It certainly looks bad to our eyes. But, beggars in Dehli would probably love to live in that sort of tent city, and have access to all the benefits available to the poor in the US.

This sort of comparison is terrible because it trivializes the miserable existence of our impoverished and implies they should be thankful they aren't "beggars in Dehli."

It doesn't imply anything, it flat out says it, being poor in America is vastly more comfortable and healthy than Dehli. Notice he didn't say "So don't worry about our poor at all.", just put it into perspective. The facts are, if you want to help the most unfortunate human beings, they're more likely to be in Dehli.

The comparison serves no purpose other than to suggest that the impoverished American should be grateful he's not a "beggar in Dehli." It's not some clinical fact devoid of context.

No, it also discusses how a moral calculus might not prioritize locality, but instead impact or efficacy on lives.

While I don't think it's an adequate idea, as it undersells the value of clannism, it's pretty easy to think of other interesting purposes for this comparison other than moral shaming. Perhaps this might've been a starting point for discussing the harms to the moral thinking which doesn't erect and police boundaries to "we".

A lot of moral discussion, in real life, on Reddit, or on HN, more or less of the same quality (as opposed to other discussions on HN) go nowhere. There is utility to discussing an objective moral calculus that multitudes can observe and negotiate.

Ten years ago I made a feature-length documentary about the homeless in Santa Monica:

http://graceofgodmovie.com

Santa Monica seems to have successfully exported their problem to neighboring cities since then. In general, things seem to be substantially worse now.

Probably worse in CA, but this exists on some level in every state. Here in NJ we have the same exact thing, just not along a bike path.

Berkeley has a tent community dead in the middle of downtown on some government property. Berkeley's homeless problem is really front-and-center. The otherwise nice parks in the area are pretty unusable.

I'd argue that if they're serving the poor, they're not unusable, they're being used to the greater good.

I'm sorry, I have zero sympathy to people from Berkeley complaining. Considering the amount of money that Berkeley citizens collectively have and the progressive positions that they hold I am baffled why they do not add an addition $X thousand per year tax to everyone who makes more than a federal poverty level there to make sure that all out of luck homeless people have a real roof over their head, warm meals and medical care.

Unless of course the so called progressive population does not actually care that the middle of downtown Berkeley looks like a third world country.

It's a mix yeah? Berkeley as a whole has a poverty rate 6% higher than the national average. .6% higher than Oakland.

2015 fiscal berkeley operating budget was 293 million.

https://www.cityofberkeley.info/Clerk/City_Council/2015/05_M...

2017 homeless number is about 1000:

http://www.dailycal.org/2017/05/29/berkeleys-homeless-popula...

If every one of them is provided a $3k/mo apartment, it would increase the budget by 36 million.

Berkeley population is estimated at 121k

http://worldpopulationreview.com/us-cities/berkeley-ca-popul...

20% of berkeley population lives below powerty level. So lets say it is 100k that are left.

36M/100k is what? $360 per person? There, I just solved Berkeley homeless problem at a price of less than 5 bottles of Napa Valley Cab per person who screamed at the sky in the city of Berkeley the day Trump became President Elect.

To wahsd (dead comment): I get your point, but you should ask if the people are poor because they vote Democrat, or they vote Democrat because they're poor (and see themselves better represented by the Democrat platform)?

Maybe not even/just poor, but excluded from local economy/politics due to race, gender, ethnicity, not being a member of the old boys' club, etc.

We've all seen the articles about Republican controlled cities putting homeless people on buses for Berkeley and other destinations in CA. wahsd is clueless.

This raises an interesting question: Do US democrats think inter-state immigration is bad? For example some liberal friends when talking about immigration last year kept posting that poem on the statue of liberty:

> "Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free", etc.

The Republican controlled cities are giving huddled masses to the people who accept that immigration logic.

> Do US democrats think inter-state immigration is bad?

Not at all. The US has a big problem with homelessness, and for a long time we've been sticking our head in the sand.

Cities like SF have been trying to do something about it for a while, but I don't believe any city can solve the problem. This issue is greater than one city or one state. It's a national problem that requires national solutions.

Agreed. It's made worse by the fact that homeless people are often transient. When a city does a good job of providing services to homeless people, homeless people travel there. Rinse, repeat until the services are overwhelmed, and everyone goes back to "why are we failing to deal with our homelessness problem?"

It worked for SLC because SLC is isolated and expensive to travel to. In the tightly packed, interconnected megalopolises of the Bay Area, LA, and the Northeast, good luck getting anything to work long-term at just the municipal level.

Yeah, no, it happens in San Francisco, Portland, and New York, too.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2017/dec/...

Yea, I read that most homeless seem to head to CA because it's where the money is...

Here in NL we have some homeless, but also lots of government systems in place to offer housing and incentives to possibly work or get schooling.

In the end this is actually cheaper, as to prevent crime and what not. Not sure how this would work in the US.

Utah simply housed their homeless and it was cheaper because homeless people were no longer using emergency services for basic healthcare among other things[1]/

1. https://www.npr.org/2015/12/10/459100751/utah-reduced-chroni...

It's only a fraction of the people that are homeless in CA, but a great result none the less. Here is an article of just LA. Seems quite out of control compared with Utah. :(

1. http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-homeless-count-2...

About 60 million Americans receive some federal assistance.

A slightly larger number get healthcare from Medicaid.

The assistance is not a large amount per month, but it is there.

Medicaid covers around 80 million people, at roughly $7,000 a year per recipient, which is double what the UK spends per patient.

https://www.kff.org/medicaid/state-indicator/distribution-of...

The breakdown of the per recipient spending is useful:

https://www.kff.org/medicaid/state-indicator/medicaid-spendi...

Much of the spending is on the elderly and disabled (which both group tend to have above average medical needs).

Also what's shocking is that you see plenty of young able people in those tents that could get a job yet decide to stay there. That baffles me. If you have arms, and legs, and you're doing ok in the membrane, then you can find a job in this country.