Homelessness Is a Housing Problem: How Structural Factors Explain U.S. PatternsIn Homelessness Is a Housing Problem, Gregg Colburn and Clayton Page Aldern seek to explain the substantial regional variation in rates of homelessness in cities across the United States. In a departure from many analytical approaches, Colburn and Aldern shift their focus from the individual experiencing homelessness to the metropolitan area. Using accessible statistical analysis, they test a range of conventional beliefs about what drives the prevalence of homelessness in a given city—including mental illness, drug use, poverty, weather, generosity of public assistance, and low-income mobility—and find that none explain the regional variation observed across the country. Instead, housing market conditions, such as the cost and availability of rental housing, offer a far more convincing account. With rigor and clarity, Homelessness Is a Housing Problem explores U.S. cities' diverse experiences with housing precarity and offers policy solutions for unique regional contexts. |
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affordable housing Amazon analysis argue capita homelessness capita PIT counts capita rates Chronic Homelessness cities Community count per capita Dashed lines indicate Data source Detroit drug Ecological Fallacy emergency shelters end homelessness experiencing homelessness explain regional variation factors federal fund Hennepin County highlighted homeless population Homeless Rates homelessness crisis homelessness per 1,000 homelessness response hous households housing cost burden Housing Economics housing market housing supply housing units income increase individual investments Journal of Housing King County lessness linear regression low-income Mecklenburg County median mental illness National ness O'Flaherty percent permanent housing permanent supportive housing political rates of homelessness relationship rent response system Rudy Giuliani Rust Belt San Francisco Santa Clara County Seattle shelter capacity shelter system social studies subsidies tion U.S. Census Bureau U.S. regions unemployment unhoused unsheltered homelessness Urban Economics variation in rates versus PIT count Veterans Washington York