Custom «Homelessness is not a Choice» Essay Paper Sample

Homelessness has emerged as one of the most critical problems affecting our society. The problem has become so entrenched in our society such that successive national governments have been unable to complete erase it from the members of the public. The causes of homelessness are numerous and some of them may not be easy to control. For example, the recent financial crisis just showed things can get bad over a short time span. The main causes of homelessness include unaffordable homes, drug abuse problems, and mental illness.

First, in the American society, owning a home has become turned into an unachievable prospect among many citizens. This is because of the high price of homes, which cuts out many prospective owners. As a result, a high percentage of people of people who desire to own homes end up doing using their limited funds to accomplish other things that they are able. The effect of limiting the possibility of owning a home has far reaching effects on the self esteem of citizens, especially considering the fact that in any working environment, there are definite times when one’s employment may come to a sudden end (Boone 14). For example, an individual may reach his or her retirement age and end up homeless if there was no formal system in place to safeguard their welfare. Since homes are unaffordable, employers will rarely provide welfare programs to enable low earning employees to own a home.

In the just ended financial crisis, many Americans lost their homes until the government had to come up with a good plan to prevent total collapse of the society’s structure. The unpredictable nature of the national economy is among the reasons that caused people to lose their homes. Hence, there is a high possibility that a significant number of the people that were affected by the financial crisis are currently homeless. Additionally, it is very common to find people using the homes as a form of collateral to access financial facilities such as homes. This is part of the reason that heightens the risk of people losing their homes because when they are unable to pay up they may risk losing their homes too. For example, there are families where both spouses contribute in paying their mortgage loan. In such a situation, when one of the spouses loses his/her job the family may end up completely unable to service the loan as required, which only exposes them to further risk.

Secondly, drug addiction is a leading cause of homelessness in our society. The number of drug users is constantly increasing to unmanageable levels. Drug use is an expensive lifestyle to maintain. As a result, most drug users tend to become broke after a long time of using them. In fact, the effect that the drug has on the affected victims is what causes some of them to become homelessness. The drug culture has become a serious concern among governmental authorities. As a result, in many affected communities, since drug users tend to have misplaced priorities when using their money, programs have been instituted to help them out (Boone 36). These programs target to change the behavioural nature of the affected people so that they can become better citizens who can make good decisions like owning a home. An important element to note is that fact that drug abuse affects all classes of people.

This is mainly driven by the probability of drugs to lead to addiction. Once affected victims become addicted, a good portion of their earnings becomes dedicated towards supporting their drug use activities. Indeed, some of the drugs commonly used by affected victims are very expensive but because of the addiction that they have they are usually driven by a strong urge to buy them. When doing this, they forget that they have other pressing needs. There are situation in which some individuals have ended up selling literally everything that they own in order to support their addiction problem. For example, without realizing it, one may start by selling his car, then he sells a few household items, and gradually it becomes habitual. This will mostly happen when the affected person has limited sources of getting his income. As time goes by this individual may find himself/herself engulfed in serious debts, which may cause him to lose his/her home. This mostly happens when they have to formal bailout plan yet they still need to use drugs because of addiction. Stories of people coming from riches to rugs because of addiction are many. This list includes some of the most popular celebrities in the world. Hence, this only shows how drug abuse as a cause of homelessness presents complexities in sufficiently addressing it.

Thirdly, one’s health status may change dramatically when they become mentally ill. The illness literally changes their perception about their surroundings. Suddenly, they find their common environment looking strange to them, which causes them to look for other places. This problem is usually uncontrollable and most families find themselves taking the affected persons to psychiatry care. Normally, when one becomes mentally ill, they are declared as being incapable of accomplishing normal duties on their own. This causes them to lose their jobs and normal way of life. When this happens there are high chances that the individuals may become internally frustrated in trying to associate with others. When this happens, they gradually become isolated from other members of the society by choosing some of the most remote place, for example, garbage sites. Addressing this problem presents many challenges because normally, it is the victim’s brain that is no longer functioning properly; hence, their minds turn into a vegetable state.

Moreover, people with mental illness may be isolated in special treatment facilities for a long time such that if they owned property such as a home, they may never get the chance to enjoy their home again. There are also unique cases of people who develop certain forms of mental illness, which modify their perception about their world. These forms of mental illness may be treatable in the beginning, but somehow the victims never come to realize the seriousness of the problem (Boone 23). Additionally, there are other situations in which the affected persons face a major shock such as the loss of a loved one, which causes them to become mentally disturbed and they end up in the streets searching for solace. Unknowingly they cut off ties with their significant others and fall prey to homelessness.

Finally, homeless is a multifaceted problem caused by a number of factors such as unaffordable homes, illicit drug abuse, and mental illness. The unaffordable nature of homes has made it impossible for many people to own homes while the situation is made worse by the changing state of the economy. The recent financial crisis proved just how people can become homeless in the split of a second. Drug abuse on the other hand is primarily a behavioural problem that affects different age groups regardless of the victims’ social class. Addiction is the main thing that causes drug users to become homeless as they end up losing control over their finances. Mental illness is also partly behavioural, but may result from a medical condition. People who are affected by mental illness are the mostly likely to become completely affected by the problem of homelessness. Thus, there is need to consider different causative elements when considering the problem of homelessness in the society.