Hard to Escape Homelessness

In New York City, the homeless population is on a tough journey to get out of poverty and the situation continues to get worse as time goes by.  It's projected that today, the homeless population increase around 60,000 but only those that were counted are living in shelters.  Those that did not stay in shelters become drifters, staying “from one friend or family member’s couch to the next, or sleeping throughout the city under awnings, in parks, on subways, on stoops” (Gibson).  In fact, most of these drifters refuse to go to shelters because of violence and insanitation conditions within them.

 This epidemic continues to grow for several reasons: increase rent and low wages.  “Between 2000 and 2014, the median New York City rent increased 19 percent while household income decreased by 6.3 percent” (Gibson).  For poor working families that were around the time period, they most likely are to become homeless today.  Another factor for the homeless percent growth was the city policies that was changed and propose temporary aid to help those in shelters.  “Advocates for the homeless blame the increase in part on the Bloomberg administration’s decision to end the practice of giving homeless families priority for subsidized public housing and Section 8, a federally funded voucher program that provides permanent rental assistance” (Gibson).  They believed the program was not effective enough to place people into the housing from shelters fast enough but only put those with vouchers at the top of the waiting list.  After many fail attempts from the Bloomberg administration, those families with vouchers not only continue to wait for permanent housing, additionally, new homeless families join in line for aid in which causing the dramatic increase.

Work Cited

Gibson, D. W. "Why It's So Hard to Stop Being Homeless in New York." Daily Intelligencer. New York Media, LLC, 22 Mar. 2017. Web. 27 Oct. 2017. http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/03/nyc-homelessness-crisis.html