This nation is currently facing one of the most severe affordable housing crises in history. Not surprisingly, those living in poverty are the most significantly affected.

In the 1970s, communities had plenty of affordable housing. That meant that when a family or individual experienced a crisis and lost housing, they could quickly find another place to live. But by the mid-1980s, the supply of low-cost housing had shrunk significantly. Since then, rents have continued to rise, and lower-income people in particular have experienced slow or stagnant wage growth.

Today, 11 million extremely low-income households pay at least half of their income toward housing, putting them at risk of housing instability and homelessness.

Public Housing and Voucher Programs

Administered by HUD, public housing and voucher programs provide decent and safe affordable housing for low-income people and play a critical role in reducing homelessness.

• Housing Choice Voucher Program (commonly known as “Section 8“) has become the dominant form of federal housing assistance.  The program, which provides vouchers to low-income households to help them pay for housing in the private market, has been found to sharply reduce homelessness.
• Public housing is federally-funded housing that is rented at subsidized rates to eligible low-income families, the elderly, and persons with disabilities.

The homeless population is a heterogeneous mix of people caught in various situations. It is not usually one factor that causes homelessness, but the intersection of a number of circumstances acting together, along with a person’s individual history and personality. For example, while not everyone who has a substance or alcohol abuse problem is homeless, their chances of becoming homeless increases when such factors are combined with a low income.

Of all the factors, poverty is the single major cause of homelessness. A person or family who is poor is often unable to pay for necessities such as housing, food, childcare or health care, and as such, is only an accident, illness or paycheck away from becoming homeless. Children are hit the hardest, with nearly half of all children in one of America’s largest cities living below the poverty line as of 2015.

Another major cause of homelessness is domestic violence. Often, battered women must choose between remaining with their abuser or becoming homeless. Sexually abused youth and senior victims of domestic violence are also at risk for homelessness.

Approximately 3.5 million people become homeless in the United States during the course of a given year, according to the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty.