Taiwan has the second lowest violent crime on Earth, right after Japan. I am an Engineer, I have two masters degrees, and have made decent money in both Taiwan and the USA. I spent a summer and most of an autumn unhoused in Taiwan. In Taipei, I often slept on benches near Hell Valley, and woke up and went to the hotspring in the morning with the older folks who liked to go at that time. Other times I slept around Banciao or other side of the river. Several nice nights, I would wake up to drunk college kids hanging out around me, occasionally falling asleep or passing out for a couple of hours in the same parks I liked.
I got a scooter for about $200 and went further South. Initially I slept in the little gazebos, and later I slept anywhere, and got a hammock with a bugnet to hang up in the trees. I slept on the toy trains in the town South of Sun Moon lake. I slept by the old tree on the Pacific side of Hehuan (and liked camping at various heights on mount Hehuan in the summer, as I could effectively pick the temperature at night). Could swim by waterfalls or snorkel in the ocean near Hualien, then motor to a comfortable altitude...
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1I am inclined to think "this is polluting the commons". All the things you used to survive are meant to be used by people who have homes and only occasionally need those things (and often pay indirectly, such as by making purchases in a store where they use the bathroom). The fact that they are free is a price structure that is only possible because people who use them are occasional users who rarely need them. Deliberately going without a home in the knowledge that you can survive using the free services is using much more than your fair share of the commons and if many people behaved like you, the free services would disappear.
Of course, you can argue "if they didn't want homeless people using them, they shouldn't provide them for free to homeless people". The consequence of this attitude, at large, is why we can't have nice things.
This is an interesting point, and I like the perspective. The main ingredients needed for my adventures were (1) lack of crime and (2) spaces, such as clean restrooms, forests, and some of the gazebos such as along the road in He Huan Mountain. The hot springs at Hell Valley, I paid for, and of course I paid for food and gas and such.
I think (1) is common to most of Asia, and I have had several friends who did similar things in China, which is a bit poorer than Taiwan. China is interesting in that almost every American female who is there for awhile will eventually comment, "This is amazing, I can walk around at 3AM in a big city and know I won't be assaulted." Used to be that way in South India, to a lesser extent, where I did a version of this for about six months, actually eating for free in many cases (such as the Ashram's giveaway food in Thiruvannamalai) and people have been doing for centuries. I would not recommend it now, but that's due to politics. And some people do have guns in India. There are stray dogs, too. And the wealth distribution wasn't so good there. Just after I left, the "eve teasing" thing started, then ...
Possessing a home also imposes costs on everyone else - it costs scarce materials and labor to build, equip, and electrify/warm/cool/water a home, and it uses up scarce space in a way that excludes others. It’s not obvious that a homeless person who works & is taxed, and is thus contributing to collective capacity to build and maintain the amenities they take advantage of, is a free rider; you’d need to actually do the math to demonstrate that.
If society evolved to 10% unhoused but working, healthy, and non criminal, I strongly suspect systems could be adapted. Non-destitute tent cities could likely be supported as easily as a large fairgrounds.
It’s possible then that the balance of outliers such as me are because most people just want to be housed? So the balance of light amenities for the unhoused in Taiwan is at equilibrium (and needs more amenities in the USA, probably). NB that surely I am not the first or only person in TW to do this. The countryside night-market culture seems possibly to involve healthy non criminal transient merchants for example. At any rate, implicitly the system is designed for the number of people doing this. No?
Back to my question above, what actual drain did I pose on society? If I could know what those are, I could mitigate them. I will likely be back in Taiwan to continue my permanent residency visa in 2025. I will be bringing in outside money and again probably living out of a bike or a motorcycle. Other than keeping things clean and obeying laws, what should I do to make sure I haven’t done harm?
Thank you for the ongoing conversation. I do appreciate this.
"If by "drain" you mean "used far more than your fair share" everything you did that wouldn't be done so often by someone with a home was a drain."
Why should we assume "cost" by default when not conforming to systemic expectations? And why should we assume others doing it should have a bad result?
I think that would only be a drain if someone else's use was diminished afterwards. You never mention, for example, my days spent snorkeling in Hualien. Hours and hours and hours for several weeks with my head in the water, looking at starfish and such. This was arguably "more than my fair share" but I did not diminish the resource for anyone else who wants to use it. And this is also something that might not be done by someone who is paying for a home. I think it's not instinctively mentioned in the conversation because we both know I could do this essentially infinitely and not diminish anyone else's use of that commons.
Likewise, if I leave everything in the condition I found it, am not breaking laws, and paying for food, gas, taxes, and whatever else I need or want, then what is our de...
2You never mention, for example, my days spent snorkeling in Hualien.
I never mention it because you are not overusing it compared to someone in a home.
even regular middle class people might be using more of the countryside in a destructive way in their time off than I am
"People who are not causing the particular harm I am causing, may be causing different sorts of harm" doesn't really justify it.
To think of it another way, if a culture of (lawful and clean) vagabonds were to evolve in Taiwan, for all we know it might create a new culture of innovation, versus the “lie flat” culture that some of Asia is falling pray to.
This is a rationalization. It's like saying "if a culture of shoplifters arose, for all we know it could create a culture of innovation, where stores benefit from the publicity caused by shoplifting, customers consider stores with frequent shoplifters to have high quality goods so shoplifting attracts customers, tourists shoplift occasionally but spend more money in the areas where they shoplift, etc." You can always invent hypothetical scenarios where your harm doesn't really cause harm. The clause after the "for all we know" is wishful thinking and supported by nothing whatsoever.
Seriously, being homeless might create a Silicon Valley?
2Lower wealth disparity also results in lower crime, particularly lower violent crimes. Taiwan generally has a fairly "sleepy" government and penal system. And for many types of crimes, you can buy your sentence off for the equivalent of about $30 a day (1000 NTD). Not a lot of private gun ownership (non-zero, as aboriginals can hunt, and there are (very very few) skeet ranges, but even the president's secret service got into trouble for having a handgun in an unauthorized way). I've found very stressed and deformed rimfire cartridges out in the woods, apparently from homemade hunting rifles. That's about it.
The wealth distribution in Taiwan has been great though. Of course, Forumosa Plastics (Wang family), TSMC, Asus, and a few other giants have made bank, but what you find is a vast quantity of people got their "fair share" there. Education rates are high (According to Farid Zakharia, in our Legislative Yuan, nearly everyone has Masters or PhD degrees, highest education in any legislative body on the planet. I'll also point to a decent gender split, not quite 50%). First Asian country to legalize gay marriage, and Taipei has be...
I'm a lawyer (NY licensed) working in Tokyo, and this account of the Japanese penal system is incorrect. Prosecutors in Japan are extremely, extremely hesitant to bring a criminal case into the penal system, and so when cases are brought they are far beyond "a reasonable doubt". As a slightly misleading short summary, this, rather than lack of concern for false positives, is the reason for the notorious 99% conviction rate of criminal cases in Japan.
I've also been unhoused in a few different countries for short periods of time.
I'm certain that my affinity for Japan has its roots in needing this peaceful cultural of public safety.
This was awesome. Here are some more stories in the same style.
Homeless person or professor?
It can be hard to tell in Cambridge, Massachusetts. That's partly because some professors—mostly the MIT ones—can look very disheveled. But partly it's because some homeless people can be surprisingly intellectual, e.g. it's not uncommon to find homeless people crouched in the shade reading a book.
My favorite example is a homeless man in Harvard Square. His name in my head is "Black Santa" because he's a old man with a full belly and white beard, and he's always surrounded by trash-bag-sacks not of toys, but of his possessions. He's always in the same spot, a stretch of Harvard Square that lots of homeless people hang out in. But while the other, mostly young, homeless in the area typically spend their time begging or zonked out, I only ever see Black Santa writing in a small notebook.
What's he writing all the time? As best I can tell from peeping over his shoulder as I pass by, he's writing poetry. Sometimes I spot him reciting it out loud before he goes back to scribbling.
Some day I hope to muster the courage to strike up a conversation out of the blue with him and learn more.
R
...
Your homeless person or professor story made me think of my uncle. He lives in his car, by choice.
He has a computer science degree and worked for a lot of top technology companies in the 80s and 90s. Eventually his disdain for the employee lifestyle inspired him to try his hand at the entrepreneurial route. Turns out he's neither a good employee, nor a good entrepreneur. After a couple bad start-ups, he went broke.
On two separate occasions during my childhood he stayed with my family in our home (with the precondition that he maintains employment somewhere). It lasted...for a while. But he grew bored. He prefers to live in his car and read books in the library than work "for the man".
I see him once a year on Thanksgiving now. Last year we talked about particle physics and blackholes.
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1When I was ~ 5 I saw a homeless person on the street. I asked my dad where his home was. My dad said "he doesn't have a home". I burst into tears.
I'm 35 now and reading this post makes me want to burst into tears again. I appreciate you writing it though.
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9The bathroom thing sucks in general. We honestly just need more public bathrooms, or subsidies paid to venues to keep their bathrooms fully public. I understand most businesses won't risk having to deal with the potential mess of having anyone use their bathroom, but it's ridiculous even for those who do have the money that you're supposed to buy a coffee or something to take a leak (and then in practice you can often sneak by anyway).
I assume that it's harder to have public bathrooms when you have a substantial homeless population. There's a fear that they'll do drugs in there or desecrate the place.
I was briefly part of an organization that tried to solve this problem by having a portable station for homeless people to use the bathroom, take a shower, brush, and change (they were also given inexpensive undergarments + cleaning equipment). While doing that, I never experienced any of the above issues but there was also an establishment of trust because the homeless people and the volunteers would interact regularly. I wonder if this can extrapolate.
In places without a homeless problem, I've never had an issue finding a place to use the bathroom without buying anything. I usually buy something after as a courtesy, but I never promise the storeowner or anything.
ETA: in upscale areas in the East Coast, I often can find public bathrooms, and they're in good shape. I don't travel too much, so I don't have a whole lot of data points.
Why do we need more public bathrooms? I'm skeptical because if there was demand for more bathrooms, then I'd expect the market to produce them.
The fact that the market demonstrably hasn't provided this good is little (in fact, practically no) evidence regarding its desirability because the topic of discussion is public bathrooms, meaning precisely the types of goods/services that are created, funded, and taken care of by the government as opposed to private entities.
In particular, these are built on public land (where private developers do not have property rights) for public use (with no excludability) and with little-to-no rivalry, at least across mid-to-long-term timeframes (past the point where another person is physically occupying the bathroom or dirtying it). As such, they fit the frame of public goods to a reasonable extent.
Why is it ridiculous?
I suspect the argument that it is ridiculous comes from an intuition that the need to go to the bathroom is such a human universal that we are all accustomed to, and the knowledge that having to hold in your urine is seriously unpleasant is so universal, that it becomes a matter of basic consideration for your fellow huma...
In particular, these are built on public land (where private developers do not have property rights) for public use (with no excludability) and with little-to-no rivalry, at least across mid-to-long-term timeframes (past the point where another person is physically occupying the bathroom or dirtying it). As such, they fit the frame of public goods to a reasonable extent.
'Public bathrooms' are definitely not 'public goods', not even close. A mere coincidence of the adjective 'public' meaning 'government run' and 'society-wide' doesn't make them so. The market doesn't provide it because it is outlawed; where it is not outlawed, it is provided; and where outlawed, it is often provided by the market in a different form anyway, like being excluded to only paying patrons of a store or restaurant. They are ordinary excludable private goods; often a club good, where load is low. That is enough disproof of it being a 'public good', but in any case:
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government-owned land has property rights, and these are allocated, leased, rented, or sold all the time to private parties all the time, and often building and management of facilities in things like parks are outsourced.
This also applies t
2Why is it better to pay an explicit bathroom providing business, then to pay a cafe (in the form of buying a cup of coffee)? It strikes me as a distinction without real difference, but maybe I'm confused.
Most obviously, so someone can provide just a bathroom, rather than wrapping an entire cafe around it as a pretext to avoid being illegal - a cafe which almost certainly operates only part of the time rather than 24/7/365, one might note, as merely among the many benefits of severing the two. As for another example of the benefits, recall Starbucks's experiences with bathrooms...
'A bathroom' is quite a different thing from 'an entire cafe plus a bathroom'. 'A bathroom' prefab fits into many more places than 'a successful cafe so big it has an attached bathroom for patrons'. Which is probably why there were apparently >50,000 pay bathrooms in the USA before some activists got them outlawed, and you see pay toilets commonly in other countries. (I remember being quite fascinated by a pay toilet in Paris, which had a built-in cleaning cycle, and considering it well worth the euro coin.)
Second, in my previous post I was trying to ask about whether or not there were any genuine differences as a user when paying $X for a cup of coffee to a cafe in order to use the bathroom versus paying $X to a just bathroom business to use the bathroom. (I was responding to @dr_s saying this: "This, and how completely unrelated specifically the "buy a coffee" thing is. It makes no sense that to satisfy need A I have to do unrelated thing B.")
Even bracketing out all other concerns, I think there is. You don't know what the setup is at any given cafe so you might go to the wrong one or do it wrong, social interactions are awkward, you have to decide what to buy, there is deadweight loss from the $5 of coffee you didn't want (and might not even drink and just throw away), the pay bathroom probably wouldn't've cost $5 (when I paid for that toilet in Paris, it cost a lot less than just about anything I could've bought from a walk-in cafe with a bathroom), you may have to wait in a line for who knows how long (and if you have to go, you have to go!) to wait for your order to be called instead of plunking in a coin and going right in, you might have to ask for the key in many places (which is always a bit humiliating, to make it a stranger's business that you have to go wee or potty), and return the key too... The cafe version of the interaction is many times worse than such a simple trivial task like 'use a restroom' has to be.
FYI Lighthaven isn't super representative – most of the bathrooms are in private rooms because it was a hotel designed for people being in private rooms, and it's expensive to build more (both because it costs money, and because each bathroom is one fewer breakout room, which we also wanted in many contexts).
1There's a saying in Chess, that if you have one weakness, you can probably defend it, but if you have two, you are probably fucked. I dunno, it's phrased better, but that's the gist.
Most homeless people are only temporarily homeless. They are the 'one weakness' crowd. Something has gone wrong, they are on the ropes, but they are straightening it out. There are times and places I can point to in my life where I could have become a 'one weakness' homeless.
A one weakness homeless has fucked up in a royal way (drugs, hit his girl...), and fallen through the cracks, but in a world where Thanos snapped them into a suburban home, they'd be fine. They are a homeowner/taxpayer sort, who just temporarily slipped out of the socket. Pick em up, turn em over twice and put em back in the USB slot, and all is well.
This is most homeless! Most people who are homeless are not homeless long. The majority, the vast majority, are on the come up. Never forget it.
The long term homeless tend to be 'all weakness' homeless. These are the protagonists of all of the frustrating stories of people trying to help someone out and suffering for it. ...
2I've often heard say, among charities people who work with homeless people, that you need as long to get out of the street than you spent living in the street.
If I were a similar homeless man and needed food, I would have robbed someone. Yet that doesn't lead me to conclude anything negative about people who don't want to be robbed.
Here's a question I don't know the answer to. If there was a program offering a basic income to homeless people, enough to pay for housing+food+clothes+etc in a cheaper area of the US without having to find work, but to receive the money you have to actually move there and get housed - would most homeless people accept the offer and move? I ask because it seems like such a program could be pretty cheap. Or would most of them prefer to stay in cities even at the cost of being homeless? If so, what would be the main reasons?
My understanding is that most homeless people are 'local' to the area. That is, the majority were already residents of a city before becoming homeless and for a variety of common sense reasons would not want to leave. They know the physical and social geography of their area. They have family or other deep ties. They know which shelters are open at which times, which areas to avoid, where to get dinner on a Thursday. Where it's relatively safe to sleep outside, etc.
Promising a person that if they move they'll be provided for means they lose whatever social network they have and requires trust that such a promise will be fulfilled and they won't be stranded in a worse situation.
That understanding is based on a handful of evenings volunteering at a local homeless shelter, conversations with a friend who is heavily involved in the non-profit world of homelessness, and a layman's interest in housing policy.
I've always felt a mix of fear, compassion and guilt when it comes to homeless people. In the UK, both London and suburbia (where I'm from) have seen the issue visibly intensify over the last decade or two.
Here as anywhere, it's a number issue. After discovering the YIMBY movement maybe half a decade ago, I began to realize, the next big social justice movement, has go to be whatever reframing of <this whole thing> -- housing and urban policy -- is required to ensure society never again returns to this kind of supply shortage and general climate of s...
I read this like three weeks ago, and it felt really familiar, though I couldn't remember why. But today, I figured it out! I found this assignment from when I was 16, and it seemed like a fitting addition.
It is five o’clock on a Wednesday. It’s drizzling, a rain soft enough to seem comforting had it been warmer. But, it isn’t, and in the dingy winter cold, it stings. This does not matter to the people in the café, insulated from the outside world by their expensive coffee. A low hum of hip-hop and typing fills the place. Old friends reunite, t...
1There are a number of rather interesting side threads that have emerged from this post. But I'm not at all sure why. From that perspective I'm not sure how I might rate the overall comments section present here.
We say hi to each other regularly now. His name is George.
Isn't it extraordinary to know the name of a homeless person? Unusual enough to make it the concluding point of a section of writing on LessWrong. After all, they are almost a separate species, with their own culture, way of life, habits, and an aura which causes a nostril-wrinkling response in any decent clean-living human. Why should upright citizens have to fund the needs of this feckless lot of wasters?
Except his name is George. He has a personality. He once had parents, maybe a school, maybe ho...
I remember going to a city and seeing someone on the subway loudly threatening nonexistent people. I wasn't scared, I just felt bad that in all likelihood, the world had failed this person through no fault of their own.
The LessWrong Review runs every year to select the posts that have most stood the test of time. This post is not yet eligible for review, but will be at the end of 2025. The top fifty or so posts are featured prominently on the site throughout the year.
Hopefully, the review is better than karma at judging enduring value. If we have accurate prediction markets on the review results, maybe we can have better incentives on LessWrong today. Will this post make the top fifty?
I have no idea what this is about but it seems to me that you are making confidential conversation about Teresa <redacted> public, possibly without her consent. Maybe because she is homeless. Can someone explain to me like I am five why this on lesswrong?
I see the point all of you are making, thank you. I agree that a last name muddies things--I deleted it from the post.
After living in a suburb for most of my life, when I moved to a major U.S. city the first thing I noticed was the feces. At first I assumed it was dog poop, but my naivety didn’t last long.
One day I saw a homeless man waddling towards me at a fast speed while holding his ass cheeks. He turned into an alley and took a shit. As I passed him, there was a moment where our eyes met. He sheepishly averted his gaze.
The next day I walked to the same place. There are a number of businesses on both sides of the street that probably all have bathrooms. I walked into each of them to investigate.
In a coffee shop, I saw a homeless woman ask the barista if she could use the bathroom. “Sorry, that bathroom is for customers only.” I waited five minutes and then inquired from the barista if I could use the bathroom (even though I hadn’t ordered anything). “Sure! The bathroom code is 0528.”
The other businesses I entered also had policies for ‘customers only’. Nearly all of them allowed me to use the bathroom despite not purchasing anything.
If I was that homeless guy, I would have shit in that alley, too.
I receive more compliments from homeless people compared to the women I go on dates with
There’s this one homeless guy—a big fella who looks intimidating—I sometimes pass on my walk to the gym. The first time I saw him, he put on a big smile and said in a booming voice, “Hey there! I hope you’re having a blessed day!” Without making eye contact (because I didn’t want him to ask me for money), I mumbled “thanks” and quickly walked away.
I saw him again a few weeks later. With another beaming smile he exclaimed, “You must be going to the gym—you’re looking fit, my man!” I blushed and replied, “I appreciate it, have a good day.” He then added, “God bless you, sir!” Being non-religious, that made me a little uncomfortable.
With our next encounter, I found myself smiling as I approached him. This time I greeted him first, “Good afternoon!” His face lit up with glee. “Sir, that’s very kind of you. I appreciate that. God bless you!” Without hesitation I responded, “God bless you, too!” I’m not sure the last time I’ve uttered those words; I don’t even say ‘bless you’ after people sneeze.
We say hi to each other regularly now. His name is George.
Is that guy dead?
Coming home one day, I saw a disheveled man lying facedown on the sidewalk.
He’s not moving. I crouched to hear if he’s breathing. Nothing.
I looked up and saw a lady in a car next to me stopped at a red light. We made eye contact and I gestured towards the guy as if to say what the fuck do we do? Her answer was to grip the steering wheel and aggressively stare in front of her until the light turned green and she sped off.
Not knowing if I needed to call an ambulance, I asked him, “Hey buddy, you okay?” I heard back a muffled, “AYE KENT GEEUP!”
Well, at least he’s not dead.
“Uhh, what was that? You doing okay?” This time a more articulate, “I CAN’T GET UP,” escaped from him. Despite his clothes being somewhat dirty and not wanting to touch him, I helped him to his feet.
With one look on his face I could tell that he wasn’t all there. I asked him if he knew where he was or if he needed help, but he could only reply with gibberish. It could have been drugs; it could have been mental illness. With confirmation that he wasn’t dead and was able to walk around, I went home.
Who’s giving Brazilian waxes to the homeless?
I was walking behind a homeless man the other day. He was wearing an extra long flannel and sagging his pants low.
Suddenly, he noticed his (one and only) shoe was untied and fixed it promptly by executing a full standing pike. I wasn’t expecting him to have the flexibility of a gymnast.
In doing so, his flannel lifted up to reveal his dick and balls. The strangest thing? Fully shaved. Who’s going around giving pro bono Brazilian waxes to the homeless?
Crazy people talk to themselves because no one else will
Walking to the library one day, I noticed a homeless woman muttering to herself. There was an aura of urine about her. She was missing several teeth.
When she spotted me, she asked for twenty dollars. My father taught me to never give homeless people money because “they’ll just use it for drugs and alcohol.” I wasn’t busy, so I sat down next to her on the sidewalk and asked, “how’s your day going?”
She launched into a tirade about why her life sucks—it was mostly incoherent and I assumed she was crazy. After about ten minutes, she paused. She skittishly made eye contact with me and said “sorry.”
“Why are you apologizing?”
“Well, sometimes I ramble. But that’s because I have no one to talk to.”
“It’s probably lonely living on the streets.”
“Yeah.”
Once she realized I wasn’t going to abruptly leave, she asked me about myself and a conversation ensued. Over the next thirty minutes I learned that in the course of her life:
At the end of our conversation, she wished me well and said, “enjoy the library!”
“Have you forgotten how our conversation began?”
“...yes.”
“You were asking me for twenty dollars.”
“Oh, yeah.”
“What did you need the money for?”
“My bike’s inner tube is punctured and I’d like to buy a new one.”
I gave her twenty dollars. She shook my hand and said, “God bless you.”
Her name is Teresa.