how we treated the poor...

[auntieannie]

Workhouse, poorhouse.... horrible institution.

Here's a show about it, given the celebrity treatment. I hope you can watch this video. There is mention of sending people to populate downunder, but no exploration of the conditions there. it probably would be worth an entire other show. (and I know it is as grim as this one).

[slowcoach]

I gave it a go but far too many adverts, I have never know so many, perhaps 10 before getting 20 minutes in. Also I am repelled by the aghast celebrity stuff.


Compared to today, if there were to be anything said for the workhouse, it might be that it was a visible manifestation that could be pointed at and discussed, debated, as it still is. The current situation is dispersed, largely hidden, difficult to quantify but certainly spreading. The UK has around 300,000 homeless, and more than 10 times that number homed but in someway destitute. Not my say so, but the Joseph Rowntree Foundation say so.

Others more fortunate might do well to realise that Dickens' depiction of Tiny Tim's existence, is one of life in a struggling middle class family.

[slowcoach]

One of the benefits of the UK Census (held every ten years) is that it reveals a snapshot of who is where at that particular moment in time. And hence who isn't where.



From the Office of National Statistics

Number of vacant and second homes, England and Wales: Census 2021

On Census Day, 21 March 2021, there were 1.5 million unoccupied dwellings in England and 120,450 in Wales. This is 6.1% of all dwellings in England and 8.2% in Wales.

Homeless People and Peopleless Homes.

[auntieannie]

I thought you would have something to say about that, Slow. and your second post about homeless and peopless homes is part of the reason for the squat culture... at least here in Switzerland, where everything is expensive.

[slowcoach]

Residential squatting in the UK was criminalised in 2012 (Tory-Lib coalition) those convicted risk spending all but a year rehoused in prison.

BTB Why is everything so expensive in Switzerland? And is it worth it?

Here is cheap, we are cheap, food is cheap, rents are silly cheap. And as for freehold residential property: you can't give it away. Becuase almpst no one wants to live here.



ETA: One way or another rent is a root cause. All sorts of rents that have to be paid. Like the charge merchants have to pay on card transactions or for a stall on an online markets place.

From a 2021 article

Amazon Toll Road, a report from the nonprofit Institute for Local Self-Reliance (ILSR), found that Amazon charged third-party sellers a total of $121 billion in fees this year alone.