UBI the solution to homelessness

There is currently a huge problem regarding homelessness, and it is a difficult one to solve. Being homeless is not free. Well, perhaps the homeless person doesn’t pay for housing, but the city they live in still has a lot of costs. First, the city has to pay to law enforcement; it takes the time of officers to police and relocate homeless camps. Second is healthcare costs. In the US, when someone comes into a hospital, the hospital cannot refuse service, even if the patient has no means to pay. These costs, and others, can amount to $31,000 (or much more) a year PER homeless person. (Source1 , Source2)

Some people think that individual cities should be responsible for their homeless populations. However, cities may not have the right incentives to solve this issue. Take San Francisco for example. If San Francisco created more housing and services for homeless people, more homeless people would move to San Francisco, in essence, helping solve the homeless issue for OTHER cities, but not necessarily for itself. This is because homelessness is a transient issue, people can move.

So providing local homeless services might not solve the homelessness issue, as it may just grow the local homeless population. Instead, the solution to homelessness might not involve government, or at least not directly. In Los Angeles, a man named Elvis Summers created small homes for homeless people (Source). The homes cost him about $1,200 to create, and included a sturdy front door, windows, and a solar panel and usb charger. This simple solution provides a place where people can lock up their belongings and allows them to go and do other things. Mr. Summers did this out of the goodness of his heart. That is the reason people do services for homeless people now, because they are nice people. However, if we changed this, everything might be different… If entrepreneurs had a profit incentive to help the homeless and make products tailored for homeless people, they would.

This is were UBI comes in. It does just that. UBI gives everyone some purchasing power, which means entrepreneurs and companies will now have a monetary incentive to create products that will help homeless people. This could lead to a major change in homelessness. A simple home like one Mr. Summers created probably could be built at scale for a fraction of the cost. These simple homes could be rented to homeless people for perhaps 20 or so dollars a month (which at $600 to build would result in a return of capital in 30 months, which is really short in the real estate world). In other words, both an excellent investment and a life-changing product.

In short, UBI might solve a problem that is otherwise difficult to solve. Individual cities cannot solve homelessness on their own, and cities essentially have an incentive not to solve the problem and pass it on to others. UBI solves this issue, and solves it in the most efficient way, by putting the free market to use. It enables for profit entities to do what they do best, provide services at low cost. So this is just another reason why UBI is the future.

The Republic

Some people will argue the Founding Fathers created the United States as a republic and not as a democracy. This argument is often used as a defense for the electoral college. I think using this argument is flawed, as it doesn’t look at the whole picture. It lacks the necessary historical context. When the United States was founded, it wasn’t the average person that wanted freedom from the British (source). In fact, ⅓ of the colonists were still wanted to remain part of Britain (loyalists). Independence was sought by the elite who wanted to pay less taxes.

This group of elites didn’t want a country run by the common person--far from it. They wanted a country run by them! So they did just that. They restricted voting to adult, white, land-owning men. Democracy was a dirty word to the wealthy elite, not to mention not in their financial interests. So, they created something else, a republic.

At its birth, the United States was not a democratic nation—far from it. The very word "democracy" had pejorative overtones, summoning up images of disorder, government by the unfit, even mob rule. In practice, moreover, relatively few of the nation's inhabitants were able to participate in elections: among the excluded were most African Americans, Native Americans, women, men who had not attained their majority, and white males who did not own land.

John Adams, signer of the Declaration of Independence and later president, wrote in 1776 that no good could come from enfranchising more Americans:

Depend upon it, Sir, it is dangerous to open so fruitful a source of controversy and altercation as would be opened by attempting to alter the qualifications of voters; there will be no end to it. New claims will arise; women will demand the vote; lads from 12 to 21 will think their rights not enough attended to; and every man who has not a farthing, will demand an equal voice with any other, in all acts of state. It tends to confound and destroy all distinctions, and prostrate all ranks to one common level.

Source

In the years since, we have moved away from the original restrictions to voting. Adult citizens can now vote. But we still are a republic, not a true representative democracy. Still today, the wealthy and big corporations decide elections with effectively unlimited campaign contributions. So while all citizens can vote, the elite still determine the outcome of elections. Perhaps, abolishing the vestiges of this system is the logical next step in our countries progression.

But on the other hand, things aren’t that simple. There are good aspects to being a republic. Being a republic is conducive to having a constitution, a bill of rights, and the rule of law. In a true democracy all laws a determined by the majority, who can use this power to oppose a minority. A Republic can stop this, at least in theory.

But in some ways, I question the validity of this argument. Imagine a fictitious person named Jeff, and a Majority of people in Jeff’s country want Jeff dead. If these persecutors want him dead, chances are someone will kill him. And perhaps a sympathetic law enforcement officer will look the other way. Or if the issue goes to court, a jury of 12 will likely not be able to convict him if the majority of people on jury wanted Jeff dead. See, even though a Republic “provides” legal protection against a majority, maybe it doesn't really.

Perhaps this last example was a little contrived, but really, it's not too different from some events that actually happened (example). Perhaps the bigger issue with a Republic isn’t that it doesn’t work, it’s when it does work. Take the 2016 election. Donald Trump won the election but didn’t win the popular vote. In this case, the will of a minority is imposed on the majority. Now I’m not saying this because I hate Donald Trump, I also think Hillary Clinton was an objectively bad candidate, but that is a story for another post. What I am saying is perhaps we should look to our roots again and determine what is good and should be kept and what isn’t so good and should be changed.

Physician Assisted Suicide

My local public radio has a segment called “With a Perspective,” where a local will share a story and what it means to them. I think I have a something slightly similar to this, which is a break from the normal policy driven posts we normally do.

My dog Riley was put to sleep recently. He was a member of the family. But that got me thinking, why do we put down dogs, but putting down people is unthinkable. Dogs are close and considered family in many households

I was listening to NPR today about a horse trainer. Apparently, when a horse old is too old, it will be shot by its owner. The man explained that a horse or a cow that dies of natural causes faces a long and painful process. That animal will continue to try to lift itself up with its legs. When that fails, they will try to lift their body up using their head, essentially beating their head to the ground until they die. It's not pretty, and it's not very uhumaine to let that happen.

So why are people any different? How is it different if a person is in pain or suffering? If a person is debilitated and unable to do anything but feel pain, why must they continue to live? Why do humans have to bear untreatable torment until their bodies literally give up. Could physician assisted suicide be the answer?

We already do it for the most near and dear things to our hearts, our pets. Why can't an adult with a terminal illness end their own life? Some people might say it's playing God to kill another. But it isn't killing someone. It's just allowing them to go on on their own terms.

To be clear, not just any person should be eligible for PAS. But those who face a terminal illness. As mentioned I will cover in a future post, many people who commit suicide fail and most who fail don’t try again.

I don’t claim to have all the answers, because I certainly don’t have them. But I think the purpose of this blog is to more to ask the right questions, to get people thinking.

Iraq 2.0

Today President Trump declared military action against Syria. My first time hearing the speech, I thought President Trump did an alright job, and that the speech writing was pretty good. After thinking about things, I felt there were a few issues with the speech. This isn't the biggest deal, but it sounds like President Trump is always yelling, which isn’t ideal for a speech about such a grave matter. A little vocal variation and less yelling could have done some good, but that is a issue for a different blog. After all, this is a politics blog, not a public speaking blog. I thought the line “To Iran and to Russia, I ask: What kind of a nation wants to be associated with the mass murder of innocent men, women and children? The nations of the world can be judged by the friends they keep” is a hard statement to argue with. It really does seem Russia and Iran are backing the wrong side. Even excluding the chemical weapon attacks, the Al-Assad regime has oppressed the Syrian people for generations. But as I thought more about it, perhaps this is not the best statement for the United States to make, especially as the speech continues, and Trump mentions, “...our friends, including Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Egypt and others…” [Emphasis added]. (Transcript available here) Of all the atrocities Saudi Arabia does to its own people, is this who we want to identify as our friends? Today in Saudi Arabia, women need a male guardian to do almost anything, such as renting an apartment or filing a legal claim. Saudi Arabia backs rebel groups of countries it doesn’t like, playing a large role in the civil war in Yemen and is partially to blame for the humanitarian crisis there (Source). The United States doesn’t have the best track record when it comes to friends either.

Let’s go beyond the speech here and look at the ideas Trump is proposing. Trump is announcing attacks on Syria because of a chemical weapon attack. However, no UN inspectors have actually been to Syria to confirm the attack. Russia has continually denied the attack. So, there have been reports of the attack, but there is not solid evidence without UN inspectors. Does this ring a bell? Well it should. In 2003, President George W. Bush declared war on Iraq because they had weapons of mass destruction. Well, years later the American public learned that they didn’t! If President Bush could have waited just a little longer, UN inspectors could have gone to Iraq and confirmed that there were no weapons of mass destruction. It would have saved countless lives, dollars, and time. Likewise, I ask today, why don’t we follow the process set by the international Community? Why do we insist on unilateral action? Perhaps this time will be different, but then again as the President might say, “maybe not.”

Killing Democracy: First Past the Post

We all know America is a democracy (well actually a constitutional republic but most Americans just call it a democracy). Also, we all know how a democracy works (well, the majority know the simple fundamentals of it anyway), but most Americans do not realize how crude our democracy actually is.

If you ask Americans off the street what is wrong with our democracy, you may get many different responses to that question. If you ask long enough, one of the responses may be about the first past the post voting system. If you have no clue what that is let me explain.

The first past the post (FPTP) is a voting system in which each person has one vote. Who ever has the most votes wins the election. Seems fair at the basic level but it is not. So what's the matter with this type of voting system?

Allowing voters to only vote once gives many people the feeling that their vote will not count if it is for anything other than the republican or democrats because a vote for a 3rd party is a vote wasted. With less representation, there becomes more apathetic citizenry that do not take the time to vote for they feel their voice is not heard. Switching out FPTP with a option that allows for more than one vote may increase desire from voters to put faith in their preferred candidate/party thus creating a more active voting base.

The alternative vote would allow a voter to vote more than once in a numerical order. If you identify more with socialists, libertarians or whatever you would know that your vote is not wasted on those parties. Once all the votes are accounted for, the candidate with the least amount of votes is eliminated and that candidate’s votes are distributed to the voters second choice. This process repeats until there is one candidate.

For example, if you really do not like Hillary but you really, really do not like Trump, and you prefer Hillary to win over Trump. Instead of voting for what you consider lesser of the two evils, which in this example would be Hillary, you vote for you most favored candidate with confidence knowing it's not going to waste a vote to help Trump get elected. This would work vise versa as well, if you preferred a more conservative candidate but didn't want Hillary to win you would vote for Trump as a second (or third, or fourth, etc.) choice to ensure you vote is not wasted.

The only thing the alternative vote does is add more options and more possible representation to the citizens. In the end, without any change to our voting system we will continue to be dominated by a two party monopoly (which is only one party more than North Korea and China).

I leave with this quote by John Adams.

“There is nothing which I dread so much as a division of the republic into two great parties, each arranged under its leader, and concerting measures in opposition to each other. This, in my humble apprehension, is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our Constitution.”

If you want more information about the alternative vote click the link below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Y3jE3B8HsE

My talk with Gary Johnson ( but not really)

This post is a little less formal

I just recently started using Instagram. And about a week ago, I got a surprising follow.

Now I voted for Gary Johnson, so this was an exciting moment for me. I thought maybe I will DM him and say thanks. But then, the next day, I noticed he DMed me

I thought the message was a little strange. Not exactly what was expected. Honestly, I even felt a little uncomfortable, but I don’t exactly know why.

So I responded. “Gary’s” response seemed even stranger to me. I thought he would be excited to hear I officially made the switch in my voter registration. Now here things take an interesting turn.

I did a little googling and found nothing on the subject. So I thought I would test if this was a real person or a bot, as I was suspicious, so I asked a question (additionally, all the past responses seems inappropriate, like bot might guess what people will say and responds to it).

So when he says yes to my question, I know it’s a real person, but I’m pretty sure this is a scam, so I decided to ask a technical question about non-profits (after all, I used to work for one) to see if he knows what he is talking about.

He read this and did not respond. Which pretty much ensures that I wasn’t talking to the real Gary Johnson after all. Additionally, I followed that hashtag and found two posts, here is one of them.

So I DMed the real Gary Johnson. Maybe he will respond and then I can truly say, I spoke to Gary Johnson. Uncut DM below for reference.

The Matrix

We live in a broken political system. Sure, there is room to discuss to what degree the system is broken, but it is still broken nonetheless. One of the contributing factors to this is that many people don’t know this simple truth. Many people don’t think about politics on a day to day basis. They don’t think about how the government operates and what they do, and some even go to great lengths to protect the broken aspects of our political system. In many ways, it is like the movie the Matrix. Many people live in essentially total ignorance of the political system we are a part of, just batteries to machine overlords. Some people even go a step further to defend their position as batteries.

The Electoral College is a good example of broken relic still present in our political system. The Electoral College of course could be the subject of many blog posts, nethertheless it serves as a good example. Does it make sense that an individual's vote in Wyoming is worth 3.6 (source) times more than the vote of someone in California? No. All votes should be counted equal, this is a fundamental principle of democracy. Now there are potentially many criticisms to what I just said. Some assert the electoral college was an important addition by the founding fathers as a protection against the (unrestrained) will of the people. Not to ad hominem here, but the founding fathers also allowed slavery to exist, which clearly conflicts with the ideals of democracy. I think the argument that the founding fathers wanted this nation to be a republic governed by white landowners is a poor excuse to keep such an archaic voting system in place.

Some people seem to enjoy fighting on the wrong side of the field, and I can understand that. After all, this blog fights against a lot of current establishment. Some people took it upon themselves to argue along side of the ISP in the battle of net neutrality. And, sure, the argument that the free market should rein can be a good one, but not when it would give ISP monopolistic power over what truly is a utility, which for me, is nearly on par with electricity. (After all, if I had no internet, what would I even do with my electricity?) The influence that large corporations have in politics is truly frightening at times. Surely we will talk about Citizens United, but not in this post.

A final point to look at is global warming. The climate is changing, that is a fact. There may be some legitimate discussion about how much of this change is manmade, and how much is nature (Google Milankovitch Cycles), but ultimately, there are two sides of the debate. Science on one side, warning humanity of the path it is on, and big oil on the other, which makes money today buy killing tomorrow. Sure, big oil tycoons may destroy the Earth, but that will be the problem from another generation to deal with. What confuses me most is the ordinary people that side with big oil. I mean, sure, it may be tempting to be a shill if I were to be paid, but some people seem to be willing to do it for free. It simply amazes me.