Homelessness: billions spent, little built
September 29, 2026 · 21 min read
Rick Caruso details how Los Angeles spent billions without adding housing, Bill Murray describes bureaucracy blocking shared purpose, and Brian Simpson ties homelessness to addiction and mental illness. It points to execution and accountability, not just funding, as the problem.
The rules, numbers and steps worth keeping in front of you.
- Core claim: the shortage is results and accountability, not money.
- Rick Caruso: a Los Angeles bond measure promised 10,000 units and delivered fewer than 1,000, at about $800,000 each.
- Caruso: Skid Row nonprofits build for about $300,000 a unit; manufactured units cost about $60,000 to $70,000.
- Caruso's plan: cheap fast housing on city-controlled land, an end to open drug markets, money to proven providers.
- Caruso: one provider waits about six years to build on Skid Row; speed up permits.
- Caruso: about 20,000 women sleep on Los Angeles streets on any given night.
- Caruso's model providers offer structure, treatment, training and hope, not just a bed.
- Joe Rogan: staff are paid well regardless of outcomes, so tie funding to progress.
- Rogan: letting people camp anywhere is not compassion; they need mental health and addiction care.
- Bill Murray: do not cut blindly; the problem solvers may be inside the bureaucracy.
- Murray: set politics aside and agree on what you can.
- Brian Simpson: many start using drugs after reaching the street, to cope.
- Caution: the figures are the speakers' own, with no account of how they were measured.
- Mental illness and addiction need a doctor or licensed professional.
This is the short form. The full insight has every expert's reasoning, their own words and the sources.