[AdmiralAsshat]

What I found amusingly about that paragraph is that the author laments encountering "the crackhead" while paying exorbitant rent.

That implies the crackhead can also afford said rent. In which case, they have just as much right to be in the elevator as the author. Fuck off!

[JuniperMesos]

Many buildings in expensive urban areas have legal requirements to set aside a certain number of units as affordable housing. If that's how the building the OP lives in is regulated, then it's quite possible that the crackhead can't actually afford the rent, except by virtue of winning a government-run lottery to gain access to a government-mandated rent subsidy.