After all the entire country of Finland has fewer people than the SF metro area (5m vs 7m).

Having experienced drug addiction, even with a strong support system of relatives and friends rallying around you with love but also holding you accountable for your recovery and dragging your arse to therapy three times a week, making sure you stick to the program and take your medications, with all that it is still very hard to get out, particularly if you are on stuff like heroin and meth.

I just don't see how the homelessness problem in the US will ever be solved just by wishful thinking that by giving people a home, meals, clothes and clean needles they will by themselves get well and leave the streets.

It will never happen that way, and the right solution, which is forced rehab and medications, is ironically seen as inhumane.

What are those incentives? Asking as someone who never felt any desire to use. (Also never been to SF or US for that matter.)

> almost no incentives not to

Isn’t money a pretty big incentive?

You would be surprised what sort of drugs these people are using. They aren't paying for cocaine. They spend all day begging for pocket change to scrounge up $10 for some crap meth-like drugs who's sole purpose it to make you not feel anything. For the 4-8 hours after they take the drugs, they can forget everything they hate about their life and maybe fall asleep.

Realistically, strangers are quite happy to buy food for homeless people if they ask. So then the incentive is to get money to for "entertainment" and relaxation in form of drug use.