Homelessness in the US

Introduction

Homelessness in the US is among the thorniest issues. The homelessness issue has been and remains to be a prevalent debate. Whilst the numbers of homeless individuals increases day by day the big the question remains to be why this would be happening in the US in the 21^st century. The back and forth of state and federal governments with regard to the issue of homelessness is an extremely unwarranted issue. Studies have shown that homelessness results from numerous reasons which the government should caution its citizens against. The citizens also have a hand in averting the homelessness menace; both the federal and state authorities have a bigger hand in it. The homelessness individuals’ debate is usually outdone by other debates such as terrorism, liberty and economy, which the lawmakers are fond of discussing. A majority of individuals observe that the economic condition have greatly fuelled homelessness more than any other factor. This document carries out a research with an aim of finding out the reasons behind the homelessness issue as well as the solutions for curing it.

Literature review  

California Department of Housing and Community Development (2011) observe that the homelessness issue within the state seems to be increasingly rather than reducing. This is however not due to the state’s inefficiency in handling the situation but those of the social organizations. The article states that the Department’s Emergency Housing Assistance Program or (EHAP) in the state of California has been providing sufficient funds to the social organization within the state. EHAP claims that sufficient funding is provided by the state but the social organization. The article indicates that with better supervision of funds the homelessness issue may reduce.

CBP (2008) attributes homelessness to the lack of affordable housing within the US. The worsening economic conditions are raising the prices of most commodities as well as rents. The increase in rents coupled with unemployment   is among the aspects that have increased homelessness within the country. People with low incomes can longer afford to pay rents this is for the reason that after the rise in prices of commodities was not coupled with increase in incomes. The income of most of the Americans remains constant whilst the economic hardships are spiraling.

Gray (2002) observes that the local authorities have been shouldering the burden of homelessness whilst the federal government sits back and watches. Form the time that the homelessness issue was said to be a disaster the state authorities have been pumping funds towards supporting the homeless individuals through the provision of food, medical assistance, and clothing among other efforts. However, there is just so much that the local authorities could do with the limited access to finances. The federal government with its sufficient of funds has extended minimum efforts. Indeed this is not an issue for only the local authorities; the homelessness issue is also within the jurisdiction of Federal government.

Mansur & Rosenthal (2001) observes that the homelessness issue has dramatically increased between 1980 and 2000. This article attributes the increase to the widening gap between the rich and the poor. The income inequality has been growing within the last few decades in an alarming rate. This has resulted to the individuals whose income has reduced to shift from their quality housing to less quality housing whilst those in less quality housing move out and become homeless.   The income inequality coupled with increases in standards of living is to blame for the homeless issue. Both the state and the federal authorities require looking into the income inequality that is making America among the most unequal nations globally.

Research

 This study was carried out through administering questionnaires randomly to participants. The questionnaire comprised of 10 questions 4 of which were qualitative whilst the remaining 6 were quantitative. The study involved participants who were aged between 25 and 50; they were all homeless individuals. The qualitative questions were open ended and opinions varied. The opinions were summarized and the most compelling and recurring reasons were chosen. On the other hand the quantitative responses were depicted in charts. The number of participants was 15; they were randomly chosen from a particular part of the city harboring many homeless individuals. On the side of quantitative questions the options were strongly agree, disagree and agree, yes and no.  

Hypothesis: the authorities as well as individuals have a big part to play in the alleviation of the homelessness issue.

Results

The data was analyzed in terms of every question. For the qualitative study the participants attributed the reasons for homelessness to the hardening economic conditions. The difficult economic conditions such as constant income, unemployment and low-paying jobs were the main reasons.   Additionally the participants indicated that lack of affordable housing, domestic violence and mental illness. Substance, poverty, abuse as well as lack of essential services are other major reasons for homelessness. The participants indicated that they undergo numerous hardships in their lives. These hardships include hunger, lack of medical services, harsh environmental conditions, stigmatization and discrimination. The daily hardships the individuals undergo have made them suffer from mental illnesses. At times the homeless individuals have died due to the lack of medical access and hunger. The participants indicated that the authorities require instituting a number of policies to caution people against homelessness as well as housing the ones already suffering. These policies include cautioning people against the rising costs of living, ensuring that incomes rise with increase in living costs, funding programs nationwide to house the homeless individuals and building low-cost affordable housing all through the nation. The authorities were placed at task for failing to institute better policies for cautioning the American citizen against harsh economic conditions. The participants also observed that the humanitarian agencies though seem to place a lot of effort much more can be done since they receive sufficient funding. Participants indicated that homeless individuals receive insufficient assistance from the social and humanitarian agencies.

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Discussion

According to the study results the authorities have the biggest contribution to the issue of homelessness. The participants attributed the reasons for homelessness as the hardening economic conditions. This is an aspect that the government is responsible for finding a solution to. In any country governments are responsible for establishing an economic climate which is favorable for the existence of citizens. Moreover the hard economic conditions reduced income, unemployment and low-paying jobs lie squarely on government’s shoulders.    The economic conditions have also rendered housing unaffordable. Other reasons which comprised of domestic violence and mental illness were found to contribute very little numbers of homeless individuals. . Substance, poverty, abuse as well as lack of essential services are other major reasons for homelessness. Indeed the homeless people undergo numerous hardships; their lives are even lost due lack of essential services such as medical facilities access; apart from the free and scanty medical camps the homeless individuals have no none to turn in case of an illness. Starvation is an additional difficult issue that the homeless experience. Since they have no source of income, the homeless people depend on food collected from trash cans. This study indicated that a homeless person may go for days without food. Starvation has claimed many lives within the area of study.  A majority of the homeless individuals reside in very unsafe and unprotected places such as below the bridge covered with a pile of polythene rags. This exposes them to harsh weather conditions such as rains, cold and extreme hot temperatures. The participants indicate that these harsh conditions have overtime exposed them to sickness. Additionally the homeless always the stigmatization hardship, the members of the public usually down upon the homeless people. The regard them as dirty, dangerous and safety risks; this categorization has overtime intimidated the homeless people mentally.

The authorities were put at task due to the fact that they seem not to bother regarding finding a solution or protecting the homeless. The homeless people have been left with no one to take care of them. Both the local and federal authorities have neglected the issue of homeless people. The participants stated that the authorities require instituting policies which will outline the process of housing the homeless as well as instituting measures to prevent future homelessness. The government is actually doing nothing to enact such policies. This study also found that social and humanitarian agencies may be playing a part of the worsening conditions of the homeless. Some of these agencies simply take the funds allocated by the authorities’ use some of it for humanitarian efforts then the rest of money disappears. Certainly these organizations can do more with the usage amounts of money allocated to them.

The study also found that the number of homeless individuals have increased within the previous 6 months from the day of the study. This clearly indicates that contrary to the figures given by the government regarding the decrease in the number of homeless individuals within the year 2013 to 2014, the numbers are actually rising. The authorities are not doing enough to protect the American citizen from being rendered homeless by the harsh economic conditions.  

Despite the authorities laxity the citizens are also to blame; drug abuse which is majorly connected to mental sickness has majorly contributed to homelessness. Other reasons include family violence and delinquency behaviors. The homeless individuals’ behaviors also result to homelessness. The domestic violence as well as delinquency is some of the elements that the citizens should avoid. The 2008 financial crisis which hit the financial and housing sectors highly contributed to the homelessness issue. A huge number of loans acquired by individuals to construct houses were un-payable and many houses were re-acquired. This heavily rendered a lot of families hardly hit by the crisis; some of them contracted metal diseases which are linked to homelessness.   

Recommendations

The homelessness problem is an issue both for the government and the citizens. However the government has a bigger role to play than the citizens. The government possesses the machinery and power to address this issue. To begin with the government requires enacting laws that will caution the American public against hard economic conditions. The rising costs of living coupled the stagnation of salaries is a factor that the government has a sole duty to address. The costs of living should move along with increase in salaries and incomes. The humanitarian agencies tasked with solving and assisting homeless individuals are usually given autonomy to spend the finances without much supervision. These situations have led them to misuse the funds. The state must put up more stringent measures to be able to supervise and determine that funds intended to be used for the homelessness are spent appropriately. The agencies themselves must be able to give the homeless the services they require such as medical as well as foodstuffs.   The humanitarian and social organizations must take the responsibility and ensure they do the right thing. The government requires building affordable housing all over the nation in order to house the low income individuals. The 2008 financial crisis took place due to the recklessness of the Federal Reserve instituting laws to govern borrowing from banks. This period was marred by insecure lending and uncontrolled interest rates. This duty falls under the jurisdiction of the government.   

Additionally, the homeless individuals must themselves caution themselves from situations that may make them end up being homeless. Substance abuse is one aspect that has greatly contributed to the number of individuals who are homeless. This has is something that the citizens should evade. Domestic violence is an additional vice that leads to homelessness; people must be able to solve these kind of problems before they worsen further though hard economic times is being blamed for homelessness, every person in American is facing the same hardships. It can thus be concluded the homeless lack resilience and are not ready to work hard similar to other Americans. Every person must thus work hard whether the economic times are hard or favorable.  Those already homeless and facing drug addiction problems are free to attend rehabilitation centers for help. Though they fail to it and blame the authorities.

Conclusion 

The homelessness issue remains to be a problem America and if measures are not taken urgently a whole community of homeless individuals will arise. Every party, which is, the authorities and individuals have a role to play in order to alleviate the problem of homelessness. The government though carries a fairly big share in this course since the economic conditions have been found in this study to being the major reasons for homelessness. As a matter of fact issues like unemployment, rising living costs, low wages and provision of low cost housing is the government’s role. It is sad that an advanced country such as the US is facing an easily solvable issue such as homelessness.  Te federal government and local authorities must stop warring regarding the issue of who contributes less or majorly. They must come together and find a lasting solution to this menace. The humanitarian agencies have a duty to properly handle and assist the homeless in whichever way they can through the resources at their disposable. Indeed if all these measures are placed into practice homelessness will be eradicated.   

References

CBP. (2008). LOCKED OUT 2008: The Housing Boom and Beyond. Retrieved  from http://www.cbp.org/pdfs/2008/080212_LockedoutReport.pdf

Gray, D. (2002). Recommendations of the Interagency Task Force on Homelessness. Retrieved  from http://www.hcd.ca.gov/hpd/iatf_july2002recommendations.pdf

California Department of Housing and Community Development. (2011). California Department of Housing and Community Development. (2011). Retrieved from http://www.hcd.ca.gov/hpd/hrc/rep/fed/annual07-08pf092707.pdf

Retrieved from http://www.hcd.ca.gov/hpd/hrc/rep/fed/annual07-08pf092707.pdf

Mansur, E., & Rosenthal, L. (2001). Retrieved  from http://www.ppic.org/content/pubs/report/R_1001JQR.pdf