>>17
"some people do just that, but your suggestion of the government providing all nesscessities is even worse because you don't even have to make the effort to find the right crime that will keep you behind bars for a while for a while before you have to do it again."
Surely that's a good thing. If someone is being given very rudimentary boring food and shelter, then they won't need to go out and shoplift or assault someone to get into jail to get food and shelter. What's more is they will be given the opportunity to get a job. You are forgetting that homeless people are usually homeless because they don't know what to do to get a better life. They are not particularly bright or social and it hardly costs anything to tell them what to do. Show up here at this time, you will be given a trolley full of lceaning equipment and a hoover and if you clean this bulding within 2 hours you will get $15. Much better than loiterring around in a homeless shelter for 2 hours and earning nothing.
"and since you'd only have to work for luxuries, there's that much less incentive, and you'll get that many more half-assed workers who know they don't need the job and really show it with thier performance. your average person would probably only work enough so they couls get some of the stuff they want, so that they have plenty of time to enjoyment."
Wrong, once they get a job they stop getting given carrots and potatoes. Not much of a loss, unless you're into boiled carrots and potatoes, in which case it doesn't really cost much. When I meant basics I meant basics. That would be their life, eat carrots and potatoes, have a cold shower in the morning, maybe a few cups of water. Once a day someone would come along and tell you of the jobs on offer and tell you you'll be fired and won't get paid unless you do it properly, you'd be so bored by sitting around all day and so bored with the food you would do the job properly. The people who have jobs and who can't afford their own accomodation (and have to live with filthy hobos, providing an incentive to get out of there and if they like it there, they probably pay for their rudimentary accomodation through indirect tax anyway) will be eating beef burgers and chop suey, whilst the unemployed will be eating more boiled carrots and potatoes. Much better than having all of them lying on the streets begging.
"and there'd be that much more income tax, those that strive to climb the ladder would be doing so while fighting the costs of paying for the collective mass of those who would be pleased enough just to have the basics, and those that are only for limited luxuries, and maybe work a little bit at Mcdonalds on the weekends."
Wrong, the benefit of turning homeless bums into workers will pay for itself. Not all homeless people are crazy fucks and drug addicts, but there are a lot out there who are not crazy and only need a leg up to spend the rest of their life working for a living. This leg up can only be the smallest of fractions of overall tax since an out door shower, scaffolding coverred with plastic and 3 months worth of carrots and potatoes (estimated time it takes for a homeless person in the shelter to start working) costs around $90, $40 for carrots, $40 for potatoes and $10 for miscellaneous, or $20 dollars if you want to go to the extreme. Assuming the worst for my argument, this person will be earning at least $10 a day for the rest of his life of which at least 10% will be taken in tax. So a dollar a day goes back into the system compared to 0 dollars if the person remained homeless and unemployed. So unless the person dies in 100 days, he/she will be paying back their debt to society aswell as making the fruit farmers of the US very happy.
"first you speak of the homeless who are unable to get jobs, THEN you speak of how mass immigartion is a benefit as it brings in more workers. is there no connection between the size of the work force and how available jobs are? does it register in your brain that the guy on the street who can't afford a shower would be even WORSE off when employers have the cheap labor of these young adults to choose from?"
That was my argument, well done. Though I fail to see why you think I disagreed with my own argument. Perhaps you think I am a liberal.
"while i'm not saying that maybe quite a few of them would do better given a second chance, doing so should be optional, not funded by tax dollars, but paid for by nonprofits that work from donations. people should have a choice, and not invariably be playing for the poor choices of others."
I believe that if such programs do cause a problem, that political parties should strive to find a balance so the net monetary benefit of the "get the homeless into jobs" schemes is the highest it can be. This is my idea, of giving them the barest cheapest essentials possible so they can at least apply for a job and not look like a dirty hobo whilst they do it. I think that they should be given cod liver oil and a few more services to get a job other than 1 job centre worker who comes each day with a list of jobs and gives a brief prep talk, but my idea of the bare essentials, living like a medieval peasant, is good for starters.
I agree with everything else. I also believe immigration should be tightenned so there are more unskilled jobs for homeless unemployed americans.