"So for 20 000 extra we can keep a cop on the payroll that will protect us when the people rise against us?"
In my city the annual cost of a bed and support was about $80,000/year, not sure what's different 😅
Your city obviously decided to employ psychologists in a 1 to 1 ratio.
I am all for helping the homeless but these numbers seem misleading. Now I want to see how much if they also get all of the amenities that come with prison. 3 meals a day and (shitty) healthcare.
Housing - 10,050 Medicare average cost per beneficiary (2022) - 15,730
31065-10050-15730 = 5285 remaining for meals, three meals everyday for a year would be $4.83 per meal, low but doable. This assumes the government will be providing everything with no contribution from the individual. Lack of housing is probably the largest impediment to employment, no address or id for job apps, nowhere to shower and be clean, have clean clothes, etc. Addiction is another issue but safe stable housing would be a major help in getting clean as well. So some number of these people will be able to get back on track and start contributing to themselves and society at large.
I realized after typing I found Medicare instead of Medicaid, it varies by state but average cost per enrollee is 8651, so another 1400 is available in the equation.
And that is probably on the low end. So even if we round up to $30,000, it's still less. And the people are better off. I have been a homeless drug addict. It's a rough life. The only reason I broke free from heroin/fentanyl addiction is because I went to prison. But I also wanted to quit. If someone does not want to quit, they won't quit.
Thank you for taking the time to research and do the math. You are a good person.
Solarpunk Urbanism
A community to discuss solarpunk and other new and alternative urbanisms that seek to break away from our currently ecologically destructive urbanisms.
- Henri Lefebvre, The Right to the City — In brief, the right to the city is the right to the production of a city. The labor of a worker is the source of most of the value of a commodity that is expropriated by the owner. The worker, therefore, has a right to benefit from that value denied to them. In the same way, the urban citizen produces and reproduces the city through their own daily actions. However, the the city is expropriated from the urbanite by the rich and the state. The right to the city is therefore the right to appropriate the city by and for those who make and remake it.
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