It's obviously both. If you're a heroin addict in West Virginia you just rent a trailer with a revolving list of fellow addicts for like $400 month and you beg or steal enough to get by. Plus, you're in a part of town where nobody is really going to notice you.
That doesn't work in San Francisco.
So did the heroin make you homeless or the high prices? It's kind of a silly question. It's both, in some sense.
That's why we see a direct correlation between the cost of rent and homelessness.
But my question is - if you can't pay rent in LA, what draws you to set up camp in skid row? Why add that burden of living there on top of everything else you're dealing with?
Well, yeah, which is why the people who say addiction isn't a factor at all are being more than a little silly. Rent is a factor, but drug addicts make poor decisions in a crisis, obviously. And it's no coincidence that addicts have a weaker support system; most of them have spent years wearing it thin by the time they hit rock bottom.
That doesn't work in San Francisco.
So did the heroin make you homeless or the high prices? It's kind of a silly question. It's both, in some sense.
That's why we see a direct correlation between the cost of rent and homelessness.