via Babs_Achtung
What’s your theory on why the state creates homelessness? (And why there is zero incentive to end it)
byu/Babs_Achtung inconspiracy
I’ve been thinking a lot about the systemic roots of homelessness, and I want to hear your theories. The official narrative is always that it’s a tragic byproduct of inflation, bad luck, or mental health. But when you look at the sheer scale of the crisis—between 745,000 and 755,000 people unhoused in America, and roughly 150,000 of them are innocent children—it starts to look less like a failure of the system and more like a feature.
Think about it: the state has the resources to intervene, but it actively chooses not to.
Everyone talks about the financial incentives that cause homelessness (like real estate lobbying, gentrification, and corporate landlords driving up rents). But we need to ask the inverse question: Why is there no financial incentive to end it?
The government hands out massive subsidies to oil companies, tech giants, and defense contractors. If they wanted to, they could easily create multi-billion-dollar subsidies, tax credits, and financial incentives for developers and local governments to completely wipe out homelessness. They could make ending homelessness the most lucrative industry in the country. Instead, funding is tied up in endless “management” programs, sweeps, and temporary shelters that keep the cycle spinning. Why is the financial incentive to solve it completely non-existent?
Here is my darker theory: What if creating the conditions where homelessness thrives is actually a massive psyop?
Think about the psychological toll it takes on everyday citizens. We walk past people, including children, suffering on the street every single day. To survive psychologically, we force ourselves to look away. We desensitize ourselves.
Could the ultimate goal be to get ordinary people to slowly devalue human life? If the state can condition the public to accept that a child sleeping on a sidewalk is “just the way things are,” then it becomes much easier for society to accept other cruelties—like stripped-back healthcare, endless wars, and dying social safety nets. If you don’t value the person on your street corner, you won’t fight for human rights on a larger scale.
Is this pure malice, institutional apathy, or a deliberate psychological tool to keep the working class numb and compliant? What’s your theory?