And yet we have such terrible poverty.
When I read stories about poor people in America, always there is lurking just below the surface the key element of scarcity. Not food. Not transportation. Not clothing. Not even, surprisingly, health care. The missing factor in all these broken lives is the simplest thing. Space. Some space to fucking sleep and live.
How can such a large country suffer from a bigger housing crisis than we find in jammed up dense countries like Singapore, South Korea, and India?
Why hasn't the market solved this problem?
Believe it or not, its not impossible to manufacture a living space in a factory and assemble it on site in a day, to provide extremely well made and affordable housing structures.
There is space enough in American cities if density is allowed to be increased. In other words if these fake "liberal" NIMBYs in American cities can be persuaded to give up the precious "character" of their neighborhoods, we can make space for everyone. CHEAP space.
The market did solve the problem and then we blew it by undermining the family unit so we have people dependent on the state with no significant family support.
> Believe it or not, its not impossible to manufacture a living space in a factory and assemble it on site in a day, to provide extremely well made and affordable housing structures.
The soviets tried this approach it doesn't work because you end up with a shitload of crappy communist housing blocks. The correct approach is to develop as much high end housing as possible which pushes all other houses down the depth chart. We want the poor living in houses that the rich used to own - not shittier houses.
At some point we have to realize that the issue isn't wealth or even inequality. The harsh reality is a significant number of the population has a several hundred dollar a day drug addiction and no means of taking care of themselves even if they were handed a blank check.
In short, childhood trauma and lack of family support. Often the trauma comes from abuse from their family. These are not problems you can just throw money at.
> I question how much experience you actually have with either the poor or drug addicts.
If you must know my experience I did youth work for inner city kids from 1999-2006 in Langley BC. I then lived and worked in the Vancouver DTES from 2006-2017. I have several close friends and family members who work at Insite Injection Clinic, Portland Hotel Society, HIV/Aids Clinic at St. Paul Hospital, and the Odyssey and Nexus programs in downtown Vancouver.
Perhaps you are unaware what life on the streets is like.
Edit: also, I never said I was a "majority" that has an expensive addiction. I said the number of people is significant - which it undoubtedly is.