Читать книгу In the Midst of Plenty - Marybeth Shinn - Страница 19

In the wake of the U.S. military involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan, federal policymakers became concerned that traumatic combat experience elevates the risk of homelessness, and in 2009 HUD began tracking the numbers of veterans among people experiencing homelessness and describing their characteristics. Similar to all veterans, about 90% are men (Henry, Bishop, et al., 2018). They are more likely to be African American or Hispanic and much less likely to be over 62 years of age than all U.S. veterans, a population that as of the early twenty‐first century still reflects the era when U.S. military forces were much larger and relied on the draft rather than on self‐selection of volunteers.

So far, those in age groups most likely to have served in Iraq or Afghanistan have only slightly higher rates of homelessness, while those with the highest rates are in middle or late middle age. For example, in 2017, 42% of veterans experiencing homelessness were 51–61 years old, compared with only 18% of all U.S. veterans (Henry, Bishop, et al., 2018). Veterans almost always (98%) experience homelessness on their own (Henry, Bishop, et al., 2018). They may have been married or had a partner, but the partner is no longer with them.