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How Homelessness Works · Stuff You Should Know

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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
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Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff you Should Know
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Speaker 1: from house Stuff Works dot Com? Hey, and welcome to
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Speaker 1: the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. With me is Charles W.
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Speaker 1: Chuck Bryant. Fresh off of the Stuff you Should Know
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Speaker 1: Facebook page, where we've been discussing all manner of interesting
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Speaker 1: stuff like Bob Ross has come up. Have you been
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Speaker 1: posting Bob Ross videos? He's the best? Yes? I posted.
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Speaker 1: I posted the Peanuts Christmas Times here a little segment. Uh,
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Speaker 1: you've been posting some pretty good stuff too, but thank you?
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Speaker 1: What what's some what's one of your favorite things that
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Speaker 1: have gotten people buzzing lately? Did I posted about Bonnie
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Speaker 1: Prince Billy? He was that on my own Facebook page?
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Speaker 1: I don't know. Yeah, did you know? Because you would
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Speaker 1: have taken it down? I would not have. I would
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Speaker 1: respect your post. I'm sleepy today because of Bonny Prince
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Speaker 1: Billy last night. I would scoff at it, but I
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Speaker 1: wouldn't take it down. I love it. That's become a
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Speaker 1: running gag. Is me loving him and you're making fun
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Speaker 1: of him? Go ahead, Okay, you're ready for me to
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Speaker 1: make fun of him. Yeah, I'm not going to. He
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Speaker 1: seems like a nice guy. Okay, So Chuck Chucker's um.
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Speaker 1: I wrote a blog post actually recently on homelessness. I
1:25
Speaker 1: read it. Did you read it? Really? I read your stuff? Man?
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Speaker 1: Are you kidding? I'm a fan? Really? Yes? Really? So
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Speaker 1: the whole thing, then, you know, this already was centered
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Speaker 1: around well, it started around this, um this news that
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Speaker 1: came out in July that the homeless, the population of
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Speaker 1: homeless school children had risen dramatically to about one million
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Speaker 1: kids in US schools, public schools, I would imagine who
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Speaker 1: are homeless? Yeah? Right? And uh in one particular area,
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Speaker 1: I think by the numbers statistically speaking, in Sue Falls,
2:10
Speaker 1: South Dakota, that's a homeless kid per classroom. Yeah. They
2:14
Speaker 1: had a huge increase, didn't they there? Oh yeah, something
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Speaker 1: like that in that state period. Yeah. In uh, in
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Speaker 1: Sioux Falls school district, it's jump over the last five years.
2:28
Speaker 1: And what in Texas like a hundred plus percent? Yeah,
2:31
Speaker 1: So across the across the US, there's been um an
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Speaker 1: increase of forty one percent nationwide, right of school children, Yes,
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Speaker 1: of homeless school children and um the so Texas has
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Speaker 1: seen an increase of a hundred and thirty nine percent, um,
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Speaker 1: Iowa a hundred and thirty six percent. The lowest of
2:51
Speaker 1: the highest five is New Jersey with an increase. And
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Speaker 1: this is, of course, i'll due to the great recession
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Speaker 1: that's going on right now out right, of course. And
3:01
Speaker 1: somebody actually posted I haven't read the links, but somebody
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Speaker 1: actually posted a comment on the blog that said, um,
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Speaker 1: you know it's bad enough. You know, homeless school children
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Speaker 1: are depressing enough, but you know there's plenty of homeless
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Speaker 1: kids out there who aren't in school. Well yeah, sure,
3:18
Speaker 1: thinking about that. So with the economic recession is clearly
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Speaker 1: to blame for this increase in homeless school children. Um.
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Speaker 1: And there's a lot of other factors that over the
3:27
Speaker 1: years have contributed to homelessness, which we'll talk about. But Chuck,
3:31
Speaker 1: let's talk about homelessness in the United States, shall we?
3:34
Speaker 1: And we should say we're just going to concentrate in
3:36
Speaker 1: the United States. Actually, I've got a few stats, do
3:39
Speaker 1: you have, Well, just some stats, Okay, so let's go
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Speaker 1: ahead and talk about this and get the around the
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Speaker 1: world out of the way. Worldwide, They they approximate, and
3:49
Speaker 1: we should go ahead and say that counting homeless people
3:53
Speaker 1: is is a tough bag because they changes drastically week
3:58
Speaker 1: to week sometimes. Well, we should say that there's two
4:01
Speaker 1: ways of doing it. One is it's called a point
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Speaker 1: in time count, where it's basically like, all right, everybody,
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Speaker 1: go count the homeless people in your area today, right
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Speaker 1: on this one particular night, and then UM reported in
4:14
Speaker 1: and then we'll tally the numbers. And then the other
4:17
Speaker 1: way to do it is UM basically over a year,
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Speaker 1: and that's like a huge undertaking UM usually done by
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Speaker 1: the Census Bureau. UM that identifies, you know, how many
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Speaker 1: people have used homeless shelters, how many of them have
4:31
Speaker 1: been different, and it comes up with a pretty rough number.
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Speaker 1: Well yeah, but one of the reasons it's it's difficult
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Speaker 1: is because fortunes change rapidly in this crazy fast moving world,
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Speaker 1: and homeless people sometimes are in cars and campgrounds and
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Speaker 1: places where you can't find them, so it's tough to
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Speaker 1: get the dead accurate numbers. But having said all that,
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Speaker 1: my friend I do have some stats worldwide, approximately one
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Speaker 1: people around the world are homeless. Uh the u n
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Speaker 1: what did you say? A hundred million people in the world.
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Speaker 1: It sounds like you said a hundred one. Uh, the
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Speaker 1: u N it says there's about thirty million displaced Indigenous people.
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Speaker 1: I don't know if they count that as homeless necessarily,
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Speaker 1: I would imagine, so that might be a part of
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Speaker 1: that larger number. Um. And then I started thinking about,
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Speaker 1: like are there homeless everywhere? And of course there are,
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Speaker 1: But I said, what about places like Sweden in Norway,
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Speaker 1: like where you would not expect homeless people, they have
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Speaker 1: him there. But Sweden only has about seventeen thousand homeless
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Speaker 1: out of nine point three million people. It's this pretty
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Speaker 1: small percentage. Uh. Norway though, has one point for homeless
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Speaker 1: people for every one thousand people, which is it's not
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Speaker 1: too far off America's percentage really because we have about
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Speaker 1: one percent. Right two About three to three point five
5:49
Speaker 1: million people is the latest number I saw. The latest
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Speaker 1: number I saw, it was actually less than that. What
5:54
Speaker 1: was it? And this this doesn't make sense because it's
5:56
Speaker 1: it's to the homelessness population has increased right right in
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Speaker 1: the US since the recession. So the two thousand five
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Speaker 1: number I think was two point three and three point
6:09
Speaker 1: five million between those two, right, like like you just said.
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Speaker 1: But then there's another one from two thousand nine, it's
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Speaker 1: one point five six. So the numbers are all over
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Speaker 1: the place this, right, So that's a little bit from
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Speaker 1: around the world, Russia, China, Africa, Canada. It happens everywhere,
6:30
Speaker 1: but most of this is U S. Base because that's
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Speaker 1: where we are. What we can say though, is that
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Speaker 1: percentage wise, there's a disproportionate number of minorities that are homeless.
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Speaker 1: Minorities in this country makeup about twelve percent of the population,
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Speaker 1: and African Americans make up about fifty and another are
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Speaker 1: Hispanic right, homeless in the United States, right, African Americans
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Speaker 1: are the account for between thirty eight and of the
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Speaker 1: homeless population, right, but they only make up about twelve
7:04
Speaker 1: percent of the U. S population, right, And this is
7:09
Speaker 1: you know, obviously you'll see most of this in big cities,
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Speaker 1: but it's a problem in rural areas as well as
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Speaker 1: well as well. And typically homeless families make up a
7:19
Speaker 1: greater proportion of the homeless in rural areas, which is
7:24
Speaker 1: that's any kind of homelessness is sad, but an entire
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Speaker 1: family being homeless, that's really tough. Chuck. We we talked
7:31
Speaker 1: about what was driving homelessness right now, driving the increase
7:35
Speaker 1: is the recession, but UM in the late twentie and
7:41
Speaker 1: this century as well, right, UM, there's been a combination
7:49
Speaker 1: of factors and the two biggest drivers are poverty, an
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Speaker 1: increase in poverty, and UM a decrease in the availability
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Speaker 1: of affordable housing, two huge factors in addition to others
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Speaker 1: that we'll talk about later, UM, that have contributed to
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Speaker 1: people not having a home, which is the saddest stat
8:11
Speaker 1: well because we'll talk about all the other factors like
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Speaker 1: drugs and alcohol and mental health and stuff like that,
8:17
Speaker 1: but it's sad that the reason why people don't have
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Speaker 1: homes because they can't afford housing. Right. And here's here's
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Speaker 1: something I just want to put this out there now.
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Speaker 1: I was reading a history of homelessness in the US
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Speaker 1: UM and the author was basically saying, homelessness been around forever,
8:35
Speaker 1: like apparently, UM, fourteenth century England had vagrancy laws. Right,
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Speaker 1: people have been homeless, have been um not necessarily living
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Speaker 1: on the streets, but don't have a permanent residence. And
8:47
Speaker 1: that's an important point too. When we talk about homelessness,
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Speaker 1: we're not just talking about people sleeping on the streets.
8:54
Speaker 1: We're not just talking about people sleeping in emergency shelters
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Speaker 1: or even in their cars. The true genuine definition of
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Speaker 1: homelessness is you don't have a home, you don't have
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Speaker 1: a place that your own, you're staying with family, you
9:07
Speaker 1: live in a weekly motel, that's homeless as well. Yeah, true, right, Um,
9:12
Speaker 1: the but back to the uh, the history of homelessness.
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Speaker 1: The author was saying, you know, we've had homeless in
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Speaker 1: the US since we've been here. Um, the differences. We
9:24
Speaker 1: used to have homeless because we couldn't afford to give
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Speaker 1: them work. I couldn't afford to take care of them.
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Speaker 1: Now we can't afford to take care of them. We
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Speaker 1: just don't write. You know. Well, yeah, that's interesting you
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Speaker 1: brought that up because I was reading about other countries,
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Speaker 1: and America seems to be unique in a very bad way,
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Speaker 1: and that a lot of Americans feel like it's deserved
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Speaker 1: and because you messed up by doing something really bad
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Speaker 1: or you're on alcohol or drugs, and a lot of
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Speaker 1: Americans stick that attitude that homeless people deserve to be homeless,
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Speaker 1: and then most of the rest of Americans just don't
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Speaker 1: think about it at all, and it's a very invisible
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Speaker 1: problem or there are you know, people that do care
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Speaker 1: and don't think they deserve it, and they're what we
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Speaker 1: call good people or advocates. So how do people get homeless? Josh, Well, Chuck,
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Speaker 1: let's talk about it. We we said that poverty and
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Speaker 1: UM the lack of affordable housing are two of the
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Speaker 1: biggest drivers UM with with poverty. Okay, right now, when
10:32
Speaker 1: you when you quantify poverty and the poverty line, you
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Speaker 1: basically figure out how much the average person pays in
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Speaker 1: a state or in a nation or something like that
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Speaker 1: for housing, utilities, food, that kind of thing. Then you
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Speaker 1: set a line and say anything below this is you're
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Speaker 1: eligible for government assistance. Right, your your poverty stricken. UM.
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Speaker 1: In the US, the poverty line is somewhere around seventeen
10:59
Speaker 1: grand a year for family of three. Right. The problem
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Speaker 1: is there's a big disparity between the poverty line and
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Speaker 1: the minimum wage. So the federal minimum wage is seven
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Speaker 1: dollars and twenty five cents an hour. Right, for a
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Speaker 1: person to work forty hours a week, it's a normal
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Speaker 1: work week, UM fifty two weeks a year, vacation none,
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Speaker 1: like they work five days a week every week, they
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Speaker 1: would gross fifteen thousand eighty dollars. That's not very much money, right,
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Speaker 1: So you're actually falling below the poverty line making the
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Speaker 1: federal minimum wage. Right, and then consider that actually too
11:39
Speaker 1: afford a two bedroom apartment. This is the median across
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Speaker 1: the states. UH to afford a two bedroom apartment at
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Speaker 1: thirty percent of your income, which is the definition of
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Speaker 1: affordable housing. UM at seven making seven, you'd have to
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Speaker 1: work eighty seven hours a week. Iculous. So there's a
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Speaker 1: big part of the problem right there. Well, yeah, it
12:03
Speaker 1: said one of the stats in here that was shocking
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Speaker 1: was about fiftcent of homeless people actually have jobs. So, um,
12:09
Speaker 1: I saw actually not in this article, but and I
12:14
Speaker 1: just across the internetteresting. Well, what is clear is that
12:19
Speaker 1: a lot of people end up homeless that I don't
12:21
Speaker 1: think they would ever end up homeless. They live paycheck
12:24
Speaker 1: to paycheck. They have a job and they're getting by,
12:27
Speaker 1: but then something happens, either lose a job, or they
12:29
Speaker 1: have some outrageous medical bills, or some catastrophe happens, and
12:34
Speaker 1: then your average Joe or Jane with a job can
12:37
Speaker 1: find themselves homeless, like pretty easily. Sometimes it's not always
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Speaker 1: just some schizophrenic who has a heroin problem, you know, right,
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Speaker 1: In fact, most of the time, I would say it's not. Um.
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Speaker 1: We also talked about a lack of affordable housing. Right,
12:54
Speaker 1: we said, the definition of affordable housing is of your income.
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Speaker 1: M A. Apparently there are five million that you're shooting for. Yeah, yeah,
13:08
Speaker 1: five million US households pay more than half of their
13:12
Speaker 1: income in rent. Right, that is unbelievable. That's called worst
13:16
Speaker 1: case scenario. And the rule of thumb is if you
13:18
Speaker 1: pay a quarter, you're doing good. Yeah yeah, so yeah,
13:24
Speaker 1: half of your income in rent, you're in a bad,
13:27
Speaker 1: bad way. Um, that should be living in whatever big
13:30
Speaker 1: city you're living in. Well, that also encompasses that worst
13:34
Speaker 1: case scenario. Also encombs as people who live in substandard
13:37
Speaker 1: housing as well. So, um, it's not just how much
13:41
Speaker 1: you're paying out, it's what you're paying for, right, or
13:44
Speaker 1: a combination of the two, right, Um, part of the problem, Chuck,
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Speaker 1: Do you remember tech Wood, Yeah, tech Wood housing, Techwood housing,
13:51
Speaker 1: US Street. No, it's not that and that um the
13:56
Speaker 1: demolished Remember they demolished tech Wood, which is like the
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Speaker 1: projects and Atlanta right before the Olympics. They were just
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Speaker 1: gone and it was like Okay, all you poor people,
14:05
Speaker 1: you don't have to go home because you don't have
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Speaker 1: one anymore, but you can't stay here. And that was that.
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Speaker 1: And apparently there's a there there. That was a nationwide
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Speaker 1: trend since the eighties. Yes, between eight and two thousand three,
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Speaker 1: more than two million low rent housing units were basically
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Speaker 1: either demolished or turned into you know, high rise, expensive
14:26
Speaker 1: high rises. And during that same period, from eighty to
14:29
Speaker 1: two thousand three, government assistance for housing um fell by half,
14:36
Speaker 1: decreased by half. That's gonna be cool a lot of homeless,
14:38
Speaker 1: So it's not. And not only are we not helping
14:40
Speaker 1: the homeless, we're actually creating homeless. Right. Well, so, uh,
14:45
Speaker 1: we talked about obviously pay and being down on your
14:49
Speaker 1: luck to temporarily living paycheck to paycheck, else would you
14:52
Speaker 1: become home? Well, you you kind of hit the the
14:55
Speaker 1: nail on the head a little bit when you talked
14:57
Speaker 1: about heroin addicted schizophrenics. Those those can be a combination
15:03
Speaker 1: of those two or separately. Mental illness and addiction are
15:05
Speaker 1: two big factors in homelessness as well, with mentally ill
15:10
Speaker 1: um Apparently about twenty of all homeless people have some
15:15
Speaker 1: type of mental illness. That brings up a really interesting point.
15:18
Speaker 1: Have you ever heard the urban legend that Ronald Reagan
15:22
Speaker 1: is responsible for the increase in homelessness because he closed
15:25
Speaker 1: down all of the mental institutions. Yes, I have heard that.
15:28
Speaker 1: That's actually not too far off the mark. When he
15:31
Speaker 1: was governor of California from like sixty seven to seventy four,
15:34
Speaker 1: he shut down a lot of these state run psychiatric hospitals.
15:40
Speaker 1: When he became president, one of the major things he
15:43
Speaker 1: cut funding too was the treatment of mental illness. And
15:47
Speaker 1: because of this cut and funding, a lot of mental
15:50
Speaker 1: hospitals shut down and a lot of mentally ill people
15:53
Speaker 1: found themselves homeless. So kind of indirectly in that sense,
15:58
Speaker 1: he he definitely contributed to increase in homelessness. Well, should
16:02
Speaker 1: we go ahead and talk about the McKinley Vento Act, then, yes,
16:06
Speaker 1: we're talking Reagan. Well, yeah, now that here we go.
16:10
Speaker 1: He also signed the first, it says, only significant Homeless
16:16
Speaker 1: Act of Congress. Yeah, the McKinley McKinney Vento Act that
16:22
Speaker 1: was had a different name, but than they named it
16:24
Speaker 1: after Stuart McKinney and Bruce Vento, who were two of
16:27
Speaker 1: the biggest champions and it had all sorts of cool
16:30
Speaker 1: programs in it, right, Yeah, emergency shelter, transitional housing, healthcare, food,
16:35
Speaker 1: job training, substance abuse services, all kinds of cool stuff. Yeah.
16:39
Speaker 1: And it's really ironic that he he was the president
16:42
Speaker 1: that signed that in the law, because he is also
16:45
Speaker 1: widely credited in this kind take off so many Republican listeners.
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Speaker 1: He is widely credited as creating the homeless problem in
16:54
Speaker 1: the US, not just through the institutionalization, but through the
16:59
Speaker 1: creation of the wealth gap that we've seen between nineteen
17:04
Speaker 1: eighty and now. You talked about substance abuse, and about
17:07
Speaker 1: two thirds of homeless people struggle with some kind of
17:10
Speaker 1: alcohol or drug problem, not surprisingly. And then uh, sadly,
17:15
Speaker 1: domestic violence has a big part to do with it,
17:18
Speaker 1: especially with women. About half the women are battered women,
17:21
Speaker 1: and they oftentimes don't have anywhere to go. They'll flee
17:25
Speaker 1: there if if they're brave enough to actually flee, they're
17:28
Speaker 1: jerk husband, abuse of husband, then there they have nowhere
17:32
Speaker 1: to be because their husband might be the sole breadwinner
17:35
Speaker 1: and and that kind of circumstance. So they have battered
17:38
Speaker 1: women shelters that God for just for women, that that
17:41
Speaker 1: suffer from abuse and kids too. I think half of
17:46
Speaker 1: a runaway homeless runaways, um, we're fleeing domestic abuse or
17:52
Speaker 1: homeless kids on their own. I guess we're fleeing domestic abuse,
17:56
Speaker 1: and about we're fleeing sexual abuse. But it doesn't stop there. Unfortunately,
18:02
Speaker 1: when you are homeless on the street, you encounter even
18:06
Speaker 1: more abuse. Many times you leave home, you leave an
18:10
Speaker 1: abusive situation at home, you live on the street. Then
18:12
Speaker 1: you get attacked on the street for being homeless, or
18:14
Speaker 1: you are forced into doing really bad things for food
18:19
Speaker 1: and shelter and stuff like that. On toward things at
18:22
Speaker 1: the bus station. At the bus station and veterans, Josh,
18:26
Speaker 1: are a big part of our homeless problem. And that
18:28
Speaker 1: I can't say satisfy of all because it's all really sad.
18:31
Speaker 1: But when you're veterans, when you've got to fight for
18:34
Speaker 1: this country and you end up one of the two
18:37
Speaker 1: hundred thousand homeless single men, usually with mental illness, substance
18:42
Speaker 1: abuse problems because of maybe post traumatic stress disorder, that
18:46
Speaker 1: is heartbreaking. Yeah, and and again you just keep kidding
18:50
Speaker 1: that nail right on the head man. There's a lot
18:52
Speaker 1: of overlapping problems or factors of in homelessness, like you know, veterans,
18:58
Speaker 1: maybe homeless veterans maybe more prone to having a substance
19:02
Speaker 1: abuse problem or suffering from a mental illness like PTSD
19:05
Speaker 1: or substance abuse and mental illness overlap and other people
19:09
Speaker 1: as well. Uh. And part of the problem is you
19:12
Speaker 1: get to get into a vicious cycle. There are far
19:15
Speaker 1: few services, far fewer services available easily accessible on the street. Um,
19:23
Speaker 1: then there are if you have a house and an
19:25
Speaker 1: income and an address and a number and all the
19:27
Speaker 1: normal stuff that that you just kind of need to
19:31
Speaker 1: be able to get by in the US these days.
19:34
Speaker 1: And you know, you you look at something like the
19:37
Speaker 1: Department of Veterans Affairs, which does as good a job
19:39
Speaker 1: as they can as far as I know, but they
19:42
Speaker 1: can only accommodate about of homeless veterans. But what's so
19:46
Speaker 1: frustrating is that they could accommodate all of them. They
19:49
Speaker 1: could if they wanted, if they had not, if they
19:51
Speaker 1: wanted to, if they had the funding. So you see
19:53
Speaker 1: these record bonuses for CEOs on one hand, and then
19:57
Speaker 1: you hear about homeless veterans the and he's out there, yes,
20:01
Speaker 1: and I'm glad it was veterans that got you. I
20:03
Speaker 1: hope it's homeless school children that get somebody else. I
20:06
Speaker 1: hope somebody hears this and realizes that we have all
20:10
Speaker 1: the money we need to get it's just some of
20:14
Speaker 1: the wealthiest are gonna have to give up a little
20:16
Speaker 1: bit of it so that some of the poorest have
20:18
Speaker 1: a house. It's as simple as that. We have the means,
20:22
Speaker 1: just not the will. Yeah, and we're not talking about
20:24
Speaker 1: just some social program with these alcoholics living off my dime.
20:27
Speaker 1: We're talking about homeless veterans and children. And you have
20:31
Speaker 1: used women. And even if it is alcoholic veterans, we've
20:34
Speaker 1: are learned. Have we not learned already that alcoholism and
20:38
Speaker 1: all addiction is a brain disease that follows the brain
20:40
Speaker 1: disease model these days, you need treatment. Well that's the
20:44
Speaker 1: whole stupid American idea that I talked about, was that
20:46
Speaker 1: some people feel like they deserve to be homeless. They
20:48
Speaker 1: see him on the street and they think, what did
20:49
Speaker 1: you do to get here? Yeah? Instead of what can
20:52
Speaker 1: I do to help you? Yeah? Well, this is touched
20:55
Speaker 1: the nerve today. It's homelessness. Really should be shocked. But
21:02
Speaker 1: I'm glad. I'm angry, That's what I'm saying. Okay, I'm
21:04
Speaker 1: glad you're angry too, chook josher's Uh, let's talk about
21:09
Speaker 1: some of the effects. And a lot of these you
21:11
Speaker 1: can file under duh. But it bears saying you're talking
21:15
Speaker 1: about women's shelters. Yeah, well women's shelters only let in women.
21:19
Speaker 1: And if you have a teenage son, you can kiss
21:23
Speaker 1: him goodbye. Yeah, so bye bye family unit. Uh. Physical
21:29
Speaker 1: attacks Homeless people are attacked, beaten, kicked, chained, feted, spray
21:35
Speaker 1: painted people, lit on fire, peton is pretty bad. Yeah,
21:40
Speaker 1: just because they're homeless. People will go out and beat
21:42
Speaker 1: up homeless people. Yeah. Well, there's like a whole line
21:47
Speaker 1: of thinking that like serial killers, practice on drifters, or
21:52
Speaker 1: sure health effects for kids. Um, if you're homeless, you're
21:57
Speaker 1: gonna have a higher rate of stomach prob UM's asthma,
22:00
Speaker 1: your infections. Depression anxiousness PTSD is pretty prevalent. It's a
22:09
Speaker 1: cause of and is caused by homelessness, and not just
22:13
Speaker 1: adults but kids as well. Right, Like, you can actually
22:16
Speaker 1: start to develop PTSD because you don't know where you're
22:19
Speaker 1: going to sleep the next night. I mean, think about it. Chuck, like,
22:23
Speaker 1: have you ever been without a home like I, I
22:28
Speaker 1: would think it can be really weird to not know
22:30
Speaker 1: where you're going to stay or did not just you know,
22:33
Speaker 1: have a hard day at work or a hard day
22:35
Speaker 1: at school, and to go to know that at the
22:38
Speaker 1: end of this day you have no idea where you're
22:40
Speaker 1: gonna sleep. Maybe you're gonna sleep in your car, maybe
22:42
Speaker 1: you're gonna sleep in the woods. But you don't get
22:44
Speaker 1: to just rest. You don't get to just take a shower,
22:49
Speaker 1: beer and watch you know, TV or whatever. It takes
22:52
Speaker 1: the unwined, So you're you're stress level is heightened constantly
22:57
Speaker 1: without any resolution to it, and of course you're going
23:00
Speaker 1: to suffer PTSD or at least stomach aches something bad.
23:05
Speaker 1: Adults too. It's not just kids. They can get frostbite,
23:10
Speaker 1: leg ulcers, respiratory infections, HIV and AIDS, and diabetes way
23:16
Speaker 1: more common than homeless population. So lots of health effects
23:19
Speaker 1: going on, Josh, I agree, Chuck. So check we talked
23:24
Speaker 1: about UM Reagan as both creator and alleviator of homelessness. UM.
23:31
Speaker 1: You you talked about some of the programs that the
23:33
Speaker 1: McKinney Vento Act created. UM, some of the other programs
23:37
Speaker 1: that have been developed in the United States are um
23:42
Speaker 1: like Section eight housing, right, do you know about this?
23:47
Speaker 1: That's uh, well, there's there's homeless shelters, which are like
23:51
Speaker 1: the emergency beds when it's cold, that kind of thing
23:55
Speaker 1: you can go temporarily, right, And a lot of those
23:58
Speaker 1: are I would say most I don't have any numbers
24:01
Speaker 1: on this, but I would say most of those are
24:02
Speaker 1: privately operated. Really yeah, interesting. Uh. And then there is
24:07
Speaker 1: the Section eight thing that you were talking about, which
24:09
Speaker 1: is not public housing. It's when you fill out of
24:12
Speaker 1: Section eight vouchure and you can go find just a
24:15
Speaker 1: regular private apartment to rent from a landlord. It's got
24:19
Speaker 1: to fit certain requirements and if you meet all those requirements,
24:23
Speaker 1: you only have to pay thirty of the rent and
24:26
Speaker 1: bills and then the government pays the other seven straight
24:30
Speaker 1: to the landlord. So that's Section eight. But Section eight,
24:33
Speaker 1: you know, they're a huge waiting list, and I read
24:35
Speaker 1: that a lot of cities have shut it down until
24:39
Speaker 1: the list gets smaller, and they're like, there's no point
24:42
Speaker 1: in keeping a list of four years, five years. We're
24:45
Speaker 1: just gonna shut it down, get the list smaller, and
24:47
Speaker 1: then open it back up in a couple of years.
24:49
Speaker 1: So good luck getting Section eight if that's what you're
24:51
Speaker 1: trying to do. And Uh, you talked about did you
24:55
Speaker 1: did you mentioned public housing? No? So, Um, well you
24:58
Speaker 1: talked about shelters. Apparently there were five hundred thousand beds
25:02
Speaker 1: and two thousand five. There's now six hundred forty three
25:05
Speaker 1: thousand or there where there wasn't two thousand nine and
25:07
Speaker 1: about three million to three point five million homeless people. Yeah,
25:11
Speaker 1: but that's a pretty significant increase in five years. Um.
25:14
Speaker 1: But but with public housing, if if Section eight is
25:18
Speaker 1: not an option, there is public housing, or there used
25:20
Speaker 1: to be, at least in at tech Wood um, which
25:23
Speaker 1: is basically like an apartment block where you go and
25:28
Speaker 1: live and you pay what you can um and as
25:31
Speaker 1: long as you follow the rules I just made air quotes, um,
25:35
Speaker 1: you can stay there as long as you like. Ideally, again,
25:40
Speaker 1: there's not that many public housing units are not as
25:43
Speaker 1: many as there used to be. Uh, you need to
25:45
Speaker 1: talk about food banks because that's a big part of
25:49
Speaker 1: being homeless is getting your meal. And you know, the
25:53
Speaker 1: United States, it's not like starvation in other countries where
25:58
Speaker 1: there is no food. There's a lot of food here,
26:01
Speaker 1: lots of food is thrown away. So since the nineteen sixties,
26:04
Speaker 1: do you know that there's an estimate that up to
26:08
Speaker 1: half of the food we produced is thrown away, really
26:12
Speaker 1: half in the US, and the low estimate is a quarter. Wow. Yeah,
26:17
Speaker 1: I'll tell you what. Never go get a job in
26:18
Speaker 1: the film industry if you want to. The food waste depresses,
26:21
Speaker 1: you know, the craft services and just catering the whole thing.
26:25
Speaker 1: You know, it's ridiculous. Um, But food banks have been
26:28
Speaker 1: around since about the sixties, and that everyone knows. You
26:30
Speaker 1: can donate can goods and non perishable items and they
26:34
Speaker 1: will distribute them to homeless shelters and homeless people directly sometimes.
26:40
Speaker 1: So that's a big deal. You ever volunteered anything like that? Yeah?
26:43
Speaker 1: Then the Thanksgiving thing before, Ah, this makes me want
26:47
Speaker 1: to do more than that though, you know, Yeah, that
26:49
Speaker 1: feels like going to church on Easter. You know we
26:51
Speaker 1: should do We should build like an addition onto your
26:54
Speaker 1: house that we can get house homeless people in. We
26:57
Speaker 1: can go there, you go Squatville. We can put up
27:01
Speaker 1: a lean to or something that jokes squad Bill. It's
27:04
Speaker 1: not a bad idea. Job training though, I mean, we
27:07
Speaker 1: we talked about things like public housing and the projects,
27:11
Speaker 1: and that's all well and good to give people a
27:12
Speaker 1: place to be. But at the same time, you don't
27:16
Speaker 1: and this is where the Republicians can go, yes, say it.
27:18
Speaker 1: At the same time, you don't want to support a
27:21
Speaker 1: nation of people on the government's time without offering some
27:25
Speaker 1: kind of job training and something to say, hey, let
27:28
Speaker 1: us help you get on your feet, let us help
27:30
Speaker 1: you get a job in data entry or on the
27:34
Speaker 1: manufacturing line or whatever. So luckily there are groups like
27:38
Speaker 1: the Coalition for the Homeless First Step that that you know,
27:43
Speaker 1: provide this kind of job job training, and the veterans
27:46
Speaker 1: are doing the same thing with the Homeless Veterans Reintegration Program,
27:51
Speaker 1: right And I should say, there isn't a homeless alleviation
27:55
Speaker 1: program in existence in the US that's geared towards simply
27:59
Speaker 1: taking care of people. All of them are geared towards
28:03
Speaker 1: ending homelessness and the individual and collectively through things like
28:08
Speaker 1: job training, through things like UM helping the right resumes,
28:12
Speaker 1: rehabs a huge one. Mental health treatment, UM getting people
28:18
Speaker 1: cheap drugs, like getting them to a point where they're
28:21
Speaker 1: not homeless anymore. Like it's addressing the factors of homelessness.
28:26
Speaker 1: Not you don't feel like work, and so here's some
28:28
Speaker 1: money that doesn't exist, and I suspect that there's not
28:32
Speaker 1: really a desire to just have somebody give you some
28:36
Speaker 1: money and not do anything ever and just be poor
28:41
Speaker 1: in anybody. I don't know. That's my that's my opinion.
28:47
Speaker 1: We disagree, that's awesome. Well, I don't know if I
28:49
Speaker 1: disagree that. I don't have enough time to think about
28:51
Speaker 1: that right now? All right, Uh, what can you do though? Well,
28:55
Speaker 1: you can we can build lean two's on your squatting land.
28:59
Speaker 1: You can volunteer, like you said, right, give your time.
29:02
Speaker 1: If you don't have the dough, you give a little time.
29:06
Speaker 1: If you do have the dough, and it's not necessarily
29:09
Speaker 1: just dough. You can donate old toys and books and
29:12
Speaker 1: toiletries and clothes. That old computer that's gathering dust that
29:17
Speaker 1: you could get seventy five dollars for on Craigslist, you
29:21
Speaker 1: donate that instead write it off in your taxes. Yeah,
29:24
Speaker 1: and maybe homeless people can get trained how to use
29:26
Speaker 1: that computer. Where you could donate your car, yeah, oh yeah,
29:31
Speaker 1: that's a big one. Yeah, you can be an advocate,
29:34
Speaker 1: try to raise awareness, letter campaigns, all sorts of things
29:39
Speaker 1: you can do there. You can hire homeless people. Yes,
29:43
Speaker 1: they do have skills. As we've seen now, a lot
29:46
Speaker 1: of people who um are recently recently homeless may also
29:52
Speaker 1: just be recently unemployed as well and have job skills.
29:56
Speaker 1: And then the last one on the list in the article,
29:58
Speaker 1: which I thought was at home rate respect huge. Ah,
30:05
Speaker 1: when you see that homeless person on the street, don't
30:07
Speaker 1: let the first thought to be in your head, Hey jerk,
30:10
Speaker 1: how did you mess up to get here? Maybe you
30:12
Speaker 1: should think, hey, did you develop schizophrenia in your thirties
30:15
Speaker 1: and lose your job because of that and get split
30:17
Speaker 1: up from your child because you couldn't care for your
30:19
Speaker 1: child even though you you know you want to. Because
30:23
Speaker 1: it happened to Will Smith, I was hoping we could
30:26
Speaker 1: make it through this without bringing up that stupid movie,
30:29
Speaker 1: The Pursuit of Hapwitness. Yeah, well it's you know, they
30:35
Speaker 1: make a movie about it. It It was such a big deal.
30:37
Speaker 1: Everyone knows that that guy was homeless with a son,
30:39
Speaker 1: and he's rich. He's worth sixty five million bucks. Actually,
30:44
Speaker 1: you know what story I like better is the one
30:45
Speaker 1: in this article. The that was a guy. What's his
30:50
Speaker 1: named David, Yeah, he's he's quoted David Peartle. Yeah, he
30:54
Speaker 1: was that part he Yeah, he was a just a
30:57
Speaker 1: regular dude, had a job as a rest front manager.
31:00
Speaker 1: College graduate and for fifteen years as a restaurant manager
31:04
Speaker 1: and developed schizophrenia, got fired, ended up hitchhiking and homeless
31:10
Speaker 1: for two years on the streets of d C. And
31:13
Speaker 1: now I think he's a heading up a homeless group
31:16
Speaker 1: in DC nowity, Yeah, I think he's an executive at it. Yeah,
31:20
Speaker 1: but he's quoted in this article in the respect like
31:23
Speaker 1: what can you do? He says, Um, most of the
31:27
Speaker 1: despair and being homeless comes from being treated like you
31:30
Speaker 1: don't exist. And there's something we should point out Chuck
31:34
Speaker 1: throughout this. It's however, many minutes into this podcast, Um,
31:41
Speaker 1: we've just now used the first homeless person's name, first Dan,
31:46
Speaker 1: last name of the whole podcast. There's a whole conception
31:51
Speaker 1: of invisibility. The nameless they are, they're not the nameless.
31:56
Speaker 1: You can completely interchange that with the homeless that's just
31:59
Speaker 1: as faceless, just as nameless, just as genderless, just as
32:03
Speaker 1: identity lists. And um, I just want to close and
32:07
Speaker 1: get everybody to over to on design. There's this awesome
32:10
Speaker 1: blog post by a guy named John the kera th
32:14
Speaker 1: h A c k a r A called Look or Connect,
32:18
Speaker 1: and he's talking about he's using photography to demonstrate, um,
32:24
Speaker 1: how we treat the homeless and how we should treat
32:27
Speaker 1: the homeless. And there's a photography book called Shelter, and
32:31
Speaker 1: this guy roamed around Europe and took photos of homeless
32:35
Speaker 1: like impromptu makeshift shelters of like blankets hanging over a limb,
32:40
Speaker 1: in in a in the woods or some place under
32:43
Speaker 1: an overpass, but in every single picture it's just a shelter.
32:46
Speaker 1: Not one homeless person appears in this whole book, and
32:50
Speaker 1: the care is pointing out like this is kind of
32:53
Speaker 1: emblematic of how we view the homeless. And then he
32:56
Speaker 1: was also kind of crediting a girl named Erica show
33:00
Speaker 1: Bolts who's a photographer out of Seattle, and she has
33:03
Speaker 1: a series called Invisible Families, and she'll she photographs the homeless,
33:08
Speaker 1: but then the caption she includes captions beneath the the
33:12
Speaker 1: um photograph and it's of that person. So there's one
33:17
Speaker 1: of a little kid walking through a homeless camp and
33:20
Speaker 1: he's he's got like this bamboo stick up right, you
33:23
Speaker 1: see him and the caption is um here Jack Ahearn,
33:29
Speaker 1: age nine, marches with the bamboo stick while staying at
33:32
Speaker 1: a city located in Skyway. Sometimes Jack win and less
33:35
Speaker 1: fellow Nickelodeon's quotes to help him look for worms. On
33:39
Speaker 1: other days, he'd play on a pogo stick in mud
33:41
Speaker 1: puddles or with the resident cab kitten that had six
33:44
Speaker 1: digits on one paw. The bamboo stick was a gift,
33:47
Speaker 1: so like, that's a person now, not a homeless kid.
33:51
Speaker 1: That's Jack A hear In, age nine. Well and then
33:54
Speaker 1: and the the gentleman from DC suggests that if you
33:57
Speaker 1: have a regular walk to work in a city or something,
34:00
Speaker 1: you see the same homeless person on a daily basis,
34:03
Speaker 1: then ask them what their name is one day, call
34:06
Speaker 1: them by their name, look him in the eye. If
34:09
Speaker 1: you don't have to give them money, if you don't
34:10
Speaker 1: want to, little things like that can make a big
34:13
Speaker 1: difference in a person's self esteem and maybe allows them
34:16
Speaker 1: to view themselves as human again. And you can give
34:20
Speaker 1: them if you're worried about giving the money that they
34:22
Speaker 1: spend on alcohol or something, give them, get a get
34:25
Speaker 1: a little food, give voucher, you know, something like that.
34:29
Speaker 1: So there is everybody. Our fifth summation of the podcast,
34:32
Speaker 1: fit and final. Yes, if you want to learn more
34:34
Speaker 1: about homelessness, um, you can type that word into the
34:38
Speaker 1: search bar how stuff works the blank generic genderless identity
34:43
Speaker 1: list search bar. Very nice. And since they said that,
34:47
Speaker 1: it's time for is it listener mailman? Yeah, And in
34:50
Speaker 1: the spirit of this podcast, we're gonna do a big
34:53
Speaker 1: old Kiva round up. You want to explain what Keeva
34:58
Speaker 1: is real quick. Kiva is a website where schmos like
35:03
Speaker 1: you and me can go and donate well, I shouldn't
35:06
Speaker 1: say donate lynn increments of twenty five dollars to entrepreneurs
35:11
Speaker 1: in developing countries and people on their way up here
35:15
Speaker 1: in the United States even uh. These loans are pulled
35:19
Speaker 1: together uh to create a larger loan which ultimately repay
35:23
Speaker 1: a loan that's already been made to the person uh,
35:26
Speaker 1: and then that person uses it for their business, repays
35:29
Speaker 1: the loan. You actually get your twenty five bucks back,
35:32
Speaker 1: that's right if you want, and you can reinvest it.
35:34
Speaker 1: And basically it's micro lending. Yes, And we have our
35:38
Speaker 1: own loan team which we're proud to say is the
35:41
Speaker 1: number four team and members on all of keeping out.
35:45
Speaker 1: I know that's really something behind atheists number one. Yeah,
35:48
Speaker 1: Christians are number two. There's like so angry and right
35:52
Speaker 1: behind the AD and UH Team Obama is number three
35:55
Speaker 1: and little old us are right there, but in front
35:57
Speaker 1: of Australia. So to go over that list again, go
36:01
Speaker 1: Chuck from wonderful Atheist of America Christian Coalition Team Obama
36:08
Speaker 1: stuff you should know. Australia so all pretty cool, and
36:12
Speaker 1: we have as of today we've loaned UH as a
36:14
Speaker 1: collective three thousand, four hundred and six members have loaned
36:17
Speaker 1: ten tho, eight hundred and thirteen loans to the tune
36:20
Speaker 1: of three d and thirteen thousand, eight hundred bucks. So
36:23
Speaker 1: that is not bad. Is this gonna be up for Christmas? I?
36:26
Speaker 1: I don't know, Jared. Yes, we would suggest you can
36:30
Speaker 1: get a Kiva gift certificate and give it to your
36:32
Speaker 1: love one at Christmas. It's a nice little cool thing
36:34
Speaker 1: to do it like a stocking stuffer, right, and they
36:36
Speaker 1: go and lend it, but ultimately if they want, they're
36:40
Speaker 1: just postponing getting that twenty five or seventive bucks cash
36:45
Speaker 1: um for a month or two. And with that it's repaying. Yeah,
36:49
Speaker 1: it's repaid, it's not a donation. And with that, here
36:52
Speaker 1: comes a listener mail because this one really got me. Uh, hi,
36:56
Speaker 1: two of them really quick. Um. Hi, guys, my name
36:58
Speaker 1: is Kara and I am another one of your thirteen
37:00
Speaker 1: year old fans. Just want to say hi, and how
37:02
Speaker 1: much I love your show. Uh. Some friends and I
37:05
Speaker 1: make and sell jewelry and donate the profits to Kiva.
37:08
Speaker 1: That is awesome. I know you guys have your own
37:11
Speaker 1: key to team and I love that you use your
37:13
Speaker 1: power to do good. Uh. Since most people haven't heard
37:16
Speaker 1: of Kiva, please mention this on your show. It would
37:18
Speaker 1: be so great to get some business that we can
37:20
Speaker 1: read loan. You can see some of our jewelry and
37:23
Speaker 1: loans at www dot tiny, u r l dot com
37:28
Speaker 1: slash project raw and I went today and they have
37:32
Speaker 1: these little ear rings and little necklaces and rings and
37:35
Speaker 1: things that these thirteen year old girls may make my hand.
37:39
Speaker 1: And they've loaned three seventy five bucks so far. And uh,
37:44
Speaker 1: that is Kara and Kensington, Maryland. And that is so cool.
37:49
Speaker 1: I can't even talk about it. When thirteen year olds
37:52
Speaker 1: are doing stuff like this and CEOs are getting rich
37:55
Speaker 1: and thumbing their nose at the rest of the world.
37:59
Speaker 1: So Karmen is gonna bite you one day, sir, and
38:03
Speaker 1: this one. We usually don't plug other KYVA teams, but
38:06
Speaker 1: we're going to because this from our our buddy, Sergeantly
38:09
Speaker 1: newly promoted staff Sergeant Walker, Mr Bryant, with your inspiration,
38:15
Speaker 1: I've started my own KYBA team for the Armed Forces.
38:20
Speaker 1: With the whole Armed Forces. He started an Army team. Okay,
38:23
Speaker 1: so it's different if you're well, he says, Armed Forces
38:27
Speaker 1: KEYVA team, but it says Army in the in the
38:30
Speaker 1: u r L. So if you're in the Marine Corps,
38:33
Speaker 1: do not give uh. It is www dot kiva dot org,
38:38
Speaker 1: Slash Team, slash US Underscore, Army Underscore, Kiva Underscore Team.
38:44
Speaker 1: And he says, wondering if you could just give a
38:46
Speaker 1: little shout out to all the Armed Forces personnel listening
38:49
Speaker 1: to your show, and can they donate to our Army team.
38:52
Speaker 1: And so I'm gonna encourage you to donate for the
38:54
Speaker 1: Army team. Everyone else donate for the stuff you should
38:57
Speaker 1: know team and support Project RAW. I can't believe you
39:02
Speaker 1: did this without checking with me. You know what's supporting end.
39:05
Speaker 1: So sorry. Anyway, good holiday mojo come in your way
39:10
Speaker 1: if you get involved with stuff like this. Well, congratulations
39:13
Speaker 1: on the promotion staff Sergeant Walker Kara, congratulations on being
39:17
Speaker 1: a very very cool thirteen year old actually a very
39:21
Speaker 1: very cool person in general. That's right. Uh. Since it's
39:25
Speaker 1: around Christmas time and I'm about to weep, why don't
39:28
Speaker 1: we just bring it on home, drive it through my
39:31
Speaker 1: heart with the sweetest Christmas story you've ever heard in
39:35
Speaker 1: your entire life, that's fact based. Have you got one? No,
39:40
Speaker 1: I'm just saying I'm asking for them. I'm on the
39:42
Speaker 1: verge of tears. I want to just go ahead and
39:44
Speaker 1: have my this lit a couple of times too, Did
39:48
Speaker 1: you really? Okay? Uh? If you have a good story
39:52
Speaker 1: for us, a good holiday story, we want to hear it.
39:56
Speaker 1: Send it in an email. You can wrap it up.
39:58
Speaker 1: I have a ribbon on to right. Make sure the
40:01
Speaker 1: card is attached, and send it to stuff podcast at
40:06
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40:12
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40:15
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40:17
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40:24
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