Say a fine and community service, with jail time for repeat offenders.
It has worked in other countries, but they have also received unemployment benefits and other support when covid hit. In the US people are close to being evicted, the police are insane, and there’s no handouts coming from the government. So if it was implemented in the US it would be a complete shitshow. I guess the argument is whether that shitshow is better or worse than the current one.
Hey, it could be worse. It has been worse. In the 1330s, during the plague pandemic, the pope issued a decree that cats were doing witchcraft and were to be exterminated. So everyone went out and killed all the cats. Low and behold, the plague, which spread through rats, went from bad to extremely bad.
