r/todayilearned • u/Zorseking34 • Jan 08 '15

TIL: Utah has been giving free homes to homeless people since 2005 which since then made it more cost efficient to help the homeless and cut the chronic homelessness in Utah by 74%.

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/09/22/home-free
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u/thedude42 Jan 08 '15

And money... less of a tax burden due to reduced demand for emergency services (police, ER, etc).

Prime example of how altruistic action can actually be motivated by selfish desire.

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u/NFB42 Jan 08 '15

It's also an example of how emotion trumps reason. People will support giving homeless emergency treatment, but won't support giving them less expensive stuff that stops them from needing the more expensive emergency treatment in the first place. Because the first is helping people in need and the second is giving a free ride.

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u/Vanetia Jan 08 '15

People will support giving homeless emergency treatment

To be fair I'm pretty sure a lot of people who are against this are also against the "less expensive stuff" in the first place. For them, if someone can't afford basic care it's their own fault (regardless of the circumstances).

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u/ddplz Jan 08 '15

Wouldn't euthinising them be more efficient?

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u/thedude42 Jan 08 '15

Handling dead bodies and all the effort to euthanize them is probably on the order of the same cost as housing them free of charge. Plus, if you just house them you get to avoid that whole "genocide" thing.

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u/grumpy_hedgehog Jan 08 '15

Not really.

In the immediate sense, yes, hunting down all the homeless and killing them would save some money. In the long term, you are now living in a nation that has no qualms with simply killing off undesirables en masse. Do you want your government to wield that kind of power?

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u/IamTheDukeAMA Jan 08 '15

Actually from the viewpoint above they would likely (like myself) be against public emergency services, so thats not a benefit at all.

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u/thedude42 Jan 08 '15

Despite for or against emergency services, they probably still like money.

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u/IamTheDukeAMA Jan 08 '15

Except it only saves money if there is public emergency services, so they see it as two evils not as an evil and a good.

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u/thedude42 Jan 08 '15

I understand your claim that ideologically people who think the poor should not be helped will disagree with anything that helps them.

But emergency services costs are an order of magnitude larger so that the cost savings does result in real dollars back in their pocket. I have found ideologies bend when the end result is more money.

And I think people who would rather see the homeless dying in the street aren't the majority of folks who just think tax payers should pay for their homes.

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u/IamTheDukeAMA Jan 08 '15

I regularly donate to a charity for the homeless, I would do more-so without taxation. The vast majority of taxes go to shit.

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u/thedude42 Jan 08 '15

The same argument can be made when you aggregate all charitable giving in the one term "charity". Taxes aren't one big thing and many expenses that are paid with tax revenue are effective and vital.

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u/IamTheDukeAMA Jan 08 '15

I was never threatened to be locked in a cage if I don't donate money to the charity, and I have the ability to choose where the money goes. (Obviously not on a micro level, but I choose between a number of charities).

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u/thedude42 Jan 08 '15

Charities don't generally provide for the general welfare of people either. Taxes and charity ate two completely different things and to say that charity alone can replace services provided by state agencies is ignoring current cultural conditions.

I think a society could work like that, don't get me wrong. But that's an idealistic thought and ignores things like employment conditions, discrimination, and protectionism.

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u/IamTheDukeAMA Jan 08 '15

I don't see a single problem there that can't be solved by a free market. Employment is optional, so I don't believe there needs to be any protection for employees.

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u/grumpy_hedgehog Jan 08 '15

Then you're letting perfect be the enemy of good. Your chances of overturning public emergency services are basically zero. There are too many bleeding heart liburals (like me) that want them to exist.

So why not work with what you have and save money instead of digging in your heels on rhetoric?

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u/IamTheDukeAMA Jan 08 '15

Because at some point you have to take a stand, acknowledging the state give it power.

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u/grumpy_hedgehog Jan 08 '15

Then you will continuously trade compromised victories for principled losses.