With the current recession, it is a very real possibility that more than 1.5 million will be forced into homelessness in the next two years alone (PBS: Public Broadcasting Services, 2011). Imagine, that number of people do not have a permanent and safe home in which to live. Why? Why do we have so many homeless in one of the wealthiest countries in the world? Clearly homelessness is a problem in America.
Another big cause of homelessness is people not having health care. They could have a job, but not given the benefit of free health care, so therefore if a poor family or individual were to be seriously ill they would not have enough money to pay for their health as well as to have a home. A high percentage of homeless people also are known to have a mental illness which could make it difficult to even impossible for them to get a job. As many as 3.5 million people in the United States has been reported of experiencing homelessness in a given year, even though most were temporarily. Some statistics of reported homeless Americans show 40% are families with children—the fastest growing segment, 41% are single males, 14% are single females, 5% are minors unaccompanied by adults, 49%
A lack of affordable housing has contributed to homelessness. The loss of affordable housing puts a great number of people at risk of homelessness. The lack of affordable housing has led to high rent burdens (rents which absorb a high proportion of income), overcrowding, and substandard housing. These phenomena’s, in turn, have not only forced many people to become homeless; they have put a large and growing number of people at risk of becoming homeless. Excessive waiting lists for public housing mean that people must remain in shelters or inadequate housing arrangements longer.
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.
Chapter 5 of the James and Gilliland text describes a crisis intervention team (CIT) approach to dealing with crises of the mentally ill, many of whom are homeless or have entered unstable living situations since the Community Mental Health Act of 1963. The act brought changes that released many mentally ill people back into the community. Analyze the tools and resources that a CIT approach could offer in your own community if you were developing these resources. Analyze the benefits and potential obstacles of this approach if you were the ambassador to advocate locally for the concept. Determining the amount of homeless individuals in any given area can be a difficult task and statistics very dependent on the source.
(Baumohl, 2001) Some people felt like homelessness was caused by heavy drinking, drug abuse, and mental problems. Because of the new policies the government made, these people were not allowed to be housed in hospitals and jails. “Homelessness was described mainly as a problem in the rehabilitation and control of troubled and troublesome people who were not only houseless but barred from their traditional institutional shelters and estranged from family and friends who might take them in”. (Baumohl, p.
Even outside urban communities, this has become a common sight at busy intersections and freeway off-ramps. As many as 3.5 million Americans are homeless each year and of these, more than 1 million are children, which on any given night can total more than 300,000. Homelessness has so permeated the American landscape that it may seem that the social conundrum has always been a part of our society. However, homelessness is a thoroughly modern phenomenon and primarily an economic problem. It is affected by a number of factors such as people not wanting to help the poor, lack of or limited income and those affected by disabilities.
Then you have the homeless people who don't receive medical treatment, and end up with long term diseases, that need long term care. Alot of homeless people feel the prisons, and jails, which is very costly to the tax payer. There are laws that target the homeless such as, loitering, sleeping in cars, and begging, which make it easy for them to end up behind bars. A study done by The University of Texas, shows that a homeless person staying in jail for a year cost 14,480 and a one year prison stay would cost about 20,000. It is actually shown that providing these homeless citizens with permanent housing would save more money and be more cost effective.
Running Head: Homelessness Homelessness Porsha Taylor GE265 Wed Mornings Homelessness Homelessness is extreme poverty in U.S society. My opinion is that our society sees it from a Moral Relativism point, which I believe it shouldn’t be seen from. I identify myself as Moral Pluralism. On any given night in America, anywhere from 700,000 to 2 million people are homeless, according to estimates of the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty. A count in January, 2007, found 745 homeless people in Lucas County, with 200 of those classified as "chronically" homeless, according to HUD data.
Homelessness has been a major problem in America even though it is the richest country in the world. New Jersey is one of the richest states in the country and it has a significant homeless problem. Historically there has always been homeless people in America. There began a cultural shift when America transformed itself from a rural agrarian lifestyle to an urban metropolis where industry and technology became the central focus of its booming economy. The simultaneous emergence of the suburbs where the middle class and affluent would live and the inner city where the proletariat and poor would dwell created a dichotomy that promoted increased homelessness.