Homeless In America

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Homelessness In America Most of us never question where we will lay our heads to sleep tonight. For many Americans, though, the answer is not quite so simple. Homelessness is defined by Merriam-Webster as, “having no home or permanent place of residence.” In a country the size of the United States, homelessness is a result of issues much deeper than we can imagine. Being homeless is probably one of the most overlooked and dismissed problems in our country today. It is easy to group these people together and label them all the same, but every homeless person has a story, a reason, or a problem, that has lead them to where they are today. Homelessness exists due to a lack of affordable housing, a loss of income, mental illness, substance abuse, and a combination of various other reasons. In our society, it seems that the rich get richer and the poor get poorer making the gap between these two Classes seem larger each year. The Middle class has carried this country, and helped fund assistance programs, but they can also find themselves caught without work or housing. Foreclosures have hit an all time high, and unfortunately some people were allowed to finance beyond their means and now have become homeless too. According to The National Coalition for the Homeless, “Housing assistance can make the difference between stable housing, precarious housing, or no housing at all. However, the demand for assisted housing clearly exceeds the supply: only about one-third of poor renter households receive a housing subsidy from the federal, state, or a local government. The limited level of housing assistance Campbell - 2 means that most poor families and individuals seeking housing assistance are placed on long waiting lists.” Not being able to afford housing does not mean that they are completely without a source of income. Many people that become homeless have jobs;

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