I have just returned from another trip to the Big Smoke. There are some signs of spring and the panhandlers are back in force on the streets. About a year-and-a-half ago I gave a first hand account of some of my impressions of how life in Vancouver continues to deteriorate. There's probably no particular need to repeat and underscore those observations.
Another city I'm well familiar with is Portland, Oregon. It faces the same sort of problems:
Portland's trouble with homelessness - Michael J. Totten, Brian C. Anderson,
City Journal, 2 March 2017
https://www.city-journal.org/html/portl ... 15039.html
Just about everyone who discusses this topic brings up the fact that most facilities that deal with those who have mental health problems have closed, and that is one of the biggest reasons we see so many people on the street.
This is undoubtedly true, however, these institutions closed in the seventies and eighties, yet there was basically no homeless problem in cities like Vancouver and Portland for at least two decades after that.
That leads me to believe that analysts are leaving out something important, namely the skyrocketing cost of accommodation. And this is driven by gentrification and immigration.
It's why I feel that people claim that immigration has no down side must have some hidden agenda. Immigration, especially illegal and uncontrolled immigration, brings many negative consequences, including depressed wages and ever higher rents.
While in Vancouver I usually manage to pick up the free tabloid called Metro.
This paper is rabidly anti-Trump, as are almost all the media in this province. Here is a story from just after he was elected:
Vancouver needs to prepare itself for Trump refugees - Trish Kelly,
Metro, 15 November 2016
http://www.metronews.ca/views/vancouver ... ouver.html
Many of us feel depressed, despondent or hopeless. As an urbanite who works my butt off for soical justice, I think it's important to remember that those cities didn't vote for Trump.
I sincerely doubt wheter Trish Kelly has ever worked her butt off. She's a twenty-something year old journalist. I bet she eats, but I also bet she wouldn't last two hours working on a farm.
She claims we should open up the border to the two to three million illegal aliens (mostly criminals) that Trump might expel from the U.S. She probably lives in a gated community, so she won't care about the increase in crime in Canada (with a marked increase in gun violence over the last few months-- despite gun control). Nor does she care about the over 2000 homeless people in Vancouver, who will, along with tens of thousands of others who can already barely afford the rent, now be competing with all these poor criminals that she wants to invite to Canada.
Metro International
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metro_International
Metro International is a Swedish media company based in Luxembourg that publishes the Metro newspapers. Metro International's advertising sales have grown at a compound annual growth rate of 41 percent since launch of the first newspaper edition in 1995.[1] It is a freesheet, meaning that distribution is free, with revenues thus generated entirely through advertising. This newspaper is primarily intended for commuters who move daily in and out of big cities' business areas, mainly during rush hours.
The company was founded by Per Andersson and started as a subsidiary of the Modern Times Group along with Viasat Broadcasting. It is now controlled through investment company Kinnevik. The first edition of the newspaper was published as Metro Stockholm and distributed in the Stockholm metro. As of 2012, all European editions (except for the Hungarian one) have been sold, reportedly so that Metro International can focus on Latin America, considered the last growth market for free newspapers.[2][3]
So this company, like other media giants, isn't really interested in social justice at all, or even in news, much less facts, no matter how you might define them.
Above all, they are interested in making in making money.
Note that they are based in Luxembourg where they pay NO taxes.