The Determinants Of Homelessness

Prologue: The nation's homeless present a vivid reminder of the underside of the richest country on earth. In recent months, though, the homeless have captured the attention of Congress. Legislators have approved and President Reagan has signed into law a measure to provide 50 million in immediate aid to the homeless, and that seems like only the beginning. With the strong support of House Speaker Jim Wright, Democratic Whip Thomas S. Foley is sponsoring legislation to provide an additional 500 million to the homeless. And Senate Majority Leader Robert Byrd has asked his committee chairs to develop a homeless assistance bill of their own. But who really are the homeless and how large a group do they represent? In this essay, sociologists Peter Rossi and James Wright of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, employ a new approach to the study of homelessness. The authors, who conducted their study in Chicago, describe homelessness as a manifestation of extreme poverty that occurs among disabled and isolated people. They see the numbers of homeless individuals as reflections of the limited availability of low-priced housing for single persons, the limited coverage and modest size of income transfers, and. the small number of low-skill jobs available in local labor markets. Rossi, who directs the Social and Demographic Research Institute at the University of Massachusetts, is a former president (1980) of the American Sociological Association. He formerly (1960-1967) directed the University of Chicago's National Opinion Research Center (NORC). During his stewardship of NORC, the center initiated its first surveys on estimating the medical care costs of individual households. Wright is associate director of the Social and Demographic Research Institute. He also is directing the management information systems that are a part of The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's national program of medical clinics for the homeless.