century) vagabondage or being a lordless man was a crime, so the actors would form groups with titles like X nobleman's players or The Kings Men. Homelessness is largely a side effect of the commodification of the landscape, cutting people off from the land, and viewing people, land, and works of creation as exploitable commodities for the enrichment of the already wealthy and those who aspire to be wealthy. Look at England in the 14th through 17th centuries to get a good idea how the situation in America developed.
Geoff

[eXpat]

Interesting article about the growing poverty in the States, link here, according to the article nearly 16 million are living in deep or severe poverty.

[vision-master]

All I can tell ya is the disability process is not for the faint of heart for the 20 to 30% of the population that end up applying. That is correct, 20 to 30%!

[holmes]

"latinos" or "hispanics" or whatever you want to call them (like it really matters. talk about racism and separating). Illegals and legals that are not white get 5 different forms of welfare. They get free autos and homes as well. All tax funded. Now the people that have been here and on the welfare are still getting it. However whites or LEGAL citizens that need a helping hand get nothing or are put through hell to get anything. Most of the time it is humiliating and the conditions in the housing given to the Non illegals that are not "heespanic" or brown skin are horrible and they prefer to live free and on the street. I know. I know several homeless poeple in my life.
Now the brownskins get HOMES not housing. They get their own Automobiles not Public transit. They get all children paid for. The racism and corruption is thorough. Now if you are single mom or dad that is white and are working and striving to get a leg up and get educated, etc... you get nothing. You can get unemployment only after a fight and humiliation.
If your brown and stupid you get it served on a platter.
Pure racism and bogotry and devicivness from the so called multiculturalists and compassionate non racists.
Hooey. These liberal multis are crual and dictatorial. They have zero compassion this gubmint socialists. its for profit and power. They have unleashed hell on the citizens of America and say they have compassion for the people. Its so twisted its beyond surreal.

You see the logic here is to support and promote idiots and vermin to breed en mas. Therfore it overwhelmes the shitstem and it collapses. and the gen poo that is created is a toilet bowl. Its Orwell is here and now. Pure and unadulterated. Its a cess pool. Not a gene pool. The gene pool has been gone since ww2.
Awesome future we gots here! Thank you for giving this to us all you cocksuckers. its what Legal decent people have worked so hard for for all these years. A shit hole, a shit environment, assholes at every turn, ignorant dependents, redneck inbreds, etcc... the list goes on. America the beautiful! Flush.

[holmes]

Do not get me started on all the whores on disability that arent supposed to be! Do not get me going!

[holmes]

every time I venture into the shitties I understand why its all being flushed. I see the yuppie punks and pampered turds driving around in their expensive cars. Prancing around like its party till 1999. These predominately white people have sold us all out. They are nothing more than spoiled children. They truly need to be stripped of all they own and forced to live amongst what they usher in. They are insulated and sheltered from reality. We can only pray one day they are dragged from their beach fron condo and hacked with machetes by their slave primitives. I really hate this ruling elite and their pansy followers. They dont care about anything but profit and the economic model. and thats it. They care not if their child goes to school in a sewer. They will just migrate and move to the "country" so they can bring all their games and vices with them changing into what they fleed. It is a perfect microcosm of their soul and personality: Parasitic and corrupt and passive aggressive. They area gestapo actually. They dictate with their money they derived from corruption and ponzi. A vicious cycle of death.

[lateStarter]

Unfortunately, I think in the very near future (less than 6 months) we will be adding another '0' to that disturbing figure. And even though in the beginning, they will not be 'mentally disturbed', just homeless and confused, in short order, it may get ugly.

[vision-master]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('holmes', 'D')o not get me started on all the whores on disability that arent supposed to be! Do not get me going!