• schroedingershat@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    The answer is trivial.

    Stop spending billions on a “war on drugs” and make sure people have houses and healthcare (including mental health) unconditionally with no ridiculous hoops or welfare traps 10 years before they become a street junkie.

    Just because some places misused a bunch of money doing very stupid things with it doesn’t validate ignoring the solution.

    • trias10@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      It’s not nearly so trivial. Having lived in Norway for many years, a country which does have unconditional free healthcare (including mental health), and free access to housing, they still have a large homeless population and plenty of street crime.

      • schroedingershat@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Norway has much much lower homeless proportion than more neoliberal countries. It is a prime example of this strategy working.

        • trias10@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Maybe, but even Norway has hardly stamped out homelessness completely. Far from it actually, there are some parts of Oslo which have immensely high levels of homelessness. Not as bad Skid Row in LA, but not far behind either.

          • schroedingershat@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Hahaha! Doing that thing you said (but still with some hoops for mental healthcare and housing) only makes it way better! Check-mate! Let’s double down on spending ten times as much pujishing the homeless for being homeless!

            • trias10@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              I’m afraid you genuinely lost me.

              I said I’m all for free mental healthcare and housing, but even these don’t seem to solve the problem. Nor does just throwing money at the problem. So I have no ideas for how to solve the issue, besides maybe just dismantling capitalism entirely, but this also comes with problems.