Make that make sense. People have to quit blaming the poor for being poor.
it’s literally sooo much more expensive to incarcerate people than it is to house and feed them. In my state it costs $90,000 to incarcerate a single person for one year. $90,000. Other states are even more expensive. for comparison, my rent is $1,050 a month. The annual cost of my housing is $12,600.
A word of advice for people advocating for criminal Justice reform to republicans and people who literally do not care about human rights: use these numbers. Republicans and conservatives and even moderate Dems don’t actually care about moral appeals of why it’s wrong to criminalize homelessness. They do however care about how much tax money this would cost to enforce. It makes financial sense to NOT incarcerate people. (Obviously it makes moral sense too, but most people don’t actually care about that)
It's so much more expensive to put people in jail. If they are in the custody of the state (jail or prison), they have to be given food, clothes, heating, and healthcare. Most of the people who are homeless have health problems--either problems that caused them to lose their homes, trauma from being on the street, substance abuse disorder, anything. The average person experiencing homelessness is much sicker than the average American.
At this point, the largest healthcare provider in the U.S. is the Department of Justice. And legally speaking, they have to provide care. (Granted, a lot of places will avoid that as much as possible, but ideally, they get what treatment they need.) There is a giant prison in Rochester, MN, because it's next to the Mayo Clinic. It's where people with rare and serious illnesses go. My old psych prof worked there part time, providing counseling. He saw people who committed horrendous crimes getting surgeries and chemo. To be clear, prisoners should be getting surgeries and chemo. They deserve healthcare. But it's jarring to hear that a murderer got a tumor taken off his lung while his victims' families have to pay out of pocket for therapy.
I also need to point out that if you're giving people housing, you're just giving them housing. Maybe you include heating, water, and electricity. You aren't giving them clothes (uniforms). You aren't paying guards. You aren't installing metal detectors and cameras. You are just giving them a place to live. That's obviously much, much cheaper than prison.
I am horrified that I have to resort to spelling this out, but yes, this is the only argument Republicans will listen to. Give them the cost-benefit analysis
The reason it costs $90,000/year to put someone in prison is mostly not the housing, heating, food, health care, etc. That's part of it! but. uh. How much do you think it costs to have round-the-clock guards? And round-the-clock security on all the entrances? And kitchen staff? Sure, the prisoners often work in the kitchen ... but you have to have enough staff there that the prisoners can't, say, hide the knives and smuggle them back to their bunks. Or use the knives to overpower the staff + guards and escape. Or a whole bunch of other things. There are a LOT of things in a prison that take a lot of extra time and money because of security even when you don't add in the guards' salary; things are just harder and take longer when you have to assume that the majority of the people are actively trying to hurt you/escape/break things. And then you add the salaries of the guards to that ... it's a lot. Whereas, if you give people housing, food, and medical care sufficient to live with, that costs a LOT less because you don't have to do everything the hard way, and you don't have to pay for guards all over the place.
