Why Will Homelessness Never End?

Why The U.S. Can’t Solve Homelessness Why The U.S. Can’t Solve Homelessness | This video by CNBC suggests that homelessness in the U.S. will never end if the rising unemployment rate and unaffordable housing crisis in America isn't remedied. Load video

Homelessness is the state of lacking a permanent, fixed, and regular home. A home is a building meant for human habitation.

An ending to homelessness therefore would mean that no person in a specific region lived outside a home. For instance, an ending of homelessness in Philadelphia would mean that no person in Philadelphia lacked fixed, regular, and permanent shelter outside of a building that is meant for human habitation.

Similarly, an end to homelessness worldwide would mean that all homeless people in the world would transition to living in buildings that were designed for human habitation. And they would be permitted to stay there, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, permanently. An end to homelessness would also mean that no new people became homeless.

Thus, to wonder why homelessness will never end is to wonder "why will all the people who lack an adequate home now forever never transition into a building that they can stay in permanently? And why will we never be able to always prevent homelessness in the future?"

Put this way, the obvious answers emerge.

Here are the 3 most significant reasons why homelessness will never end:

3) UNEXPECTED LIFE CIRCUMSTANCES CAUSE HOMELESSNESS

The first reason why homelessness will never end is that people will always become homeless. One of the major reasons why people become homeless is unexpected life circumstances.

Unless society begins offering homes to everyone who becomes homeless, job loss, domestic abuse, injury, mental and physical illness, physical disabilities, and loss of a spouse will always cause homelessness.

job loss

One of the most common unexpected events that lead to homelessness is job loss. Job loss is probably something that is going to be around for a long time. Often resulting from quitting, or being laid off or fired, job loss results in homelessness when a person falls behind on rent payments and is evicted.

Evictions will always happen while rent costs money because people will always lose jobs. So one reason why homelessness will never end is that, unless jobs one day no longer exist, people will always lose jobs.

domestic abuse

Another reason why homelessness will never end is domestic abuse. Homelessness results from domestic abuse when a victim flees an abuser to avoid future violence. While instances of intimate partner violence increase and decrease with the times, domestic abuse will likely always occur. Thus, homelessness resulting from domestic abuse will too.

Therefore, homelessness will also never end because of domestic abuse.

physical injury

Another reason why homelessness will never end is physical injuries. Homelessness results from physical injuries when an injury interferes with an individual's ability to earn an income to pay rent.

Obviously, as long as people live in human bodies, physical injuries will always occur. Thus, homelessness will always exist because physical injuries will always occur.

mental illness

Mental illness also can cause homelessness. This happens when an individual is mentally unable to hold down a job to avoid eviction. Unless severe mental illnesses are ever fully eradicated, homelessness will result from failing mental health.

Thus, another reason why homelessness will never be solved is mental illness.

physical disability

In addition to job loss, domestic abuse, physical injury, and mental illness, another reason why homelessness will always exist is physical disabilities.

Like temporary physical injuries, physical disabilities result in homelessness when an individual cannot pay for rent because they cannot earn an income due to physical immobility. Examples of physical disabilities include a loss of a limb or difficulties seeing, hearing, or walking (1).

Loss of a spouse

Another reason why homelessness will never end is spousal loss. This occurs when the head of the household or a member who contributes to rent payments no longer can. Examples of when this situation causes homelessness includes after a break-up, and when a spouse is imprisoned or passes away.

Thus, homelessness will always exist because people will always lose spouses.

natural disaster

The final reason why homelessness will always exist is natural disasters. Examples of natural disasters include tornadoes, volcanic eruptions, tsunamis, hurricanes, earthquakes, and wildfires due to lightning strikes. Natural disasters cause homelessness by forcing a person to vacate a home to avoid disasters, and by destroying homes that people live in. These events are usually unexpected and beyond an individual's control.

Thus, since natural disasters will always exist, homelessness will never end because natural disasters will always unexpectedly cause homelessness.

In summary, homelessness will never end because unexpected life circumstances will always exist. Therefore, unexpected life circumstances like job loss, domestic abuse, physical injury, mental illness, physical disabilities, spousal loss, and natural disasters will always render homelessness unsolvable.

2) THE COST OF HOUSING IS TOO GREAT

Of course, if society could just put all the people who need a home in one, homelessness would not exist. But at least in current times, building homes, and maintaining them is too pricey. Homelessness will probably never end because the cost of housing is too great.

not enough vacant homes exist already to house the homeless

If there were an abundance of vacant homes and homeless people needed a place to stay, homeless people could just move into those. Then, after they get back on their feet, the homeless could then move into a home of their own and pay rent there.

building homes is expensive

But vacant homes are never in abundance. The reason is that building homes is expensive. It is expensive because to do so one needs to pay for permits, materials, and labor. Knowing this, builders only build when they know they can profit from doing so.

maintaining homes is expensive

In addition to being expensive to build, homes are also costly to maintain. If we were to give homeless people a place to stay for free, we would need to maintain the home as well. Home maintenance costs include painting, roofing, keeping the infrastructure safe and intact, and landscaping. Each of those services can cost a pretty penny.

Thus, another reason why homelessness will always exist is that homes will probably always be in short supply, and are expensive to build and maintain.

1) SOME PEOPLE WILL ALWAYS PREFER TO BE HOMELESS

Finally, the last reason why homelessness will always exist is some people will always want to be homeless. Many reasons for this exist.

paying no rent

First, some people prefer paying no rent. Homelessness is one of the few ways that this can be possible. Not paying rent affords a person the time to work less or not at all, and to pursue hobbies and passions that he or she would not have time for if otherwise working.

traveling

Another reason why people prefer to be homeless is they enjoy traveling. Being tied down to a home in a specific city and neighborhood can be a real burden to someone who enjoys traveling. Not having a specific place of their own, and, for example, living in a van, allows homeless people to travel and see the world. This can all be done without worrying about making a rent payment for a house that they never stay at.

love of camping

The last reason why some people prefer to be homeless is they enjoy camping. They prefer waking up to the song of birds and sleeping under the stars. Some people are just free-spirited and enjoy the outdoors enough to live in it permanently.

Thus, the final reason why homelessness will always exist is some people will always prefer to be homeless.

FINAL THOUGHTS

It may be said that homelessness will one day end. Even though housing is expensive to provide, giving everyone who needs a home is not impossible.

We may need to reprioritize the way we spend money, but one day, as humanity becomes more and more evolved, and as result more and more altruistic, people will finally decide that the suffering experienced by the homeless people is intolerable and thus something must be done.

When that day arrives, society will figure out a way to provide homes to all who sleep on the streets.

And to that, I say you are correct. Solving homelessness is not impossible. All it takes is for people to finally decide that offering homeless people homes is more important than everything else that we currently spend our tax money on.

I do not, however, believe that we will ever decide that homeless people ought to be given free places to stay, at least while our taxes are not generously raised, or our society is not radically changed. The reason is what we spend our taxes on currently, for the most part, is needed.

Put another way, we have no extra money to build and offer homeless people free homes. So the money required to build and maintain free homes for the homeless would need to come from additional sources.

Given that homelessness at its root is caused by not being able to pay the rent, and not being able to pay the rent is a problem of the individual not being able to work or of affordable housing or housing being non-existent, until we figure out how to completely eradicate the need to pay for rent, that is, by offering places to stay for free with no requirements completely, homelessness will always exist. In short while jobs and rent and mortgage payments exist, homelessness will too.

Thus, homeless will never be solved because some people will always not want or have the money to pay for rent, and rent will always exist because homes are expensive to build and maintain.

summary

Homelessness will never be solved for three reasons.

First, unexpected life circumstances will always cause people to get evicted for not being able to pay the rent. Job loss, domestic abuse, physical injury, mental illness, physical disability, loss of a spouse's income due to imprisonment, death, or break-up, and natural disaster will always occur and sometimes result in homelessness.

Next, homelessness will always exist because housing will probably always be expensive to build and maintain. Because of this, housing will always be expensive to provide for free.

Finally, probably always will some people choose to be homeless. Some people will prefer not paying rent, desire to travel, and like the idea of sleeping outside.

Thus, homelessness will probably never be solved because people unexpected circumstances will always happen and people will not be able to pay rent, housing is too expensive to offer to everyone who needs it for free, and some people will always prefer to be homeless.

conclusion

So the next time you think about why homeless will never end think of "unexpected life circumstances, unaffordable housing, and a preference to be homeless" as reasons why it won't.