Even published, sometimes well-known, artists work for surprisingly little. That’s a particular reality in an internet world where intellectual property is usually free.  Sometimes, self-expression and profit are even at odds.

In Monterey County, the percentage of black or African American people who are homeless is more than seven times higher than the county’s black population. It is nearly six times higher at the state level. While only 3.5% of people living in Monterey County identify as “black or African American,” 25% of the county’s homeless population identifies as such, according to the homeless census, also known as the Point-in-Time Count.  And across the state, the U.S. Census shows about 6.5% of Californians identify as black or African American, but they account for nearly 40% of the state’s homeless, according to a Department of Housing and Urban Development report to Congress. Nationally, black people account for 13.4% of the population but are 39.8% of the homeless population. A September report from Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority (LAHSA) indicates institutional racism plays a large role in the extreme over-representation of homelessness of all people of color.  “Black people are more likely than White people to experience homelessness in the United States, including in Los Angeles County,”  the report says. “…The impact of institutional and structural racism in education, criminal justice, housing, employment, health care, and access to opportunities cannot be denied: homelessness is a by-product of racism in America.”

The survey also found that nearly a quarter (23 percent) of unsheltered adults lost their housing in 2018 and were experiencing homelessness for the first time. In Los Angeles, a renter earning minimum wage ($13.25 an hour) would need to work 79 hours per week to afford a one-bedroom apartment.

L.A.H.S.A.’s 2019 homeless count found that 64 percent of the 58,936 Los Angeles County residents experiencing homelessness had lived in the city for more than 10 years. Less than a fifth (18 percent) said they had lived out of state before becoming homeless.In San Francisco, 43 percent of the homeless said they had lived in the city for more than 10 years.

“Single-family zoning became basically the only option to try to maintain both race and class segregation,” said Jessica Trounstine, an associate professor of political science at the University of California, Merced, who has studied segregation.

Single-family neighborhoods rose to prominence across the country after the United States Supreme Court ruled in 1917 that zoning based on race was unconstitutional.

Whenever we think about a problem in America, for better or for worse, we always ask: What is the government doing about this or how can they help? And if the problem gets big enough, it starts to be talked about by presidential campaigns, schooling, health care — these pretty intimate things.

A lot of our housing policy is determined not at the federal level, but by a million city councils that, together, determine where, how and how much our shelter costs.

We have a huge rent burden problem. A quarter of renters spend more than half their income on rent.

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Erin McCormick i

Ready meals and convenience cooking spare the consumer effort in preparation of a meal while providing high levels of energy and pronounced, if mostly artificial, flavour.