Charge:
Homelessness is not a choice. There may be a small amount of people who experience homelessness and enjoy it, but the overwhelming majority are suffering. After university I lived out of my truck as I wandered the nation, it was part necessity, part desire — a desire to see and understand the people of my nation, how they live, what they do, and how they think. While out, I experienced some of the common difficulties faced while homeless. Talking to homeless people in parks, libraries or on the streets of San Francisco has opened my eyes to one of the biggest social atrocities affecting our nation: the fundamental lack of a holistic support system for our poorest and most vulnerable citizens.
I’ve been putting off writing this post for so long because of the way it makes me feel. Homelessness is one of the most heart-wrenching, unethical side-effects of wealth inequality. Every time I read more about it, or talk to somebody on the street, I feel a heavy societal guilt. Someday I will do a formal rant on the centuries-old failures of greed and capitalism, but first I need to pay my respects to our neglected communities.
There are two lines of questioning that get asked when I tell people I’m researching homelessness. The first, always asked by non-homeless, starts, “How did they get there?” The second, always asked by homeless people yet rarely by housed, sounds like, “How do we fix it?” I’ll go ahead and answer both in this post. But for future reference, one of those questions is far more important.
Definitions and Statistics:
Homelessness is best defined as the state of an individual without permanent housing who may live on the streets; stay in a shelter, mission, single room occupancy facilities, abandoned building or vehicle; or in any other unstable or non-permanent situation. [Section 330 of the Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C., 254b)]
Gentrification is a small cause of homelessness I want to touch on because I am unwillingly an accomplice to it in San Francisco. I won’t harp on it too much in this post, but know that it’s a whole ‘nother beast in itself. Here’s the definition: “the process of renewal and rebuilding accompanying the influx of middle-class or affluent people into deteriorating areas that often displaces poorer residents.” [Merriam-Webster]
Chronic
- “Persons most like the stereotyped profile of the “skid-row” homeless, who are likely to be entrenched in the shelter system and for whom shelters are more like long-term housing rather than an emergency arrangement. These individuals are likely to be older, and consist of the “hard-core unemployed”, often suffering from disabilities and substance abuse problems. Yet such persons represent a far smaller proportion of the population compared to the transitionally homeless.”
Transitional
- “Transitionally homeless individuals generally enter the shelter system for only one stay and for a short period. Such persons are likely to be younger, are probably recent members of the precariously housed population and have become homeless because of some catastrophic event, and have been forced to spend a short time in a homeless shelter before making a transition into more stable housing. Over time, transitionally homeless individuals will account for the majority of persons experiencing homelessness given their higher rate of turnover.”
Episodic
- “Those who frequently shuttle in and out of homelessness are known as episodically homeless. They are most likely to be young, but unlike those in transitional homelessness, episodically homeless individuals often are chronically unemployed and experience medical, mental health, and substance abuse problems.”
Size of Homeless Community:
Getting an understanding of the size of this community is difficult because point-in-time counts really don’t capture all stages of homelessness. Individuals hiding away in sub-optimal living spaces like cars can easily be missed. The department of Housing and Urban Development releases a point-in-time count each year for most urban municipalities by walking the streets and accessing shelter numbers. This year was the first year since the housing crash that homelessness rose. The report said 554,000 people were without permanent or adequate residence on a night in January 2017.
However, this count does not show the entire picture. In order to get a more appropriate number, some estimates must be made. From my research I’ve found most sources referencing a number from 1.7 million to 3.5 million. This is the total number of people who experience any stage of homelessness at some time throughout the year. That’s 1% of our entire population. Even though 1% sounds like a small number, I urge you once again to realize the insurmountable suffering endured by these 3,500,000 American human beings. Then, realize that you will probably never understand their immense pain. Then remember that I’m only talking about Americans. Homelessness is not a uniquely American phenomenon.
Overall, the United States ranks fine compared to other civilized nations, but that is for two reasons. First, many other European nations are accepting hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees that have nowhere else to go because they own nothing. Second, the number we report is bogus. Regardless of the numbers, it’s obvious that we are experiencing a homelessness crisis in America. The main cause for this crisis is due to the way we have historically approached the issue: through a failed plan called homelessness management — more on this later.
Demographics of Homeless Community:
To get a picture of the different types of people experiencing homelessness, I’m going to run through the percentages.
Homelessness disproportionately affects men. Overall, sheltered and unsheltered, men account for 61% of the homeless population. Women account for 29% and less than 1% identify as LGBTQ+. The total unsheltered ratio is even more skewed with 71% being male.
The gender ratio has always been heavier on the male side, but the ratio that has changed recently is the number of young people on the street. In the most recent point-in-time survey it was found out that 33% of homeless people are experiencing homelessness as a family. Young people account for approximately 30% of the homeless population, with 20% aged 0-18 and 10% aged 18-24. These statistics have never been this bad in all of American history; not even the Great Depression matches this unprecedented amount of homeless youth.
More saddening statistics are that 9-13% of the total homeless population are veterans, which has increased in the last few years. Around 25% of homeless are affected by at least one severe mental illness. 38% are dependent on alcohol and 26% addicted to at least one hard drug.
Finally, where are the largest populations of homeless located? Overall, two states stand out the most. California with 26% of the total homeless population and New York with 16%. But there are three main urban localities that account for those numbers: New York City, Los Angeles, and the San Francisco Bay Area.
How did they get there?
This video does an incredible job in quickly highlighting the common ways individuals find themselves entrenched in homelessness. There are many avenues, but the most common are poverty and lack of affordable housing.
Poverty
In 2016, nearly 13% of Americans lived below the poverty line. Growing income inequality and debt have made life difficult for many Americans. It’s no surprise that anybody can fall into homelessness when 62% of Americans have less than $1,000 in their savings account. For those people, living paycheck to paycheck is an unfortunate fact of life. And when you are in that circumstance, costly emergencies, the loss of a job, or the loss of a spouse could spell disaster. Even though unemployment is at its lowest in 18 years at only 3.9%, the quality of life hasn’t really changed. Jobs simply aren’t paying enough. Graduates are finding themselves marginalized and underemployed at a staggering rate. It’s not just young people either, in upwards of 46% of seniors are dependent on social security to pay 90% of their expenses. Anyone is susceptible to homelessness, it just takes one crisis to lose all of your money and hope. Hell, getting a parking ticket, or your car towed can mean you miss your next month’s rent, putting you in danger of eviction.
Affordable Housing
In places like San Francisco and New York City, the two most expensive cities to live in America, affordable and available housing is obviously in short supply. But since the housing crash in 2007, it’s been more than just the urban areas that have been feeling the effect. Renters are at an all time high, and over 25% of households are paying over 50% of their income to housing. The Department of Housing and Urban Development states: families with only one full-time worker making minimum wage can’t afford rent for a two-bedroom market-priced apartment anywhere in the country. Ever since the Reagan administration and the defunding of the Housing and Urban Development department, subsidized contracts to construct and maintain public housing have nearly vanished. And there is no sign of this changing soon.
This is where gentrification comes into play. Large urban areas like the San Francisco Bay Area are booming with highly lucrative industries, mostly due to consistent advancements in technology. These industries attract highly skilled workers from all over the world, and they expect to be paid well for their qualifications. Wealthy landowners and real estate corporations will recognize this influx of highly paid workers and move to revitalize their properties and eventually raise rents. This process forces out long standing residents who may already be living in poverty and cannot afford to pay the new rates. I live in a studio apartment in arguably the roughest district in the city, and the rent is $1,850 a month. You can’t find a place for any less than $1,700 if you tried. Families whose income is less than $60,000 a year (which is the national median) would be paying half of their income just to have a place to stay. This growth is unsustainable, and we are heading towards an inflation disaster. There is no reason for all these companies to be in the same 100 mile radius, and soon I expect to see a max exodus.
Social System Failures
Other factors play a key role in the rise of the homelessness epidemic. Deinstitutionalisation in the late 20th century, an abundance of foster care children with poor, inadequate or lacking families, a criminal justice system which incarcerates and releases with no continued support, the proliferation of cheap and highly addictive street drugs like crack cocaine and meth, veterans returning home from war without adequate support, and the rising costs of health care all contribute to this intractable problem.
One of the most frustrating things I hear when talking to housed individuals is, “Why can’t they just get off their ass and get a job?” As if they know anything about the difficulties these people face. How is someone expected to get a job when they don’t have access to a shower, clean clothes or any modern amenities? Homeless people are more worried about getting robbed, beaten or murdered than the format of their resume. They have to think about whether or not this alcove in a rat infested alleyway is going to provide enough shelter from the elements, not to mention getting something to eat that day, or finding a place to drink clean water and use the restroom.
You can’t even easily qualify for state/federal aid if you don’t have an address to receive it at. The “system” we have in place to support homeless individuals is broken, and actually perpetuates the problem.
How do we fix it?
Homelessness management is a methodology for housing these vulnerable neighbors that enlists temporary shelter housing, coupled with publicly funded hospitals and prisons to get these people off the streets and out of danger every night. And it’s costing the American taxpayer a fortune. Not only that, but it’s not working. Billions of dollars have been spent thanks to the McKinney-Vento grants to aid these support centers, but the numbers haven’t changed. Why? Because there isn’t motivation to create a holistic support system that takes into account all the difficulties faced by these people. We bucket funding into nodes in the network, but nobody seems to realize that in order to make change they need to work together.
A blog post similar to this one by Sam Davis of UC Berkeley highlights this flawed methodology and known working alternatives. The one thing that absolutely improves the quality of life for these individuals is a notion called ‘housing first’. The idea is: in order for progress to be made in a homeless person’s life, their main struggles need to be provided for. As I mentioned earlier, homeless people are not worried about going to the doctor or getting sober. Their primary concern on a day-to-day basis is where can they get food, water, shelter and safety. Their lives are exclusively survival-based. And until they have a reliable source for the necessities of life, they can’t get any better.
Supportive Housing
Instead of spending loads of money on contracted services that have no communication with one another, and only dedicate small portions of funding to the actual housing of these people, we should fund and develop supportive housing. Supportive housing is the development of subsidized permanent residences where individuals can not only live, but have easy access to the help they need. Within the residence there would be a point of contact who would be similar to a resident adviser on college dorms. This person or group would work with the residents and make sure they are seeking the right help and following up on their plan to well-being. The housing would connect people with the proper health services, mental health services, drug counselling, job training, and anything else these people might need.
This approach is designed to cater to the individual experiencing homelessness, and their progress could be tracked and managed by the support group at the housing facility. One note that Sam brings up in his post is that we don’t want these to feel institutional. Many of these individuals suffering don’t want to feel homogenized and labeled. Even more so, they should feel integrated in the greater community. This requires a change in mindset among citizens, something that definitely won’t happen overnight.
Temporary Housing
Even if the federal government stepped up their game and orchestrated these programs on a grand scale across the nation, there would still be a delay of support. We need not solely focus on the best long-term approach, but also improve our current temporary support network. By building out better shelters, having individuals working to manage the support these people are getting, and continuing a societal campaign to change the mindset of current residents in these neighborhoods, we can provide a structured support system in the meantime. Our current homeless management system is barely a system at all. If we integrated some of the services the people and taxpayers would be benefited greatly. So until affordable housing projects are publicly funded on the federal level again, these band-aid solutions can actually do some good.
Alternative housing ideas such as encampments, shipping crates, and tiny homes should not be ruled out of consideration either. Localities should spend time and resources finding places within their respective borders to provide both long-term and temporary housing improvements. This plan in general can be replicated in all municipalities, but the approach needs to be catered towards the land and space available, environmental considerations, and public approval. This is where all of us come in.
What can you do about it?
The problem of homelessness isn’t going away any time soon. As we see our economy continue to drive more and more people into dire circumstances, and less and less is done to aid our poorest citizens, it’s obvious this problem isn’t going away. So what can any one person do to affect change? It’s a hard question to answer.
For starters, if you are in a position to donate to some of these organizations working tirelessly to alleviate the difficulties faced by homeless people, please do: National Coalition for the Homeless, National Alliance to End Homelessness, or find a center near you to support. Many of the citations are credited to them, and not only do they help homeless assertive networks, but they all do good work advocating for policy change in government.
Another way to help is by donating your time. Shelters across the nation are in need of temporary and continued volunteer service and would gladly take any help they can get. This is especially important for my next point.
Stop ignoring these people. Each person you see on the street is another human being. The idea that they probably got themselves into this situation and should be left alone to figure out how to get out of it is morally horrific and logistically absurd. We as a society need to to hold ourselves collectively responsible for getting these people the help they deserve. In many developed nations across the world, each citizen is allotted basic human rights such as a shelter, health care, and education. It’s not communism, it’s basic respect for the well-being of our fellow human beings. Our nation is extremely wealthy and we still can’t afford that common respect for humanity. We should be smarter about how we spend our time, money and effort, and that starts with the individual.
When you see a homeless person on the street, whether they are asking for money, shooting up heroin, or just laying down on the sidewalk, give them the common decency of eye contact. Look at them, see their pain, and respect their humanity. If you can only do that, you have no idea the effect it will have on them and yourself. Just don’t look away. If after a while you can muster the strength to have a conversation with some of them, please do. You shouldn’t be afraid of homeless people any more than anyone else. Nobody deserves to feel ignored, alone, and left to rot.
If we can all just do this, we will start to love these people and care for their well-being. We will become upset, not at them, but at the fact that nobody in power is doing anything about it. And our collective outrage at the failure of our current system will drive political change. Then maybe, with considerate legislation and well managed programs, we can end homelessness once and for all.