Rents over the last two decades have risen much faster than employee pay, contributing to an escalating homelessness crisis in the U.S.

A growing number of Americans are ending up homeless as soaring rents in recent years squeeze their budgets.

According to a Jan. 25 report from Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies, roughly 653,000 people reported experiencing homelessness in January of 2023, up roughly 12% from the same time a year prior and 48% from 2015. That marks the largest single-year increase in the country’s unhoused population on record, Harvard researchers said.

  • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
    0·
    10 months ago

    I think you may be misunderstanding who has all the money and all the high-priced lawyers in this equation.

    • queermunist she/her@lemmy.ml
      0·
      10 months ago

      Bosses have money and high-priced lawyers, workers can beat them anyway. A strong tenant union can beat a landlord just the same.

      • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
        0·
        10 months ago

        Yeah, okay. The last time I lived in an apartment building, there were six tenants. If we had tried to form a union, we would have just been kicked out because we lived in a desirable area of L.A. and he could have charged new tenants more. Should we have added ourselves to the record number of homeless so this plan of yours can come to fruition? How about all the people in single-occupancy dwellings that are renting? Should they form a tenant union of one? Do you think that would work?

        It’s like you think every renter lives in a high-rise.

        • queermunist she/her@lemmy.ml
          0·
          10 months ago

          It’s like you think the wider national union wouldn’t bother to help a little group of six tenants. You’re basically arguing we shouldn’t bother with labor unions because not everyone works in a factory.

          If your six neighbors joined a union to collectively bargain, it wouldn’t be a union of six people! You’d just be one small part of the broader union, which has the resources to hire lawyers and pressure the landlord.

          • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
            0·
            10 months ago

            How could they help a group of six tenants?

            How could they work with single-occupancy renters?

            What would stop the landlord from just kicking those people out? Do you think people can just refuse to pay rent until their demands are met? Because it doesn’t work like that anywhere.

            You’re basically asking for people to be forcibly dragged out of their homes by cops and then becoming homeless.

            Finally- what have you done about this? Have you unionized any tenants anywhere? Have you risked getting kicked out of your own home? Otherwise, this sounds very much like “some of you may die, but it’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make.”

            • queermunist she/her@lemmy.ml
              0·
              10 months ago

              When the UAW negotiates for higher wages, that raises wages for everyone else even when they’re un-unionized. A rising tide lifts all boats. That’s how you help single-occupancy renters.

              It would also help if blue states would pass more tenant’s rights laws to keep landlords from evicting people, and Biden could use the bully pulpit to push those forward. You’re seemingly ignoring that we were talking about tenant unions with a national spotlight. Surely you realize that would be different, right? A shitty landlord would get national attention and be forced to bargain by public pressure, and Biden could help. Sure, some landlords would be basically untouchable (single-occupancy renters and such) but enough could be pressured to effect the market.

              All of this is besides the point! I said that Biden could support tenant unions to help fight homelessness and unaffordable rents. Do you disagree with this basic premise?

              • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
                0·
                10 months ago

                You have not answered any of my questions. I asked you multiple questions and you didn’t answer a single one. Not even the one where I asked you what you personally have done about unionizing renters.

                So I have no idea why you think I would answer your question.

                • queermunist she/her@lemmy.ml
                  0·
                  10 months ago

                  I did!

                  How could they help a group of six tenants?

                  How could they work with single-occupancy renters?

                  When the UAW negotiates for higher wages, that raises wages for everyone else even when they’re un-unionized. A rising tide lifts all boats. That’s how you help single-occupancy renters.

                  And then

                  What would stop the landlord from just kicking those people out?

                  It would also help if blue states would pass more tenant’s rights laws to keep landlords from evicting people, and Biden could use the bully pulpit to push those forward. You’re seemingly ignoring that we were talking about tenant unions with a national spotlight. Surely you realize that would be different, right? A shitty landlord would get national attention and be forced to bargain by public pressure, and Biden could help. Sure, some landlords would be basically untouchable (single-occupancy renters and such) but enough could be pressured to effect the market.

                  And then

                  Finally- what have you done about this?

                  Now this one I didn’t answer this because it seemed irrelevant. I’m not the god damn president of the United States. That’s what we’re talking about. I don’t matter and trying to drag me in as if I am as responsible for the lack of tenant organizing as Joe Biden is absurd.

                  • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
                    0·
                    10 months ago

                    I see. So the responsibility for this rests solely on Biden’s shoulders and you don’t have to do anything but talk about it on the internet. Convenient.

                • Cosmic Cleric@lemmy.world
                  0·
                  10 months ago

                  What would stop the landlord from just kicking those people out?

                  In California at least, laws.

                  And in all the other states?

                  I’ll move to each one of them and then report back to you on their laws. IANAL.

                  OR, people in those States can push for laws in the same way that those in California did.

                  • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
                    0·
                    10 months ago

                    Ah, I see, so if people are able to change laws, they won’t get kicked out and it’s Biden’s fault those laws aren’t changed. Got it.