Argumentative Essay On Homeless People

Food, water, clothing, and shelter are the basic necessities of life. Surviving without even one of these things is detrimental to a person's health, and by default, their mental and emotional state as well. Because these four things are the foundation of life itself, all humans should be entitled to them, no matter their moral standards or work ethics. Lacking shelter can result in a shortage of food, clothing, and sometimes clean water. On top of these problems, those without shelter may face physical and verbal abuse, addiction, possible imprisonment, and severe mental illness. Denying a person shelter is as good as denying their value as a human being. The most morally straightforward person in the world, Pope Francis himself, stated that
“we can find no social or moral justification, no justification whatsoever, for lack of housing”(qtd. in Grossman). This was during his visit to Washington D.C. in September of 2015 to speak out about the homeless and the poor (Grossman). However, even in a first world country such as the United States, hundreds of thousands of people are denied these necessities. In January of 2013, there were over 610,000 homeless people accounted for in the United States ("Global Homelessness Statistics"). On a worldwide scale, there are an estimated 100 million people who are homeless ("World Habitat Day 2015 Key Housing Facts"). Homelessness is an unspoken problem in our country, but it is possible to help people off the streets and into homes through a series of solutions.
There is an unreasonably large number of homeless people struggling to get by in the United States.
In a ranking of countries with the highest standard of living, the United States comes in eighth place ("Standard of Living by Country"). This suggests that there should not be many homeless or impoverished people living in the U.S. However, as stated earlier, there are over half a million homeless people living in this apparently wonderful county. To make matters more grim, it should also be noted that counting the number of homeless people in any given location can be difficult and inaccurate. It is nearly impossible to account for every single person living on the streets, and the definition of homelessness varies place to place. The result of this is that statistics on homelessness are lower than what they really are. Nonetheless, over half a million people were counted as homeless in the U.S. Of those counted, nearly 15 percent were considered chronically homeless, meaning that they are on the streets long term (“Snapshot of Homelessness”). Considering the number of people challenged by homelessness, it should be a leading issue in communities and
government.
Homelessness must be solved because people without shelter are faced with unending threats and struggles every day. Being homeless is a vicious cycle. Not having shelter makes it more difficult to get a job, which in turn makes it harder to not be homeless. Homeless people are at a great risk of experiencing violence, mainly from sheltered people and police. Aside from the obvious difficulties with being homeless, such as where to sleep, obtain food, shower, or go to the bathroom, there are also problems that are generally kept secret. There are more crimes committed yearly against homeless than there are of all other hate crimes added together (“Hate Crimes Against the Homeless”). Police brutality makes up a portion of these violences committed. Over the past few years there has been an increase in laws that basically incriminate homeless people for being homeless, such as bans on lying down in public, loitering, and sleeping in cars (Resnikoff). The National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty, an organization dedicated to changing laws in order to protect homeless, condemned these new rules, stating, “Criminalizing homelessness and its associated activities when people have nowhere else to go constitutes cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment” (“No Safe Place”). The people who commit these supposed “crimes” have no choice but to do them. By making these actions illegal, it punishes people for being homeless, does nothing but aggravate the problem, and makes life for homeless people much harder. A homeless youth from Salt Lake City named Jacob described the added stress of being harassed by police because of the new laws. “The cops give us no rest,” he explains, “There was one night I couldn’t even get a full eight hours of sleep because I was getting woken up by cops and told to go from place to place. And I would just go lay down and get woken up an hour later. Go lay down another place, and get woken up. I got five tickets that night”(qtd. in “No Safe Place”). These tickets that are given out to homeless are added assurance that the homeless will never be able to recover, pinning them down with excessive fines that they cannot reasonably pay. Arrest for not paying these fines also ensures that homeless people stay on the streets, due to the fact that criminal records can prevent people from finding employment. These laws has also elevated rates of police violence, as well as civilian crimes against homeless (Resnikoff). They perpetuate the negative stereotype that homeless people are dirty criminals who deserve their bad fortune.
Another reason why homelessness must end is because of the cost. Imprisonment for pointless laws, such as laying down in public, come at a cost to all parties involved, not just the homeless person. Going to prison for a year is almost as costly as attending college for a year, and someone has to pay the bill (Rios). Often, the government must pick up the tab, due to the fact that the homeless person does not have the money, either before or after incarceration. In a few cases, when given given the option of food, a bed, heating, and a roof over one’s head, or living outside on the street, homeless people will intentionally go to jail just to survive. A homeless man in Seattle recently held up a bank (with no weapon, and for only a dollar) in order to be arrested and given medical attention (Quigley). Desperate actions such as these are costly and, in the end, do not help the homeless. Caring for inmates actually costs the government far more than providing shelter for the homeless (Miles). Homeless people may also check themselves into hospitals or emergency rooms so that they have a place to sleep for the night. These hospital bills are almost always paid for by the government, or not at all, leaving the hospital itself to deal with it. Similarly, it is cheaper to provide therapy and recovery options to those homeless people with drug addiction, rather than pay for hospital bills in the cases of overdose or illness resulting from drug use (Miles). Denying help to the homeless is costing the government and the people far more in the long run, and it certainly is no fun for the actual people on the streets.
Some believe that homeless people do not deserve help, and that if they only got a job and worked to “earn their keep” like the rest of society, then they would stop being homeless. If you type the phrase, “homeless are” into Google, the first suggested search is “homeless people are lazy.” This assumption is not only rude, callous, and dehumanizing, but it also distracts from the real problem. There are dozens of reasons as to why a person can become homeless, and many of those reasons are simply due to bad circumstance. An estimated 76 percent of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck (Johnson). This means that there are millions of people in danger of becoming homeless at any given time because of an emergency or job loss. Very few people intentionally becomes homeless. A reason that this negative culture exists towards homeless and other underprivileged individuals is due to the false meritocracy in America. A meritocracy is a system in which hard work or laziness reflects on a person’s status, especially financially ("Ever Higher Society, Ever Harder to Ascend”). Basically, if you are rich, then you worked hard to get there and you deserve it. Vice versa, if you are poor, you must be lazy and you deserve to be poor. It is a nice idea to believe that the United States is a meritocracy, but it is incorrect. Often, wealthy people are born into lofty positions, and did not need to work for it. Disadvantaged people can also be born into poverty, with things like racism, lack of available education, and other simple things like bad luck preventing them from climbing the ladder. But the idea that being poor equals laziness is still very common, despite how inaccurate it is. Those people who believe that the homeless deserve to be poor are not only are wrong, but also have some critical thinking to do about their views of society.
The number one solution to solving homelessness is through “housing first” aid. Housing first is a program that is what it sounds like; it gives homeless people a place to live before anything else. In the past, programs to help the homeless were more based on dealing with issues first, like drug abuse or unemployment. In 1992, a psychologist named Sam Tsemberis tried a different route, and discovered the effectiveness of housing first (Sanburn.) Tsemberis stated, “We made the assumption that housing would actually stabilize people (Qtd. in Sanburn.)" His idea was that giving the homeless a place to stay made it much easier for them to obtain and hold down a job, break any addictions, and begin rebuilding their finances and their life. Tsemberis was evidently correct, and housing first programs are gaining popularity throughout the country to help homeless people get back on their feet. A special feature of this program is its leniency for those struggling with addiction. Unlike most other forms of shelter for the homeless, housing first programs do not require clients to be clean and sober when they enter the program, only asking that they do not deal or engage in anything illegal once they are placed in a home. This allows more people to be helped, rather than turning away those who are most in need. Housing first programs have been shown to help people permanently, with an 85 to 90 percent success rate ("Housing First Model.") This is opposed to just cycling people back out onto the street like most shelters, prisons, and rehab center do.
Not only do housing first methods succeed in helping the homeless themselves, but it is also cost effective. The cost of providing temporary shelter for homeless is approximately $20000, whereas placing them in a home through housing first only costs around $8,000. Those people who are given shelters are less likely to go to jail, which is a win-win situation for both the homeless person and the government (Sanburn). This is especially significant because those who do go to prison eventually get out and are immediately kicked to the curb, which restarts the vicious cycle and costs more money. Those in housing first programs are also known to make less frequent hospital visits. Housing first programs are cost-effective and successful.
Another solution to help end homelessness is through treatment for addiction and substance abuse. According to Alcohol Rehab, a program made to help those with alcoholism, nearly 38 percent of the homeless population in America abuses alcohol. Additionally, 26 percent of homeless people use other types of drugs (“Homelessness and Substance Abuse”). Treating drug addiction is necessary to helping the homeless off the streets. This often goes hand-in-hand with housing first programs. Drug rehabilitation specialists and counselors make frequent visits to the new homes of those in need. Rehabilitation is important in helping homeless people because it can help them to get and keep a job, and also to help them save their money for more important things. It is also, obviously, imperative to their health and well being to break their bad habits. Again, by reducing the amount of substance abuse in the homeless, the government and hospitals are saved from having to pay for incarceration and emergency room bills. More counselors and mentors should be employed to help homeless people along the path to recovery.
There are an endless number of ways to help solve the quiet, yet massive, problem of homelessness.
Homelessness is sadly common in the United States, and millions are affected by it worldwide. Not only is it extremely difficult and dangerous to those experiencing it, but lack of remedy for it saps resources and money from hospitals and the government due to the cost of incarceration and emergency room visits. It can be solved through housing first methods, rehabilitation, and overall compassion towards those in need. Homeless people are no less important than anyone else in the world. They deserve the basic necessities of food, water, clothing and shelter, and overall, they deserve to feel
safe.