...Carla Hill Speech 108 Teacher – Ms. Margot Williams Homelessness in America To inform To inform the audience about the homeless crisis in America Homelessness in America I. Introduction Individuals nationwide are experiencing homelessness. Even the most educated people have joined the homeless. The major contributing factor of homelessness is the recession that our nation is experiencing. The country’s economical status is in a very critical state, causing numerous corporations and businesses to close. Our economical downturn based on documented statistics show there are high unemployment rates across the country. There are also other contributing factors that play a role in homelessness. II. Body The major reason for the homelessness in America is the recession. According to, The National Alliance to End Homelessness it is estimated that the recession will force another 1.5 million people into homelessness over the next two years. The second reason for the homelessness in America is high unemployment rates worldwide. This is a trickle down effect that has caused the recession. With the nation’s economy in such a critical state of downturn, numerous corporations and businesses around the world have either down-sized in the amount of employees on staff or closed altogether. There are other factors for homelessness in America: 1. Unaffordable housing is the result of individuals who have lost their jobs or simply...
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...Where Does America Go from Here? How close to being homeless are you? Any person living in poverty is one mishap away from living out on the streets. Many Americans live everyday with a risk of being homeless or becoming homeless, America has the highest homelessness rates in the world and the biggest problems are not enough jobs opportunities and outsourcing, not enough affordable housing, and mental illness. PROBLEM 1 Homelessness can be directly related to a shortage of jobs in America due to outsourcing and businesses being shut down. Although most of the population has jobs there is a small percentage that don’t and in that percentage lays the homeless percentage. Long-term unemployed individuals rates have not changed since June of...
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...Homeless people in America Name University April 15, 2013 People being homeless Introduction: Now a day’s students face the world overflowing with global inconsistency, no job opportunities, high level of education cost, and increase in the rate of poverty in America. We know that hunger and homelessness is spreading rapidly in the United States. In the resent years, the national poverty rose to the level of 13.2 percent of the population. And nearly 3.5 million people were compelled to sleep in the parks, under bridges, in shelters and cars. In comparison to the high cost of living, low- wages jobs, and high unemployment rates are considered to be the main reason behind the problem for countless Americans to make a choice between food, housing, and other expenses. If the society does not treat this situation as a notional priority and address those in a systematic way the problem will keep continuing with the future generation as well (Alayne Potter, 2011). People Homeless: The United States consists of more than 3.5 million people from all walks of life experiencing the homelessness every year. And 35 percent of homeless populations are families with children, one of the fastest growing sectors of the homeless population. The remaining homeless population consist 23 percent of retired U.S. military people, 25 percent of children under the age of 18, 30 percent of experienced domestic violence, and 20 to 25 percent of people suffering from mental illness....
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...market entirely (Folks, 2013) and are now facing housing crises. As the demand for affordable housing continues to grow as adults are unable to find work, many Americans are facing homelessness and have no affordable housing available to them. All across America, more people are finding themselves homeless. Whether in big cities or small urban towns, the homeless rate continues to grow as the inability to pay for affordable housing grows. The number of people paying more than fifty percent (50%) of their income toward rent increased by more than six percent (6%) from 2009 to 2010. The United States Housing and Urban Development (HUD) classify those paying that high of a percentage as “severely housing cost burdened”. In a survey conducted by the Low Income Housing Information Service, more than 17.6 million households with children experience at least one major housing problem, meaning that one out of every two households with children in this country experience an issue with housing (Kaufman, 2013). Per The National Alliance to End Homelessness (2012) the national rate of homelessness was 21 homeless people per 10,000. Nearly four in ten of those homeless are unsheltered, living on the streets or in cars, abandoned buildings or other places not intended for human habitation. Homelessness affects people of all ages, races, ethnicities and geographies but studies have found that people recently discharged from prison, young adults leaving foster care and people without...
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...Homelessness in America Homelessness in America has always been an issue but it has become an even bigger issue over the past years. With a world filled with global conflict, disappearing jobs, higher education cost, and increasing poverty in America, the homeless need our help more than ever. Just last year, the national poverty rate rose to include 13.2 % of the population. Also, 3.5 million people were forced to sleep in parks, shelters, under bridges or in cars. Hunger and homelessness are increasing epidemics plaguing the United States. Because of the high cost of living, high unemployment rates, and low-wage jobs, countless Americans are forced to choose between food, housing, and other expenses. According to recent studies, money is being devoted to rent and utilities rather than food. 35% of the homeless population is families with children, 23% are U.S. military veterans, 25% are children under the age of 18, 20-25% suffers from mental illness and 30% have experienced domestic violence. 19.3 % of homeless people live in New York City and Los Angeles. New York City has been shown to have the highest number of homeless people in the country. The next biggest is Loss Angeles and then Seattle/King County Washington. As a result of doing nothing for the homeless, more people will become homeless. That means, more people sleeping on the streets, dying from hunger, and possibly an even higher crime rate. Economic factors play a huge role in the issue of homelessness. The...
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...grows daily. History In the United States, de-institutionalization of the mentally ill -- unaccompanied by promised outpatient psychiatric and social services -- led to a large increase in the homeless, mentally ill population in the late 1970s. The number of homeless grew in the 1980s, as housing and social service cuts increased. This was in part a consequence of the transfer of federal dollars to a huge military buildup (including the spectacularly wasteful and unsuccessful "Star Wars" strategic missile defense initiative) and consequent large budget deficits. Fortunately, public compassion soared, and in 1986, 5 million Americans joined hands across the country to raise money for homeless programs (May 25, 1986 Hands Across America). In 1987, the McKinney Act authorized millions of dollars for housing and hunger relief (Donahue, 2007). Nature and Issues of Social Problems Homeless and poverty go together. People are unable to pay for food, clothing, shelter, child care, health care, and education. Choices have to be made to have what they need for their daily life so they have to put other things behind to cover necessities. Domestic violence leads people to become homeless because they are forced to choose from the abusive relationship or becoming homeless. Mental illness issues also force people to become homeless. They are unable to find supportive housing or adequate treatment. Addiction issues also put so many people on the streets to feed their addiction...
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...Homelessness, Poverty and Politics in America At no time in American history is the poverty and homelessness problem more salient than it is now. Jabs and insults are hurled at political opponents like dirty bombs are hurled during war. Words like “food stamps” and “working poor” and “47%” become a regular part of the national rhetoric and almost seamlessly, they enter the ugly arena of bad words that people use to denigrate and demean. Meanwhile, the nameless and faceless majority of people living at or significantly below the poverty line still yearn for a voice. In days past, impolite rhetoric was covered up with a thin shroud of political correctness, today, there’s no such need as social media opens the floodgates for frankness and politics gets dirtier and uglier than ever. And still, the homeless men, women and children in America have no voice. On the left, President Obama’s administration reminds America that the 47% of people who rely on government programs of some kind and who legitimately need assistance are a group of people forgotten by the right. On the right, Governor Romney’s obsession with cuts and reductions on everything from taxes (paid by the top 1%) to government programs (that benefit everyone else) sound a lot like the fiscal policies espoused by President Bush and President Reagan three decades before that. Reagan has been credited with exploding the homeless problem in the United States (BBC News, 2004; Kengor, 2012) and yet there are many whose...
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...Homelessness in America seems to happen with alarming frequency. Homelessness affects millions of Americans each year, with approximately one third of the population suffering from severe mental disorders. It is a devastating experience for families. Every year, the United States conduct an enumeration of homeless people around the nation. These reports of homeless people conducted by the National Alliance to End Homelessness are based on the definition set by the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), in what is commonly known as a “point-in -time” count. Point-in-time counts are the only measure that captures unsheltered persons experiencing homelessness. Last year's point-in-time count is the most recent national estimate of homelessness in the United States. As of January 2013, the national count of unsheltered people experiencing homelessness decreases by 11.6% between 2012 and 2013. There is a common misconception that homelessness is an issue that only pertains to single men and women, but in reality over 600,000 families a year will experience homelessness. The problems of family homelessness are not solely restricted to urban areas; rural area and suburban communities are increasingly plagued by the problem. The three main reasons for the abundance of dispossessed families within America are the following: 1) the lack of affordable housing, 2) poverty, and 3) mental illness. In today's society, these causes are the main contributors towards...
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...of Phoenix The Streets are not A Home for Youth The United States of America; the "Land of Milk and Honey," also known throughout the world as a place of prosperity. While this may be true for some, there is a significant percentage of the American population who lives in poverty. There are many who are so impoverished that they do not even have a place to call home. While homelessness has always existed in America, never before has this nation seen such a high percentage of its youth population living on the streets. Even though Young people often become homeless due to family conflict and substance abuse, youth is at a higher risk for homelessness than adults ("Starry Children At Heart Ministries, Inc.", 2015). In order to reduce the number of homeless youth, society needs to address the high rates of substance abuse, mental illness, and sexual trauma that is experienced by today's young adults. Substance abuse of alcohol, marijuana, and other drugs are prevalent amongst homeless youth. Many, young adolescent young people who became or on the verge of becoming homeless, were brought up in households where drug and alcohol were being used on a regular basis by parents or guardians. Domestic violence and some form of abuse within the home was present. Therefore, prompted the youthful pre-adult youth, encountering a horrible and traumatic adolescence. Subsequently; a high rate is brought up in foster homes, mental organizations, or detained before the age of...
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...freedom from want. America, even today, still is not free from want. Thousands of Americans are starving, remain jobless, and even abandoned on the streets because they have no homes. We live in the world's wealthiest nation. Yet 14.5 percent of U.S. households—nearly 49 million Americans, including 16.2 million children—struggle to put food on the table. In the United States alone more than one in five children is at risk of hunger. 20 million students receive free or reduced lunch each day; however, less than half receive breakfast and only 10 percent have access to summer feeding programs. Although 81.3 percent of eligible infants are enrolled in WIC, the program reaches just 47.3 percent of eligible children ages 1 to 4. (Bread for the World) The unemployment rate in the United States decreased to 7.70 percent in November of 2012 from 7.90 percent in October of 2012 (Trading Economics ). In the past, from 1948 until 2012, the United States Unemployment Rate averaged 5.80 Percent reaching an all-time high of 10.80 percent in November of 1982 and a record low of 2.50 percent in May of 1953. In the United States, the unemployment rate measures the number of people actively looking for a job as a percentage of the labor force. Each year, more than 3 million people experience homelessness, including 1.3 million children. One-third of the homeless population is made up of families. The recession will force 1.5 million more people into homelessness over the next two years...
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...There’s no place like home | | Homelessness started as far as the 1930’s when the stock market crashed causing “The Great Depression”. During this time people lost jobs and their homes. People were devastated at the fact that that they were forced to sell their belongings. Later on in the years homelessness began to increase after the war because the vets couldn’t find jobs and were forced to live on the street because no one would hire them. The reason that there are so many people homeless is because the economy. People can’t find jobs so they have to sell their home and downgrade to a smaller home or apartment. Often there are times when families are broken up because the husband can’t provide for his family and they end up on the streets. The root cause of being homeless can be explained by economics, it’s said that people who become homeless are going through a financial issue and are unable to obtain or maintain their homes. Research shows that 83% of the homeless population experience episodic, transitional, or temporary periods of homelessness. The challenges that people in poverty ridden areas in trying to keep their get a home is the level of the housing cost burden. When housing is 30% or less of monthly income then it is considered to be affordable. Data collected from the US Census Bureau’s 2010 American Community Survey shows that 75% of the households at or below the poverty line are severely housing cost burdened. When your housing accounts for 50% or...
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...Homelessness and Its effects on the Community A common social concern talked about often in the United States is homelessness. 610,042 young adults, adolescents, and families can be found living without a place to call their home. The amount of homelessness is increasing at an alarming rate; this resulted fundamentally from America’s present-day economy system and the lack of prevention help. Homelessness has an effect on the community economically, socially, and politically; specifically taking an impact on public safety, local governments, and living costs. Anyone can become homeless; nobody chooses to be put in such position. According to Fargo et al., as stated in their article about the variations of homelessness, “as of a single night...
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...Introduction Homelessness is a critical issue within the United States of America. According to the United States federal law and the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act of 1987, if a person lacks a fixed, regular, or adequate nighttime residence the person is then considered homeless. The National Alliance to End Homelessness reported that on a single night in January 2015 564,708 people in the United States were considered homeless, meaning they had no place to sleep. In the 1870s the issue of homelessness in America emerged causing many homeless people to live in urban cities. In the 1930s this issue worsened due to the Great Depression, causing poverty and more than two million people were homeless and in search of work. The homeless...
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...Why can’t we end Poverty in America? Jake Hauser English 102 12/6/13 Today in the United States, more than 46 million Americans are living in poverty. The word poverty is defined as; the state of one who lacks a usual or socially acceptable amount of money or material possessions. In other words, poverty is essentially the state of being poor. In a broad perspective, there are two types of poverty. There is relative poverty which refers to people who live in poor accommodations, cannot afford certain necessities, and struggle to make ends meet. In most cases for theses people, there is welfare available to help them so it would be rare for them to go without somewhere to live or to go starving. The other kind of poverty is known as absolute poverty. This is the kind of poverty that you would see in third world countries. These people have no food, no water and no help and it usually leads to death. Believe it or not, poverty is a worldwide problem that is taking place in every nation on the globe. In fact, half of the people in the world today are living on less than $2.50 per day. Statistically, Haiti is the most poverty stricken country in the world, with 77% of it’s population living below the poverty line. It also has a 40% unemployment rate, and many poverty-stricken people live on less than $1 a day. The United States may not be the most poverty stricken country in the world, but that doesn’t mean that there still isn’t a big problem in our...
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...Vietnam War. As a direct result of Post Traumatic Syndrome and other mental/medical disabilities many in this group may not have a permanent home to call their own. To define homelessness according to the site for National Health Care for the Homeless Council (retrieved 2014), one of the official definitions for the state of being homeless or homelessness is presented as follows: A homeless individual is defined in section 330(h) (4)(A) as “an individual who lacks housing (without regard to whether the individual is a member of a family), including an individual whose primary residence during the night is a supervised public or private facility (e.g., shelters) that provides temporary living accommodations, and an individual who is a resident in transitional housing.” A homeless person is an individual without permanent housing who may live on the streets; stay in a shelter, mission, single room occupancy facilities, abandoned building or vehicle; or in any other unstable or non-permanent situation. [Section 330 of the Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C., 254b)](National 2014) This is one of the definitions that tries to explain this large sociological perspective based on trends or patterns and the fact that this social situation requires such a broad explanation to attempt to cover all aspects of homelessness. This explanation does show how widespread and complicated the state of being homeless is and how socially there is not one simple...
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