The U.S. faces many social problems. A few examples include homelessness, unemployment, lack of healthcare, inequality, and substance abuse. These social problems are major issues for not only the U.S. but also other countries. Virtually every government, society, or community suffers from at least one of these social problems. For example, in the U.S., homelessness is considered to be one of the most serious social issues. According to a 2019 report released by the Council of Economic Advisors, over 500,000 Americans go homeless in a single night in the U.S. However, since the homeless remain invisible, their exact number in the U.S. is not known (Ferris & Stein, 2018). Despite being a serious social issue, little has been done to address homelessness in the U.S adequately. The focus of this paper is to compare and contrast homelessness in the 1960s versus homelessness in the 2000s. In particular, the paper will compare and contrast the causes of homelessness in the 1960s versus homelessness in the 2000s. Furthermore, the paper will compare and contrast federal responses to homelessness in the 1960s versus federal responses in the 2000s.
Homelessness in the Early 20 th Century
The term “homelessness” was perceived differently in the 19 th and 20 th centuries as to when compared to how it is perceived today. When it was first utilized, it was used to refer to the “tramps” navigating the nation to look for employment opportunities (“National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine,” 2018, 175). National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (2018) write, “The primary emphasis at this time was on the loss of character and a perceived emerging moral crisis that threatened long-held ideas of home life, rather than the lack of permanent of home” (175). In the 1960s, the key to ending this social problem was often perceived to be the solution of the plight of “tramps” traversing the nation. On the contrariwise, today, the creation of affordable housing is perceived as the solution to this social problem.
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Prior to the Industrial Revolution, only a few Americans lived in cities. The advent of industrialization brought a steady migration to urban centres. As a result, the population and number of people looking for employment opportunities in U.S. major cities increased. At the time, lodging rooms served as the major shelter system. After these shelter systems declined following the end of the Civil War, homelessness became a very serious issue in the U.S. The increase in homeless was facilitated by a number of factors in the 1960s. This includes the urbanization, industrialization, and morbidity (“National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine,” 2018). These factors led to the emergence of tramps in search of employment opportunities.
Following the end of World War II, the U.S. saw the need to build its economy. As such, it put the nation to work. Three decades after World War II, the homeless in the U.S. continued to be disproportionately white and male. In addition, according to (), the homeless became increasingly older (50 years and above), disabled both physically and mentally, dependent on social security. However, at the time, the homeless resided in cheap hotels and “single-room occupancy” hotels (SROs) located in economically disadvantaged communities and urban areas. Ironically, the homeless who lived in shelter systems like SROs and rooming houses during the 1960s would be considered “housed” under HUD’s (“The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development”) contemporary meaning of homelessness (“National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine,” 2018). This observation underlines the struggle in coming up with a comprehensive definition of this social issue. Also, it accentuates the challenges associated with the study of homelessness throughout U.S history.
Homelessness in the 2000s
The early 1980s marked the modern era of homelessness. A number of factors have contributed to the complexity of this social issue in the U.S. Some of these factors include high unemployment rate, the emergence of “Human Immunodeficiency Virus Infection and Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome” (HIV/AIDS), lack of affordable housing, and lack of adequate funding to the HUD (Jones, 2015). According to Jones (2015), numerous other forces changed the complexity of homelessness today in the U.S. Some of the forces outlined by Jones (2015) include the deinstitutionalization of the mentally ill. After the Great Depression, property values increased dramatically. Furthermore, shelter systems like SROs and rooming houses, which provided shelter to many transients, were converted into other forms of unaffordable housing, such as apartments. After the Great Depression, rents in satellite cities, town, and intervening rural areas started to increase significantly, while wages stagnated (Katz, 2006).
Solutions for Homelessness
Early Solutions (19 th and 20 th Century)
In the past, local and state authorities were mainly responsible for handling the social issue of homelessness. Urban slums across U.S. major cities were plagued with the homeless. This led to numerous other problems, such as the outbreak of infectious disease. In order to reduce overcrowding in urban areas, the U.S. federal government allocated $20,000 to the “Department of Labor” (DOL) in 1892 (“National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine,” 2018). The aim was to investigate urban slums in U.S. major towns and come up with solutions to address the issue. In the early 1900s, President Roosevelt created a formal committee to investigate urban slums in the U.S. However, President Roosevelt’s efforts to investigate these urban slums were halted by the crash of the stock market in 1929.
After the Great Depression, the number of homeless people in America increased significantly. There was a greater need to address this issue by addressing the issue of poverty and making housing in the U.S. affordable. In response, several federal policies and legislations were enacted to improve the quality as well as the affordability of housing. One such policy is the Emergency Relief and Construction Act, which was enacted in 1932. According to Congressional Research Service (2004), this act authorized banks and other agencies in the U.S. to led funds to corporation to build affordable housing. Other federal legislative acts that were passed to address the issue of homelessness include the “National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933,” “the Housing Act” of 1949,1954 and 1956, the “Housing and Urban Renewal Act of 1965,” “Title VIII of the Civil Rights Act of 1968 (the Fair Housing Act),” the “Housing and Community Development Act of 1974,” and the “Homeless Assistance Act of 1977” (“National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine,” 2018). Generally, prior to the 21 st century, the solutions to address homelessness focused on passing legislation to addresses the causes of this social problem, which include poverty and lack of affordable housing.
Solutions in the Modern Era (the 2000s)
In 2002, the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness (USICH) spearheaded the Chronic Homelessness Initiative, where governments were asked to create 10-year plans to end homeliness, especially chronic homelessness. In 2003, another federal legislation was enacted. The legislation called for the provision of affordable housing programs to end chronic homelessness. At this time, the federal government in collaboration with the USICH formally defined chronic homelessness as “an unaccompanied homeless individual with a disabling condition who has either been continuously homeless for a year or more or has had at least four episodes of homelessness in the past three years” ( HUD , 2007, 3). From 2003 to 2009, several existing programs were reauthorized by the federal government with the aim to house every individual and families experiencing homelessness. Furthermore, new definitions of “homeless,” and “homeless person,” were expanded. These changes were based on the federal government identifying (I) lack of affordable housing and (II) belief that virtually every community suffers from homelessness.
During his tenure, President Barrack Obama created a federal strategic plan to end homelessness in the United States. The strategic plan, which was released in 2010, was comprised of four main goals: “ (1) Prevent and end homelessness among Veterans in 5 years; (2) Finish the job of ending chronic homelessness in 7 years; (3) Prevent and end homelessness for families, youth, and children in 10 years; and (4) Set a path to ending all types of homelessness ” (National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 2018, 187) . Unlike the early federal responses to homelessness which focused on ending poverty and providing affordable housing, the solutions to homelessness in the modern era focused on ending chronic homelessness completely. However, despite all these efforts, homelessness is still a serious issue today as it was in the past.
References
Council of Economic Advisors. (2019). The State of Homelessness in America. Council of Economic Advisors. (2019). The State of Homelessness in America.
Eisenstein, M. (2016). Poverty and pathogens. Nature , 531 , S61-S63.
Ferris, K., & Stein, J. (2014). The real world: An introduction to sociology . WW Norton & Company Ltd.
HUD. (2007). Defining Chronic Homelessness: A Technical Guide for HUD Programs.
Jones, M. M. (2015). Creating a science of homelessness during the Reagan era. The Milbank Quarterly , 93 (1), 139-178.
Katz B. (2006). Racial Division and Concentrated Poverty in U.S. Cities. Urban Age Conference; Johannesburg, South Africa. https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/20060707_UrbanAge.pdf
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. (2018). Permanent supportive housing: evaluating the evidence for improving health outcomes among people experiencing chronic homelessness . National Academies Press.
