“most forms of low-income housing have been criminalized in nearly every major US city.”
This is an _incredibly_ under-addressed issue. The Left has made it ILLEGAL to be “functionally poor” (can live a sustaining lifestyle at sub-poverty-line levels). Never mind how quaint, high “quality of life”, or content the setting is, the Left will literally put you in jail for building and living in inexpensive housing which was the norm (if not luxurious) for most of “first world” human history.
Many on FR respond to such articles with “they’re trying to normalize bad living conditions! the Left wants us to live in third world huts!” etc. I disagree: the push for ever-higher minimum wages and rising welfare dependency is in part manipulated by demanding _higher_ standards of living, which in turn demand ever-growing confiscation of earned wealth.
If someone wants to, and can, live independently in low-income housing, let them. Buy a cheap lot and put up a yurt if you like.
I agree. At one time a family could build a small home, even a one room cabin if that’s all they could afford, and then over time add on or build another larger structure, or move up. They could either sell the smaller home or help out another family member starting out.
Or single men could live in a boarding house while saving money to afford to get married, buy a small property or build a small house and start a family. Can’t do that today.
My great grandfather was a boarder near his job for 3 years and saved every penny he could until he could afford to marry my great grandmother.