Summary

Elon Musk has called homelessness a “lie” and “propaganda,” claiming advocacy groups profit from maintaining high homelessness rates.

Partnering with Donald Trump, Musk is pushing for drastic federal budget cuts targeting programs for vulnerable populations, including food stamps and healthcare.

Trump’s plan includes forcing unhoused individuals into treatment or institutionalization.

Critics argue these approaches criminalize homelessness while ignoring root causes like lack of affordable housing.

Homelessness in the U.S. has reached record levels, with 650,000 people affected in 2023, prompting calls for evidence-based solutions over punitive measures.

  • ArchRecord@lemm.ee
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    10
    ·
    7 days ago

    This is the danger of elite projection. What his life is like must be how other people’s lives are like.

    He was successful. If he wanted to get a job, he could. If he did work, he got paid.

    If these people aren’t doing that, it must be their fault, and they need “treatment” (via institutionalization) in his mind. It couldn’t possibly be because to get a job, you often need existing housing, but to get housing, you need money from a job. Or the fact that people like him don’t pay enough.

    It’s always their fault. Individual responsibility, meritocracy and all that jazz.

  • M0oP0o@mander.xyz
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    8
    ·
    7 days ago

    Ah yes, it is a “life style” choice and all that jazz… Not at all the inevitable result of decades plus of poor governance/systemic failures.

      • LifeInMultipleChoice@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        10
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        edit-2
        7 days ago

        It’s also interesting to think about the level of artificial unemployment. In theory everyone could work… and a lot less hours, and we would have no scarcity.

        We would never do it but I have a theory that we could set aside 20T (less than 1 year of GDP) and it would be enough money to build everyone in the U.S. a house and provide free housing for everyone in America, without ever touching the initial investment, and setting aside 3% to assure if we keep inflation below 3% a year if would cover housing indefinitely. That’s based off the 2.5 people per household average, and building a new house every 30 years at a base price of $250,000. Which at mass production, would be the equivalent of a much more costly house. Could repurpose what we have to house people until everyone got moved in over a generation.

        What that does is free up ~$1400-$1900 dollars a month for the average household, and instead of having to stash money in savings over the worries of losing a job and becoming homeless (which stunts the economy), it incentivises people to go eat at a restaurant more often, have a kid they were worried about having, buy nicer things. All of which is spending money and boosting the economy. More kids… Less/near 0 homeless… and booming economy that will offset the original investment. Stress levels down, happiness levels up… which should also mean health issues should decrease.

        Who knows…

        (That’s over 2T a year being added back into the economy, also we don’t have to build all new, refurbish/keep older homes that people want works as well, figure out solutions that have less impact on the environment, and can plan more walkable, heathier towns when building them)

        • Pieisawesome@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          2
          ·
          7 days ago

          GDP is not taxed revenue or availability of funds.

          Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is the monetary value of all finished goods and services produced within a country during a specific period. (I used gen AI for this paragraph).

          According to the CBO, they expect to collect $4.864 trillion in taxes in 2025 (source: https://www.cbo.gov/topics/taxes ).

          Unless you are going to forcibly steal assets from companies (which would lead to amass exodus from the US economy and cause a massive depression) you’d never get 20 trillion.

          This idea is a nice thought, but impossible and not how the economy works.

        • in4aPenny@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          7 days ago

          Very nice idea, but that’s assuming the 1% give a fuck about helping people and not having an army of slaves to make everything they want. Why does money have to be involved in feeding or housing human beings?

  • Nougat@fedia.io
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    82
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    8 days ago

    Is there going to be room in the detention camps for the homeless?

  • asteriskeverything@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    72
    ·
    8 days ago

    “What you actually have are violent drug zombies with dead eyes, and needles and human feces on the street.”

    Yo this is the most cartoonish out-of-touch shit take I’ve see. In an election that accused a disenfranchised minority group of eating people’s pets!

  • MagosInformaticus@sopuli.xyz
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    69
    ·
    8 days ago

    “Have they no refuge or resource?” cried Scrooge.
    “Are there no prisons?” said the Spirit, turning on him for the last time with his own words. “Are there no workhouses?”

    • Infinite@lemmy.zip
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      35
      ·
      8 days ago

      “If they would rather die, they better do it and decrease the surplus population.”

      Fuckin’ hell, fiction is a warning not a guide, you filthy-rich absolute cockwombles.

      • samus12345@lemm.ee
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        21
        ·
        8 days ago

        I seem to recall seeing a Christmas Carol story with Trump when he was last president in which the spirits tried warning him and he didn’t get any of it, thinking that everything was just showing that he’s the greatest. Accurate.

    • SulaymanF@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      40
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      8 days ago

      It’s an old old myth. Ronald Reagan said that everyone who is homeless in America is by choice since there’s so many shelters and charities already. It’s incredibly out of touch, but today people like Musk brag about their ignorance.

    • monotremata@lemmy.ca
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      15
      ·
      7 days ago

      It’s so much worse than that. From the article;

      “Homeless is a misnomer. It implies that someone got a little bit behind on their mortgage, and if you just gave them a job, they’d be back on their feet,” he told former Fox News personality Tucker Carlson in October. “What you actually have are violent drug zombies with dead eyes, and needles and human feces on the street.”

      Basically, it’s not the “homeless” part of “homeless people” he thinks is a lie.

      • derfunkatron@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        edit-2
        7 days ago

        This take is infuriating because it completely ignores the unobvious homeless (or unhoused). If homeless equates to “drug zombie,” then you can say shit like “this person chose to be homeless so they could do drugs” or “they deserve what they get because of drugs” or some other awful sentiment I can’t articulate. It completely erases homelessness because of bigotry, domestic abuse, low wages, lack of opportunity, etc.

        And to top it off, Musk can literally afford to never go to the places where you’d most likely see his version of the homeless.

    • pftbest@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      12
      ·
      edit-2
      7 days ago

      I think the idea is they are too lazy to work for rent. If they really wanted they would go to work and not be homeless anymore. And if they are not able to find any job, they can always do forced labor in a prison system. That’s how it was in the USSR. People in power really like this kind of a system

    • ThrowawayOnLemmy@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      8
      ·
      7 days ago

      He doesn’t actually believe anything he espouses. He only says these things to further his goal of self enrichment to our detriment.

    • klemptor@startrek.website
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      2
      ·
      7 days ago

      Would it even matter? We’re already gonna have a brainworm running the DHHS…

      Maybe all these numbnuts are brainworms driving human meat suits.