Rising Homelessness Highlights Need to Invest in Proven Solutions
“Homelessness has risen sharply since 2023, new data show. The research is clear: rental assistance promotes housing stability and is key to solving homelessness. Reducing, and ultimately solving, homelessness will require expanding rental assistance and access to supportive services. Unfortunately, President-elect Trump’s record and Republican proposals raise concerns that the incoming Administration and Congress could abandon evidence-based approaches; cut fundingfor programs like rental assistance, increasing the already large number of households who don’t receive help because of inadequate resources; and pursue policies that will further increase homelessness and housing instability and deepen inequities.
New data released in late December by the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) show that homelessness was 18 percent higher in January 2024 than the same time last year, reaching an all-time high for the second year in a row. Homelessness increased among families with children, single adults, youth, and people experiencing chronic (long-term or repeated) homelessness — every household type except for veterans.
Affordable housing is a basic human need. We know a lot about how to make housing affordable and accessible for people with low incomes, including people experiencing homelessness. But those evidence-based solutions, like rental assistance, remain underfunded, and homelessness and cost burden among renters have reached unprecedented levels. This is a policy choice. In the wealthiest nation in the world, solutions are in reach.”
Read more at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.