dignified?

 The city of Baltimore is tearing down what used to be affordable housing units. Now you can call these units by a variety of names depending upon your outlook. Originally, they were affordable housing. Apartments built to provide shelter for those that otherwise could not afford a place to live. Those living there however began to view them differently. Just a place to live with no interest in maintaining that property it's fair to say many tenants simply allowed conditions to worsen. Eventually they began calling this housing, the projects. The project was to provide housing, but the meaning of that term came to mean something entirely different. And today as that building is being torn down a city official gave a speech saying how they were going to erase the racist buildings of the past and restore the dignity to those that live in affordable housing. You see the apartments in the past just weren't good enough. New apartments with all the modern amenities of the very finest quality are what is required. The basic necessities aren't nearly enough. The whole concept of building affordable housing was just racist! It was an affront to the dignity of those people. 

 Now those living in the neighborhood, in those apartments created the environment. It is the residents that allowed certain behaviors to proliferate, indeed encouraging those behaviors. No outside sources came into those buildings and destroyed anything. No outside sources came into the building to distribute illegal substances. No, all that was done internally. Then once the place had become a run-down, dangerous environment that even the residents themselves began to fear, it was called the hood. In the neighborhood. That's what the meaning is. Thing is, the residents created that hood and they alone are responsible for that. You can make all the excuses you want about the landlords not fixing things, ignoring the tenants, but the fact remains, it is the residents that make the neighborhood. It's like my grandmother would say, you can be dirt poor but that's no reason your clothes can't be clean, your home clean and you have good manners. Personal pride and dignity cost nothing! 

 Now affordable housing is defined as housing made affordable to those with a median income. Generally speaking, that means your cost of housing shouldn't exceed 30% of your income. That's the figure most banks use when approving mortgages. If you go by what the government says is the average income for an American today that cost would be 1688 a month. If your rent is higher than that you should get affordable housing. But that doesn't work at the bank, does it? No, ideals and reality are quite different. The bank will not give you a mortgage greater than 1/3 of your income. 

 In the affordable housing model, the rents are usually paid, subsidized by some sort of voucher system. In short taking from those that have, to give to those that don't have. And now we have decided that those that don't have should have the very best! Just because you can't afford the best, doesn't mean you shouldn't get the best. No instead everyone gets the same. There's a name for that, it's called socialism. 

 Not a bad system if you don't have anything, not so good if you want to improve yourself. That's because not only do you have to improve yourself you have to continually provide that upgrade to those behind you. They must get what you get! You need to make twice as much. Its charity taken to a new level. Codified charity! In the church it is called a tithe. 10% is a tithe. Interesting to note is that no matter how much you make the first 10,000 dollars is taxed at 10%. A tithe to the government. Most of us are paying a good deal more than 10% however. That's to make up for those that aren't paying anything. Of course, sometimes, like right now for instance, the government needs to borrow more money to pay for all this charity. But then again, we wouldn't want to offend anyone's dignity. 

  Now the push is on for 15 an hour to be the minimum wage. That equates to 31,200 dollars before taxes. That means your housing cost, to be affordable, should be 780 dollars a month if you paid no taxes at all. The average cost of a two-bedroom home today is about 100,000 dollars. If you have the very finest credit rating and live in the best neighborhood your mortgage could be 550 a month on that 100,000 dollar loan. Few will qualify for that loan. According to government sources the average hourly wage is $27.77. Currently the federal government has set the min wage at $7.25. That's 14,500 a year. That means your housing cost should be 362 a month. But the government is also saying your housing should be as good as those making 67,000 a year. The plan is to build that and have those people pay for it. Seems fair enough doesn't it. And everyone maintains their dignity.