Few social problems have increased so suddenly or been dramatized so effectively as the plight of the homeless in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Once an invisible people who could easily be ignored, the homeless are now recognized everywhere on the streets and in the public facilities of major cities. There are bag ladies who roam the streets carrying what is left of their possessions in shopping bags or grocery carts. There are disoriented men curled up on benches, in stairwells, or alongside walls. There are children—some runaways and some throwaways—scrounging for food and shelter. The number of homeless people in underdeveloped societies in the mid-1980s was estimated by the United Nations (UN) to be more than 100 million. The so-called “new” homeless live in the developed, industrialized nations of Europe, North America, and East Asia. Accurate statistics have been impossible to verify, in part because of the conflicting viewpoints on the subject of homelessness. Advocates for the homeless have said that there are from 2 to 3 million homeless in the United States alone. Others who have studied the problem from a less sympathetic point of view suggest that the number is closer to 300,000. One reason for statistical uncertainty is the composition of the homeless population. Some families suffer temporary poverty because of loss of a job. Unable to afford rent or mortgage payments, they may temporarily join the ranks of the homeless for a period of days or weeks (or they may live with relatives). Once another job is found, the family can usually afford shelter once more. Those who are truly homeless consist of possibly 3 percent or less of the very poor. Their most common characteristic is poverty, though some work at least part-time, while others receive various kinds of welfare payments. A study conducted by the United States Conference of Mayors in 2003 found the following breakdown of the homeless population in 25 major U.S. cities: 41 percent single men, 14 percent single women, 40 percent in families (usually one-parent families), and 5 percent unaccompanied minors. As a group, the homeless tend to be young, mostly under the age of 40. The 2003 study estimated that almost a quarter of all homeless people are former mental patients who have been discharged under deinstitutionalization programs. Many of the homeless are also addicted to drugs or alcohol or both. Some are victims of structural unemployment—temporary, but massive, changes in an economy. Others become homeless when the eligibility rules for assistance change or when the supply of low-rent housing runs out. Some members of the homeless population are voluntary in the sense that they leave intolerable situations within their former homes. Battered wives and abused or neglected children become runaways, living on the streets or in shelters opened by charities. Government responses to the problem have varied. England has a Homeless Persons Act, enacted in 1977, that requires local authorities to house the homeless. In an attempt to improve housing for the poor, the UN declared 1987 the International Year of Shelter for the Homeless. Also in 1987 the United States Congress enacted the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act to provide basic services for the homeless. Local governments and private groups also provide funds to operate shelters and soup kitchens. Other countries rely on a combination of government and private sources of help for the homeless as well. |