The article says that targeted responses are still also required and compliment UBI.With UBI, someone receiving addiction treatment could also actually stabilize their living situation as well as their mental health.

I agree - the problem is varied, and the solution needs to be nuanced.

It seems clear to me that there are folks that don't have mental health problems but rather very different preferences. Some folks you just can't tell not to keep moving around, and they also dislike working, at least in the types of work available, and would rather beg and scavenge. I'm not sure that scenario falls under any of the three categories, and not sure how to help it either. I think the line is also quite blurry between folks like this and those on hard times and with mental health problems, but there are folks on the other side who we shouldn't forget about or force into a system they don't want to be in.

This is the most eloquent summary of "bums are lazy".

I propose it's highly unlikely that a person who is living on streets is doing so simply because they are lazy.

Imagine freezing in the winter or sweating in the summer. How about worrying about finding food or how to be safe from unstable people, maybe even well off people who attack/kill the homeless. Your claim is that this is a choice out of a laziness and not a mental disorder or an inability to get a job outside of their control.

That's insane

I never claimed any of that stuff you said I did. Are you continuing some other conversation you had elsewhere where the person said something more extreme than what I did without realizing it?

Four communities in the US have ended chronic homelessness: https://www.usich.gov/communities-that-have-ended-homelessne...

This means that, if someone does become homeless in one of those communities, it is brief and one-time. The communities were able to achieve this by providing adequate shelters and housing assistance both before and after people lose their homes. They also used person-by-person outreach to make sure they found everyone who was homeless and got them housing.

To me, it seems like that doesn't line up with the idea that some people are predisposed to chronic homelessness/resistant to getting housing.

Very different preferences can be mental health problems, in the sense that their mental state isn't compatible with a healthy society. Even if someone "really" prefers blocking sidewalks with all their worldly possessions and shitting on the streets, that's a problem.

I have to disagree. Substance abuse and hard times are the same thing, because substance abuse is caused by stress. Usually when we give poor people money, they significantly decrease their spending on drugs and alcohol.

https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/poverty-homelessness-and...

Mental health issues can also be alleviated with money. Regardless of what issues a person is facing, they will function better if they don't have to cope with the stress of poverty.

I don't agree. I could see UBI keeping a roof over someone with a crippling drinking problems head or giving someone with severe mental health issues enough bandwidth to seek treatment, or at the very least sheltered.

It might for some at the margin, but I’d posit severe substance abuse or mental health issues are largely characterized by the fact that people suffering from these conditions cannot be reliably counted upon to act rationally (and spend money on shelter as opposed to spending it on their addiction or or squander it some other way)

The mental health dimension is often less extreme than people imagine. It can be something like a depressed but otherwise "normal" person hitting an unusually low point and being put on suicide watch. Because they are not allowed any outside communication, they can easily lose their job, and now they have potentially exorbitant medical bills to pay on top of trying to recover mentally. Thus begins their slide into homelessness. UBI could be a backstop against this as we hopefully make progress fixing healthcare.

One of the biggest strengths of UBI is that it eliminates the beurocracy and waste associated with determining who "deserves" assistance. The dominant model in the US is expecting homeless people with drug problems to solve both their addiction and homelessness at the same time by themselves before they are deemed worthy of being helped, which needless to say is barely assistance at all. Having a gaurenteed income stream would make it easier to gain a foothold.