I've been reading Steven Landsburg's "Fair Play: What your child can teach
you about economics, values, and the meaning of life."
In it he writes: "[his daughter] understands too, as incredibly, many
adults do not, that the reason there are homeless people is that-- for
whatever reason-- some people prefer not to acquire homes. That is to say,
either they prefer not to earn enough income to acquire a home or they
prefer to spend their income in other ways. She scoffed when she heard a
television commentator suggest that the problem is a "shortage" of
housing; she's old enough to understand that when people offer to buy
houses other people will offer to build them."
I understand this argument, but is this the best economics can do in
explaining why people are homeless? Do explanations dealing with
government cutbacks of services for mentally-ill people, or banks refusing
to lend to certain groups of people because it's easier to ignore the
entire group than sort out good risks from bad risks not count as
economic explanations? It seems to me using Landsburg's argument you could
claim that people starve because the prefer not to earn enough income.
Daljit Dhadwal
