The Homeless: The Margins Of Society

Currently, the rates of homelessness in America continue to drastically increase. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (2012) depicted how many people are homeless in a single night in America. The findings revealed that there were approximately 633,782 people who are homeless in America or 20 out of every 10,000. Approximately 394,379 are single individuals and 239,403 are people in families with 77,157 homeless families in a single night, and approximately 162, 246 are children. Veterans are more likely to be homeless than those who are non-veterans, approximately 29 out of every 10,000 veterans are homeless. Unfortunately, 38 percent of those who are homeless are unsheltered, either living on the streets or in places that are not suitable for human inhabitation. Most states account of for less than 1% of homeless population, whereas Texas contains approximately 5.4% of America’s homeless population. In San Antonio, there are approximately 2,981 people who are homeless each day, and 1,243 are unsheltered. Through a sociological perspective, the social problems of homelessness can be analyzed through the concept of sociological imagination, the comparison of the person-blame approach and the system-blame approach, and through the analysis of one’s own community’s effort in helping those who are homeless.

Homelessness is a prime concern for numerous countries across the globe, including the most advanced ones. Though the population of homeless people tends to be higher in developing countries, it is still a concern in developed nations. Homelessness is a state where someone lacks regular shelter. The term includes people who do not have a home and sleep on the streets, as well as those whose basic nighttime residence is a homeless shelter or other improvised form of housing. Such people lack the capacity to acquire or maintain sufficient nighttime shelter. Individuals and family units become homeless for many reasons. Assessing these causes can help to mitigate the issue.

Homelessness exists as a prominent issue that plagues society in various ways. It brings about hardship and controversy as individuals struggle to survive on a daily basis. Additionally, this complication tears families apart and ostracizes individuals from a society where they once belonged. A specific problem regarding homelessness consists of lack of interest from bystanders; some of these spectators refuse to even acknowledge homeless individuals sitting at their feet. As homeless people live their lives on street-corners, the more fortunate members of society choose to engulf themselves in their personal problems alone. Displayed by their clothing and accessories, most of these individuals possess the ability to help in some way;

There is a list of certain rights that every natural born citizen is granted once they are born. This conveys no matter what social or economical state the citizen is, his or her rights cannot be taken away, but must be protected by the government. Homeless citizens then do maintain these undeniable rights and remain under the protection of the government. John Locke an English philosopher, who’s ideals influenced the foundation of numerous constitutions, asserts that a person’s undeniable rights

There are many populations that are medically vulnerable and underserved globally and they change depending on the region on the world you are in. However, one medically vulnerable and underserved population can be found in all regions on the world, is the homeless population. Savage, Lindell, Giepsie, Lee and Corbin state that “About 1.2 % of the US population experiences homelessness at any given point in time, with a lifetime prevalence of &7.5% within the general US population” (2008, p. 469).

The controversial issue of the homeless in New York has been an ongoing battle for several years. Many leaders like Andrew Cuomo have come to the conclusion that obligating homeless people into shelters should be enforced, yet others oppose the idea. They believe such harsh actions shouldn 't be taken. Journalist like Hinckley, who wrote "Can New York Force Homeless People into Shelters?" and Marc Santo, who wrote "Keep New York 's homeless off the streets!" have written articles with fact based information with details on the homeless living conditions. In my opinion, such actions shouldn 't occur. The homeless in New York have the right to choose their living conditions, therefore they shouldn 't be obligated to be put in shelters.

Cities increasingly grapple with homelessness, while facing budget cuts to various services, but the failure to tackle homelessness creates more problems. While there are homeless people who are on drugs, some are there because housing is expensive and they have no reliable sources of income. Homelessness may result in the city spending more on welfare in a never ending cycle without finding a solution to homelessness. There are various factors associated with the risk of homelessness, including individual factors like those fleeing domestic abuse, and even those who can longer earn a living because of health conditions and disabilities. The problem of homelessness is further compounded when the homeless suffer mental health issues and alcohol or drug dependence (Benston, 2015). Homelessness is a problem that affects even the youth, and stakeholders ought to work together to tackle the problem, as city officials, and residents are the audience who should be concerned with the problem at the local level.

Homelessness is an epidemic social problem that faces several individuals and families across the United States, especially in Detroit, Michigan. You may have seen a person or family sleeping on a park bench, under bridges and other public areas. Perhaps you have seen them holding up a sign on a street corner asking for money because of the hunger pains. At some point, we all had taken a look at the person holding up their sign thinking it’s not my problem. Why should I help? They’re probably lying or scamming just to make money to buy drugs and alcohol. However, there is a small part of us who may want to give money, buy some food or we may to choose to ignore the problem. Who are we to decide who’s

Of that number, roughly 360,000 were individuals with 15% being chronically homeless and about 8% consisting of veterans. The National Coalition for the Homeless (NCH) is a national network of activists, advocates, faith and community based service providers, and others committed to a single mission to prevent and end

The National Coalition for the Homeless is a local organization for people who are experiencing homelessness. The goal of the organization is to prevent and end homelessness while providing immediate services to those in need. Other organizations such as Volunteers of America, a nonprofit organization, work to prevent and end homelessness while providing services such as affordable housing.

Lakeland is a city in Polk County, Florida, United States, located between the two larger cities in central Florida those being Tampa to the west and Orlando to the east. While interventions to interrupt and end homelessness may vary across groups, ending homelessness permanently requires housing combined with the types of services supported by programs operated by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). This paper will address demographics for the area, identify the social issue of homelessness, and address using a social action model for community change, and the strengths and weaknesses of the model.

Homelessness affects millions of people every year. Homelessness is an endless epidemic that continues to grow. There isn’t one specific causal factor to this every increasing population. Individuals experiencing homelessness come from various backgrounds and cultures physically, financially, and emotionally. They could be considered the melting pot for diversity. Often times individuals experiencing homeless are judged by their outer appearance with no regard for the contributing factors to the situation. According to the National Alliance to End Homelessness, “in January 2014, there were 578,424 people experiencing homelessness on any given night in the United States. Of that number, 216,197 are people in families, and 362,163 are individuals” (National Alliance to End Homelessness, 2015). The homeless population contains “about 15 percent who are considered to be chronically homeless and 9 percent are homeless veterans” (National Alliance to End Homelessness, 2015).

1) I have been in various amounts of situations where I have experienced a culture shock, but the one that was most influencing my life was when I went to a homeless mission here in Las Vegas for the very first time to volunteer. I have always had a presumption on how the homeless lived and what they were like, but I could never have imagined what I experienced that day.

Homelessness in America should be a growing concern. When discussing the United States' current economic crisis comparisons with the Great Depression are becoming more and more common. Tent cities or makeshift shelters in specified areas or just beyond city limits are becoming familiar sites across the country. Each of these "cities" contains dozens if not hundreds of families struggling to just survive (Maide, 2010).

The current social welfare issue that I chose to explore is homelessness within Canada. First, this essay will give a brief description of homelessness. Secondly, it will describe how homelessness relates to some concepts and theories that we learned in this course Introduction to Social Welfare, it will also look at what may have happened to people facing homelessness one hundred years ago, next we will explore a possible solution to this social issue and where this fits within the political ideologies. Finally, I will give a brief explanation on whether social media is an effective tool for bringing about awareness regarding social issues.