Majority of the homeless are the Hawaiians, and it may be because they re on drugs, but more often than not they can t afford the skyrocketing rents here. It s sad to know that native people can t live comfortably on their own land. It s disgusting.That s not to say that ALL Hawaiians are homeless. I know plenty who have jobs and live in either apartments or houses with no problems.On Oahu, the Waianae coast and Ala Moana Beach Park are where you ll see them. Sleeping in their tents and cars.
It depends who you talk to. I have lived in NYC and there are more homeless people in NYC, but, because of the cold weather during the winter and because NY State provides plenty of shelters and assistance, you don t see them as often as you do in Hawaii. Hawaii is warm and there are plenty of parks and beaches for the homeless to camp at, so they are simply more visible. The state of Hawaii does offer plenty of benefits, but unless you have a social security card, birth certificate and driver s license, it is very hard to attain these benefits.The big issue, in my opinion, are the drugs. People spend all their life savings to drugs - namely crystal meth. You see these people in the streets who are addicted to the drug. The poverty level is similar to NYC. There are the areas which are nice and expensive - Hawaii Kai, Manoa, Haleiwa, etc. But then you have your inner city area. Unfortunately, all the inner city areas are in Honolulu, which is a huge tourist draw, so people see the inner city life on their way from the airport to their nice hotel in Waikiki. Jobs pay OK. However, the cost of living is extremely high because everything has to be shipped out to HI, so everything becomes more expensive, causing more people to lose money.
Coming from San Francisco which has a very bad homeless problem, I d say Oahu has just as bad or even a worse problem with homeless. However, I do not believe crime is as bad as some of the other major cities like LA and NYC. It is mostly petty crimes in Hawaii, a lot of thefts and not as many violent crimes.Oahu is where the majority of Hawaii s industry is and as a result, about 90% of the population live on Oahu. Oahu s unemployment rate is still fairly low, about 7.5% which is a bit lower than the national average in Oct. of 10.2 %Jobs do pay much less while the cost of living is comparable to San Francisco. The low salary is commonly referred to on the island as the paradise tax or price of paradise . Hawaii is a great place to live, but a really bad place to try to save or make a lot of money.
you only get problems in and around honolulu...there are bums like most places and a huge meth problem..but once out of the city everyone trusts each other and things like hitch-hiking are common. its way chill and relaxed. most hawaiians are not homeless but many live in houses i would call small or crappy.
Poverty and homelessness is very bad in Hawaii and Africa and the whole world.. It is a shame to humanity.. We must fight against this phenomena and try our best to mitigate poverty and prevent unnecessary wars.