Homelessness may look like a patchwork of people with different stories from different backgrounds, but a few basic reasons explain the majority of homelessness in the United States. Many people without permanent dwellings fit into more than one of these categories. A lack of affordable housing, mental illness, and general poverty are the primary reasons for homelessness, and other reasons tend to be related to these three basics.
Homelessness Because of Lack of Affordable Housing
When Congress enacted the minimum wage, some consideration went into what that wage could buy. Over time, that buying power has gone down, and now people have a hard time paying for housing despite working, often more than one job at a time. The National Coalition for the Homeless, the most prominent advocacy organization for homelessness, data suggests that there are places in every state where someone working full-time for minimum wage, or even above it, will not be able to afford decent housing. This homelessness because of lack of affordable housing leads many people into homelessness because they have no other option.
Mental Illness and Homelessness
Images of Vietnam-era veterans who are homeless are fairly common, and homeless advocacy groups often discuss the number of homeless veterans in the United States. What many of these homeless advocacy organizations do not point out enough is that mental illness is behind much of this homelessness. In fact, mental illness is a leading cause of homelessness, regardless of veteran status. People who are mentally ill often have a hard time maintaining a job and cannot afford housing.
Poverty and Homelessness
The National Coalition for the Homeless reports a poverty rate around 13 percent in the United States. In some states, that rate is as high as 20 percent, making poverty an issue for a significant percentage of the population. These people often have to make a choice about what they can afford, and many times being homeless is preferable to being hungry or ill-clothed. Estimates about children in homelessness suggest that as many as 1.3 million children in the United States are among the ranks of the homeless. These children most often are in situations where the parents present do not make enough money to put the children into stable homes.
The next time you see people out and about who are homeless, consider offering them food, a sweater, or just a good conversation. Few people “choose” homelessness; instead many people are homeless because of life circumstances that got to be too much for them.
