Summer Economics/ CS 2006

What can be done about homelessness?

Realistically, what can be done about homelessness on a national level? This question has been posed time and time again with many proposed solutions. Unfortunately in our day and age there are more pressing subjects and matters to attend to, but here’s a list of small solutions that I’ve come up with.

1) We, as a nation need to start getting the homeless off the street and into shelters or homes.

2) The government should offer a stipend to the homeless community to help “get them back on their feet”

3) Many homeless are unable to get jobs simply because employers are uncomfortable with the concept of a homeless employee. An act could be passed that created equality for the homeless in job situations, or a union could be created that did something similar.

4) A good deal of the homeless community have addictions to either illicit substances or alcohol. Rehabilitation centers could be developed all over the nation along with the one’s we already have to help the homeless break these old habits.

5) A mere $1.7 billion a year is spent on solving homelessness[1], this may sound like a lot, but in comparison to the $450+ billion spent on the military alone, the budget for homelessness in trivial. If we were to divert 0.01% of the military budget to help combat homelessness, that alone would double the funds.

6) With inevitable growth in GDP, we face gradually rising inflation, which means higher prices. The government could start a program that lowers the taxes homeless have to pay, similar to welfare, or other forms of government financial aid.

What are the “powers at be” not doing?

The government is not paying enough attention to domestic problems we have. Our politicians are too focused on “the war abroad” that they are unable to attend to problems like homelessness. Even when Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans our government did not intervene until much later in the crisis, and efforts made to prevent the disaster were apparently minimal[2]. If our government cannot make the proper efforts to prevent something as cataclysmic as the flooding of an entire state, how are we to expect the government to make efforts toward solving homelessness?

What impact could we have to change the current situation?

Sadly none of us could do much more for the national homeless community than raise a couple thousand dollars for donation. Though it is indeed the thought that counts, $5,000 thrown at the national homeless problem does little more than a scratch. Our abilities to solve homelessness in Hawaii are much stronger. We could donate food, money, old clothes, backpacks and all kinds of useful items to local homeless shelters. We could also volunteer to erect new shelters that could house even more homeless. Another thing we could do is raise awareness to local businesses that the homeless are people too, and deserve to be employed as well. All of the efforts I’ve proposed could be done on a national level, but would have a much smaller impact. It would be more helpful if all of our efforts were focused on solving homelessness in Hawaii first, then we can play Bono and save the rest of the nation. For more information on what you can do to help homelessness in Hawaii read Tierney’s article on what can be done on a local level.

What does the future situation look like?

If the nation continues down the path its going, homelessness will be in the exact same place it’s at right now in 5 years, or even 10 years. However, if our government has an epiphany and decides to stop our wars abroad, this would free up a lot of government funds and allow some of it to be spent on domestic problems like homelessness. If our nation were to travel down this path, I can foresee bright skies in the future of our nations homeless.