More money, more problems
Is the increased funding in mental health helping?
There is an enormous discrepancy in our society.
On one hand, there is a lot of money going towards mental health. This trend has only skyrocketed over the past few years, and the momentum doesn’t seem to be slowing down. And this is not exclusive to the private arena: The government has also been allocating “record-setting” amounts to various mental health causes and programs.
Yet despite this increase in funding, we still have a system that fails many people. Those with mental illness and housing insecurity continue to sleep on the streets untreated, suicide rates don’t seem to be decreasing, and our overall mental health apparatus feels like a broken pipeline that discharges most people before they can receive the help that they need.
But why is it that despite increased funding in mental health, things just don’t seem to be improving?
This is a complex problem. Like an endless labyrinth, any specific issue that we highlight leads us to numerous other ones. Yet we have to start somewhere.
One of these reasons for the discrepancy is that private funding does not flow to the area of greatest necessity, but into the territory that is most lucrative. And so, instead of money helping fund businesses and solutions for those who need it most, it goes towards businesses that may generate the most profit.
Furthermore, there is difficulty in raising funding for businesses that are positioned as focused on social impact. This was highlighted in my conversation with Quyen Tran, who has significant experience leading investor relations and capital development at leading investment management institutions.
Throughout her work, she has noticed that investors are still somewhat hesitant of funding companies or investment funds with a social mission due to a pervasive belief that social impact can detract from performance returns.
In other words, investors need to generate returns, and the overall consensus is that a social mission will take away from the goal of making money.
The data, however, is beginning to show that impact investments can do as well as “pure bottom line” investments, and that investing in a company with a social mission does not need to detract from financial returns. Furthermore, the performance of successful B-corps such as Unilever, Allbirds, and Patagonia shows that companies with a social mission can perform just as well, if not better, than companies without a social mission.
Although the interest in impact investing is rising, it is still in early innings and continues to face skepticism
Yet another problem that leads to this discrepancy is the overall inefficiency of systems that help the most marginalized. I had firsthand experience with this while working at a shelter for the homeless.
One of the first issues I noticed was that it could take months or years for someone to obtain the necessary documents. And so, clients who needed identity documents such as birth certification or immigration documents were “frozen” and could not access the range of services that would help pull them out of their current situation. Other issues included overwhelming amounts of administrative work and an overall suffocation by red tape and bureaucracy. All of this contributed to a work environment that was draining, pessimistic and demotivating.
The reality is that these inefficiencies are not unique to the homelessness sector, but are common across all organizations and businesses within the human services sector. This sector includes non-profits and for-profits, in addition to government departments such as The United States Department of Housing and Urban Development and The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.
Ultimately, this discrepancy leads to an inferior society for everyone. Every one of us feels less safe and more frustrated at the unfairness of life when passing by someone who is mentally ill and living on the streets. We all lose when taxpayer dollars are funneled into inefficient systems of waste and misuse.
There is no silver bullet here — no simple and easy solution that can lead to widespread change. Instead, the first step may be a general recognition that the society we are living in currently does not seem to be working for many of its constituents.