Will SF homelessness be solved by 2040?

San Francisco

188

Ṁ2.2K

Ṁ670

2041

21%

chance

ALL

For purposes of this market, I will consider SF homelessness to be "solved" if there (i) is estimated to be fewer than 500 people in SF living in homelessness, or (ii) I determine, by my personal judgment using the information available to me, that SF homelessness in 2040 is not a humanitarian issue.

For reference, as of 2022 there are an estimated ~7.5k people living in homelessness. I will use a data source akin to this for market evaluation: https://sfgov.org/scorecards/safety-net/homeless-population

I may bet in this market.

Get Ṁ200 play money

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bought Ṁ223 of NO

Those betting Yes, even at low odds, what is the chain of events that gets us to solving this issue? Construction of new affordable housing? Intensive care for the chronic homeless? Or is it an uncertainty bet tailored around AI making us super wealthy?

predicts YES

More affordable housing, intensive care, and people moving somewhere else.

predicts YES

Also, some fuzzy hope that we will be able to solve these kinds of solvable problems, without exactly knowing how.

predicts YES

@CarsonGale I've personally and voluntarily participated in homeless outreach and support programs. I know that there are others out there who care deeply and are working hard on this issue. For example, look at Bonton Farms in Dallas.

predicts YES

@CarsonGale When a problem gets bad enough, sometimes that prompts governments to really focus on getting it right, in the way that isn't true of the third or fourth worst problem on their plates, which are allowed to fester.

predicts YES

@CarsonGale realizing that a big part of the problem is our broken economic system and fixing the money will have cascading effects across society

predicts YES

@CarsonGale 2040 has some risk of human extinction, so homelessness is not a humanitarian issue, and also some chance of sufficient basic income (in rich countries at least) such that people are only homeless voluntarily. Lots of uncertainty but 15% seems too low.

predicts NO

I found this graphic from a Mckinsey report in 2023 helpful in internalizing SF homelessness. There were 20k homeless in 2022, and 7.7k point-in-time estimate. By end of 2022, roughly 4.4k people were determined to be chronically homeless.

I find it much more plausible that non-chronic homelessness can be "solved" by 2040, though that seems mostly conditional on (i) a UBI of some kind getting implemented, or (ii) affordable-to-free housing options existing.

Chronic homelessness, however, seems very difficult to solve, as the only compelling solution I've seen is mandatory intensive care for those affected. This seems ideal, but also expensive and difficult to achieve politically.