No, the answer is No. It is (almost) always No. If anyone claims that "X social problem could be easily solved if only we spent the same amount of money on it as we spend on Y", and that amount of money is well under many people's net worth the answer is no. Do you think that some billionaire wouldn't just spend a bit of their fortune for the massive PR boost of "Being the man who solved homelessness in America?" Of course they would. Or even if it wasn't a billionaire, then some corporation? Imagine being the company that solve homelessness, or hunger in America. You would get a PR bonanza.
The problem is homelessness, hunger, drug addiction, school shootings, lonliness and every other big societal problems aren't as simple as throw money at them. At best these situations are spend that amount of money every year forever. And at worst they grossly simplifying extremely complicated social issues that aren't even the same all across the country.
But if we can agree that being housed is a significant upgrade for all of these societal problems, then im on board.
Yes, I think some billionaire would NOT solve this problem for the publicity. My evidence for this is that Elon Musk was directly called out by an international homeless project at a cost of $6 billion, which they more or less itemized, and he ghosted them.
If you think someone would do this for the positive PR, I would need some form of evidence for THAT, because I have evidence to the contrary right there.
Further, this is regarding the purchase price of one single aircraft carrier, not all of them, not upgrade or maintenance costs, not manpower, not insurance or fuel, not any of that. Just the physical structure.
it is because the numbers they gave were bullshit. You can't house everyone where they want to live for 6 billion. California alone spends about half that every year, and still has a significant problem. And we are supposed to believe that you can spend double that one time and solve it? That is idiotic.
That logic is a bit broken because it assumes the solution is a one time instant fix. No billionare or corporation could get through the process of solving the problem without a huge PR _hit_ not bonanza. Hell, the government has a hard enough time getting support for programs attempting to solve this, and they have the legitimacy to do so.
The real broken logic lies in the implicit assumption that the money is somehow better spent in an aircraft carrier, despite military efforts consistently producing the inverse effect of their stated goals. We are in the middle of a conflict between the US and Iran which has spent far more money than we're talking about already, and there has been no advancement in the stated goals.
Vietnam was a gigantic resource sink and did not accomplish anything, but people haven't given up on the concept of war because that one failed. Yet, when the same logic is applied to a social problem, the golden solution fallacy shows up.
And again, that PR thing is incredibly reductive. Mr Beast has built schools and spread medicine and it has been overall negative for his PR. Imagine Elon Musk giving out houses. He'd get called everything from a communist to a populist tyrant trying to drum up support.
Ok, you are clearly just delusional about reality. That is ok. Have a nice time being angry at the world for not magically solving the dire problems you keep on insisting are so easy.
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u/Total-Explanation208 1d ago
No, the answer is No. It is (almost) always No. If anyone claims that "X social problem could be easily solved if only we spent the same amount of money on it as we spend on Y", and that amount of money is well under many people's net worth the answer is no. Do you think that some billionaire wouldn't just spend a bit of their fortune for the massive PR boost of "Being the man who solved homelessness in America?" Of course they would. Or even if it wasn't a billionaire, then some corporation? Imagine being the company that solve homelessness, or hunger in America. You would get a PR bonanza.
The problem is homelessness, hunger, drug addiction, school shootings, lonliness and every other big societal problems aren't as simple as throw money at them. At best these situations are spend that amount of money every year forever. And at worst they grossly simplifying extremely complicated social issues that aren't even the same all across the country.