Homelessness in United States of America Case Study

The inability to believe this situation prompts for investigation to clearly bring the issue to light and have a deep look at its causes, how the situation has affected the country and ways of its mitigation. The latest data collected reveals that in an approximation of 553,742 people in the United States of America are suffering due to lack of homes or rather place of residence every night (Hopper, 2014). This figure shows that in an estimation of about 17 people are undergoing the concern of homelessness for every ten thousand people in the country’s overall population. In 2017, most of the homeless persons in the country survived under very tough means in terms of shelter acquisition making them occupy temporary housing. The estimated number of these people stood at around 360,867 people.

This implies that living in the squats or on the streets with no form of violence is better guaranteed than living in a permanent residence with full forms of residence that makes you feel unacceptable and homeless. Homelessness in people’s life is brought about by various reasons including eviction, result of divorce as well as a result of the occurrence of natural calamities including floods and earthquakes. In determining the data of persons rendered to be homeless, the most important factor to consider is that a bid difference exists in the numbers depending on the problems faced by the individuals who are housed but still termed as homeless and those with total lack of homes regardless of race, gender or even age (Hopper, 2014).

  Let us have a critical look at each of these concepts to have a better understanding of how the interrelationship occurs; Age Differences in the age bracket bring variations in variance with regards to the state of homelessness depending on the differences in the time taken when faced by the state. Reports reveal that the young adolescents as well as the adolescents undergo very short periods in the states of homelessness with the older adults undergoing longer terms. Multiple races then follow up having an approximated figure of 35,745 individuals. The Native Americans come last as the people suffering homelessness at a figure of 16,796. The results prove that the black Americans are mostly affected in the country because their overall number in the country is too low to that of the whites (Sreenivasan, 2009).

  Causes of homelessness Growing rate of poverty - poverty contributes to a key increase in homelessness. If someone was not poor, issues like the loss of a job, domestic violence and natural calamities would not cause him /her to shelter in the streets. This explains why the crisis is most prevalent in cities such as Seattle, Los Angeles San Francisco and Oakland, where the housing prices have shot up. Housing, which is a necessity of life is viewed as a source of private profit/ a commodity. This is why the private housing industry does not invest in low income housing anymore since they would rather serve the interests of real estate developers. This explains the decline in the low cost housing today in the USA in most nations (Tsemberis, 2015).

Rise of drug addiction and alcoholism It is estimated that around 38% of homeless individuals’ abuse alcohol. Solutions Dealing with the growing rate of poverty Poverty stricken people are mostly unable to find and maintain employment. Job training and placement programs can be implemented by the federal government to provide people with competitive skills in order to secure stable employment. The public can also assist by offering help to the homeless through social and community projects in collaboration with schools and churches. Alcohol and substance abuse A remedy for this can differ according to the type or level of abuse. There can be prevention measures to enhance abstinence within the society, for instance by creating mass awareness programs. Conclusion By solving those major contributors to homelessness in the USA, the number of those homeless will reduce.