Yet a study that involved giving homeless people money without strings attached showed that most spent it on things to improve their future, like buying a used car, paying off debt, pursuing education, starting a business and getting a home. There were no adverse outcomes for any of the participants.
But still our society will judge the homeless and make out they’re all feckless addicts who can’t be trusted with help.
It is insanely easy to end up homeless, the vast majority of the working class could last a month, maybe two if they’ve got some savings.
What’s noticeable here is the £2,000 given is quite a big lump sum, actually capable of helping people make a difference. It’d be inhumane to test it, but if that £2,000 was split up into 12 payments of £166, would it have made as much of a difference? I doubt it. Yet that’s how most benefits work, a pittance a month. Just enough to keep you alive, nowhere near enough to actually help lift people out of poverty.
That’s a good point. Especially with how benefits are usually granted for a short time and many people fail the reassessments, get into debt to survive before the appeal reinstates their benefits, it’s difficult to even get out of the debt cycle on benefits. But they get accused of being feckless.