Personal Economics

Homelessness for Stupid People

The foibles of the most pampered homeless population in the Bay Area...

Economics is often misunderstood as the exclusive domain of mathematicians. Certainly there is a great deal of Maths involved. But the maths is basic. A good command of addition, subtraction, multiplication and division, skills every adult should have, are more than enough to understand it at its base level.

But economics is not simply maths. It is Sociology. It is the original Social Science. The term “Socio-Economic” seems a bit redundant when you look at it this way, but it's forgiveable, I suppose. Homelessness is perceived as an Economic issue and as an Economic Indicator by the News Media (but not Economists). Unemployment is, however, a valid economic indicator that Economists do use.

It is interesting to me that when someone is employed versus being unemployed, it changes their whole mode of thinking. Those that are unemployed might be on Unemployment, or they might be on EBT/General Assistance (welfare). Unemployment, I must stress, is NOT Welfare! It's an insurance payout that employees have paid into. At the Macro-Economic Level it's fundamentally different from Welfare.

However, on the personal economic level Welfare and Unemployment can be fundamentally the same, more-so the longer Unemployment is collected. Both allow people to relax. They give a person time to fall into bad habits, and one can lead to the other (Unemployment can lead to Welfare).

Before I go on, this is not a rant against the evils of unemployment and welfare. Government will do what government does, good or bad.

The effects of these programs, especially EBT/General Assistance, are on full display amongst the Homeless. What's interesting to me is I've not seen any economist or sociologist take the time to study the effects of Welfare on the homeless, which I have come to believe is a microcosm of society at large at its most depressed level.

Livermore may be quite different from most places with a homeless community. A significant number of the homeless here have jobs. Yes, I am one of them. I cannot speak to other places with any degree of certainty. Outside of Livermore, the most experience with the homeless I have had were two days in San Jose's Jungle. But looking at stories of homelessness from across the country, I see no indication of “working homeless” in any story I read. Is it that there's no interest or is it that Livermore is unique? I doubt it's unique. It's more likely just uncommon.

Of those who work, several have been employed and homeless for years! The two best examples I know are my good friends Frank and Gary, both have full time jobs, and I've mentioned both before. But there are quite few others, at least one of which commutes to San Leandro each day.

These people are the least likely to speak of their slide into homelessness. How did this happen to people who are industrious enough to hold jobs? In my own case, that's a very personal story, and I'll bet it's just as personal to people like Frank and Gary. It's not something I'd ask about unless we were having a maudlin moment over a little too much beer after a good Scottish Bar Brawl...

These people, the working homeless in Livermore, blend in wherever they are (me notwithstanding... I'm just a little too loud). They tend to be unassuming and personable, the kind of people who are casually known but who's trust will take a great deal of time and effort to earn. Those like Frank and Gary are people I trust implicitly as mature adult men who have an innate sense respect for the world around them, have very little and take care of what it is they have.

My friend Lynn, a volunteer I've mentioned before, had observed a while back that a lot of the homeless he'd conversed with always seem to have an “angle.” Amongst those who are not working this does tend, in my experience, to be true. You'll hear them begin a monologue (often a LONG monologue) with: “I'm going to...” “I'm working on...” “I'm waiting for...” whatever windfall that's magically going to make things better. Should you run into this, challenge that notion at your own peril. I'll likely lead to more monologue at higher volumes.

The lion's share of these people have EBT cards and are often receiving cash from General Assistance.

“Confidence goes out the window and self respect follows,” Lynn observed this morning. He went on to say that those who are working, it appears to him, are the ones who understand and have experienced self respect. Those who are not working tend to not have.

Having had an EBT card, I am aware of the process and what it did to me. It created a sort of barrier. I'll lose the assistance and have to fend for myself. If I get a job, things will get worse, not better, in the short term. Know that homeless people, especially those on public assistance, tend to think in the very short term.

However, economically the benefits of working outclass being on public assistance exponentially for two reasons. The first is, even if you're only working ten hours a week, it's more money per month than EBT provides. The second is that it's a time-sinc. Less time to spend that money. The more hours you have working, the less time you have to spend your pay-check.

I cannot find any study that has ever probed the economics of homelessness. I've spent several hours on Google and Bing and Startpage trying to find a Sociology Paper on the topic with no success. With all the advocacy out there and all the government money being thrown at the problem, you'd think there'd be SOMETHING. That said: if anyone does find something, please post a link in the comments.

You should not take any of this as gospel. These are personal observations of the environment I live in and of the characters I have come to know.

Homelessness entered the national Consciousness during Ronald Reagan's presidency largely as a means to undermine his economic policies. Since then it's been pretty much a media tool of whichever political party is not in the Oval Office, always connected to Economic propaganda. Perhaps this is the reason there's so little understanding of homelessness. I submit to all of you that personal economics and it's effect on the individual have a lot to do with the cause and the solution to homelessness. Maybe, someday, someone somewhere will be interested enough to do a study...