Government responses to the problem have varied

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Government responses to the problem have varied

Few social problems have increased so suddenly or been dramatized so effectively as the plight of the homeless in the 1980s and 1990s.

Once an invisible people who could easily be ignored, the homeless are now recognized everywhere on the streets and in the public facilities of major cities.

The number of homeless people in underdeveloped societies in the mid-1980s was estimated by the United Nations to be more than 100 million. The so-called "new" homeless live in the developed, industrialized nations of Europe, North America, and East Asia.

Accurate statistics have been impossible to verify, in part because of the conflicting viewpoints on the subject of homelessness. Politicians, lawyers, and others who become advocates for the homeless have said that there are from 2 to 3 million homeless in the United States alone.

Others who have studied the problem from a less sympathetic point of view suggest that the number is closer to 300 000.

One reason for statistical uncertainty is the composition of the homeless population. Some families suffer temporary poverty because of loss of a job.

Unable to afford rent or mortgage payments, they may temporarily join the ranks of the homeless for a period of days or weeks (or they may live with relatives). Once another job is found, the family can usually afford shelter once more.

The number of I hose who are truly homeless consists of possibly 3 percent or less of the very poor. Their most common characteristic is poverty, though some work at least part-time, while others receive various kinds of welfare payments.

The National Institute of Mental Health has estimated that one third of the homeless in the 1980s were former mental patients who had been discharged under deinstitutionalization programs. Many of the homeless are also addicted to drugs or alcohol or both.

Some are victims of structural unemployment, temporary, but massive, changes in an economy. Others become homeless when the eligibility rules for assistance change or when the supply of low-rent housing runs out.

Some members of the homeless population are voluntary in the sense that they leave intolerable situations within their former homes. Battered wives and abused or neglected children become runaways, living on the streets or in shelters opened by charities. In Japan many men reportedly have dropped out of the economy voluntarily for such reasons as stress, old age, indifference, or to escape family problems.

Government responses to the problem have varied. Canada and the United States have no laws on homelessness, but government agencies provide funds to operate shelters and soup kitchens. England has a Homeless Persons Act, enacted in 1977, that requires local authorities to house the homeless. In an attempt to improve housing for the poor, the UN declared 1987 the International Year of Shelter for the Homeless.

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