Causes Of Homelessness In America

Improved Essays
Homelessness in America
Homelessness has been a problem that we’ve been facing for a long time now. Through the years we have noticed different patterns on the homelessness population in the U.S. alone: the homeless population has gone up, down, but has never completely disappeared. In the U.S. alone, homelessness has become a huge problem that may escalate in the near future if we don’t try and find solutions to it.
Homelessness has to be the cause of something, right? It can’t just happen out of nowhere. One of the main causes of homelessness is unemployment. Some people end up in the streets because they lose their job (whether they are fired or from a sudden cut of working staff) and they can’t find another job in time. With bills and
…show more content…
Sometimes a person can have a job but still go homeless because the rent of the house may be too expensive to afford. The person may try to look for another place that can be affordable, but in most cases, the place that is too expensive for them is the cheapest place available and so they have to live on the streets. Another main cause of homelessness is overpopulation. In places like China and India, the population is so high that they live in crowded spaces. The government can’t help families that much with this problem because there is limited space and resources while the population is still growing. Eventually, there won’t be enough space and resources for everyone. The rate at which people are born everyday is higher than the rate of people dying everyday. This means that the world population is growing and growing. Unfortunately, the population is growing at such an exponential rate that we will reach the ten billion mark in a few years. As sad as it sounds, wars have to happen in order to control the world population. Another cause of why this phenomenom is still at large is because some people end up in the streets as an …show more content…
Racial ethnicity varies widely in the community as well as age. According to a study made by the National Coalition for the Homeless, children under the age of eighteen make up more than a third of the homeless population. Another study made by the National Center on Family Homelessness says that “one in fifty children in the United States experiences homelessness each year.” It’s kind of terrifying that people like us (teenagers and children) make up a third of the homeless population. Wait, no, more than a third of the homeless population! That’s crazy! Another crazy thing is that there are still veterans that are homeless. The people that risked their lives in order to fight for this country don’t have a place to stay. The main cause of this would be that when they returned from war they had suffered long-term damage over there. Now that has put them at a disability that it has prevented them from working anywhere. They also don’t have any family that cares about them so the only place left to go is the streets. However, over the years the amount of veterans in the homeless community had diminished. A study says, “The total number of veterans living on the streets has fallen by a third since 2010. That’s about 25,000 fewer veterans without housing”. Many organizations are now helping our fallen heroes find a new home. An event called Stand Down, which has been located for the past 27 years in San

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    Throughout the world, homelessness is an ongoing problem that affects millions of people on a daily basis. Many people face an intense struggle to survive harsh conditions and stay alive. It is a constant effort to break out of the homelessness despite the fact that the society turns against the homeless population. Homelessness is a societal issue that cuts through every race, age, and cultural background; however, the lack of affordable housing is a common issue homeless people share. Societal issue, such as homelessness affects micro, mezzo, and macro levels of social work.…

    • 1263 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Homeless people have been seen living on city streets, under bridges, cars, in front of stores, and other places. People who are jobless struggle to sustain their life, which then might result in becoming them homeless. I think that the main problem of homelessness is that the government is supporting the wrong people. Welfare should be limited to a certain amount of people, after an amount of time they would have to go back to work and then the government can help other people get back on their…

    • 500 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Homeless People Effect

    • 88 Words
    • 1 Pages

    Nowadays, Our world has many homeless people. Do you know who they are and from where? Homeless people create a lot of problems in the country and to the adverse impact of the many ways, such as the image of the country, the social, etc. They do not want to be a homeless person they would like to have a house is the same as the normal. Three significant causes why have number of homeless people are increasing everyday Throw Away Teens, drug abuse problem, and mental illness.…

    • 88 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The income and housing cost become unbalance. Some people become homeless because of mental illness, drug addiction, and alcoholism. One of those people has a higher risk of becoming homeless than others (“Hunger and Homeless” 1). Homelessness is also caused by tragic life occurrences like loss of loved ones, job loss, domestic violence, and divorce.…

    • 1578 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    Homeless has been around but it’s been ignored until what brought more attention to it was the Great Depression. This is not the first time that this social problem have been presented. On October 29, 1929, change happened in America and it was not good for the people. The Stock Market crashed, which caused many people to lose their jobs and home, which arise from in many being homeless.…

    • 238 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Decent Essays

    The primary causes are poverty and lack of affordable housing. Various other conditions, both physical and mental, are also triggers for homelessness. They include the loss of a job, a natural disaster, mental illness, lack of community or family support, addiction, domestic violence, and chronic unemployment (Buckley 55). Most homeless people lose their job or get laid off…

    • 236 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Epidemic of Homelessness in America Imagine the limitations of providing adequate housing for you, and your family while living paycheck to paycheck. Where a sick day, or the cut back of hours at work could leave you with the inability to pay rent. Unfortunately, this is a hardship that millions of Americans who live below the poverty line face on a daily basis. Now, imagine someone suffering with mental illness, or drug addiction on their own, who are obviously in desperate need for the resources that could enable them to become functional in society.…

    • 985 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Social, economic and individual factors also have an influence on whether someone becomes homeless. Hopefully one day we as American come together and we have system that everyone could live by and no one would ever be out on the streets and would not eve have to worry about homeless people…

    • 762 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Satire On Homelessness

    • 657 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Primarily homelessness falls into an economic issue also affected by political issues, Economically the high issues causing homelessness are lack of affordable housing, a gap between wage earnings and the cost of housing leaves millions of individuals unable to meet end meet. It is shown that to afford a house for a…

    • 657 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    According to the National Alliance to End Homelessness, “homelessness occurs when people or households are unable to acquire and/or maintain housing they can afford”. People who are living in poverty have the highest possibility of becoming homeless. Homelessness in America can be improved if the government developed employment, housing, and mental health assistance. Since 2007, the government has implemented several programs and in doing so, homelessness has been on a steady decline.…

    • 212 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Homelessness in the United States of America is a real issue. According to the November 2015 National Homeless Report (AHAR) to Congress the numbers of homeless in America are staggering numbers. There are estimated 564,706 persons homeless every night. Additionally, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the homeless are more susceptible to infectious diseases, chronic illness, mental health issues, substance abuse and violence. Even more alarming is the mortality rate for the homeless, which is four to nine times higher when compared to those persons that are not homeless.…

    • 416 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    (Basirico, Cashion & Eshelman, 2014). The National coalition for the Homeless reports that 39% of the homeless in the United States are children under the age of 18 (2014). Homelessness affects people of all races, geographic…

    • 788 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    It is one of the important issues that might affect many people in any society around the world. Homelessness is very difficult situation. It is loneliness and stressful way to live. These people are around city and…

    • 1278 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Great Essays

    The steadily increasing rate of homelessness in Chicago is a social justice issue that is difficult to ignore. It is nearly impossible to walk down Michigan Avenue without noticing the countless shivering, hungry people begging for spare change. But the people we see on our everyday route to school and work are only a very small portion of the thousands of people suffering throughout the city. The National Health Care for the Homeless Council defines homelessness as “…an individual without permanent housing who may live on the streets; in a shelter, mission, single room occupancy facilities, abandoned building or vehicle; or in any other instable or non-permanent situation”(1). Chicagoans may think they know about the issue of homelessness…

    • 2068 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Like the conservatives and liberal, homelessness may be caused by failed government or doing it to themselves. Moreover, homelessness is caused by many other reasons. Natural disasters occur in certain locations; the aftermath is not always as we expect. In the YouTube video, Sociological Perspective Project: Homelessness, it stated that about 141 million people lost their home by 3,559 natural disasters, such as floods, landslides, earthquakes, and windstorms throughout the globe (Fulton 2012). Also, physical and mental disability plays a role in homelessness.…

    • 974 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Superior Essays