First the good news: Homelessness in the U.S. is down. In the mid-2000s, President George W. Bush’s “housing first” program made substantial inroads against the problem. President Barack Obama continued the campaign with the Homeless Prevention and Rapid Re-Housing Program in 2009 and a follow-up program in 2010. As a result of these efforts, the nationwide homeless population has continued to fall:
That happy trend shouldn’t be minimized. But it masks substantial regional inequality in access to housing. In some states, homelessness has dropped a lot, but in other states it has gone up:
Regionally, homelessness appears to be moving out West, to states like California, Washington and Colorado.