Reaching and enumerating homeless populations

doi:10.1017/CBO9781139381635.012

9 - Reaching and enumerating homeless populations

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 September 2014

Eric Hirsch and

Edited by

Kirk M. Wolter and

Irene Glasser: Affiliation:
Brown University
Eric Hirsch: Affiliation:
Lancaster University and University of Sydney
Anna Chan: Affiliation:
US Citizenship and Immigration Services
Roger Tourangeau: Affiliation:
Westat Research Organisation, Maryland
Brad Edwards: Affiliation:
Westat Research Organisation, Maryland
Timothy P. Johnson: Affiliation:
University of Illinois, Chicago
Kirk M. Wolter: Affiliation:
University of Chicago
Nancy Bates: Affiliation:
US Census Bureau

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Summary

Whether called roofless (India), sin techo (Latin America), itinérants (Quebec), furosha (Japan), or gamino (street child of Columbia), homeless individuals and families confront us with a failure to provide safe and permanent dwellings to meet our most basic human needs. In the United States, by the 1980s the homeless had migrated out of the skid rows and the Bowery of cities to become a visible presence in many neighborhoods of cities and suburbs. A major reason for the increase in homelessness was the great reduction of affordable housing, including the loss of 2.3 million units of low-income housing between 1973 and 1992 (Wagner & Gilman, 2012). A second reason was the retreat from a policy of financial assistance to single unemployed individuals, General Assistance (in some places called the “rent money”), in the 1980s as we moved from cash assistance to providing housing and food through homeless shelters and soup kitchens (Glasser & Bridgman, 1999). In addition, the stagnant and falling income of low-wage workers put housing out of reach for many workers (National Coalition for the Homeless, 2009).

As the US was confronting the visible homeless, policymakers, and the public wanted to know how many homeless individuals and families existed and who they were. The answer to these questions proved to be difficult. The numbers varied depending whether the count came from a census, surveys based on sampling, or administrative records such as shelter rosters.

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Type: Chapter
Information: Hard-to-Survey Populations , pp. 180 - 200

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139381635.012 [Opens in a new window]

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Print publication year: 2014

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