This report distills a year of research on homelessness in America.

It provides background, evidence and a point of view on some of the major drivers of America’s homelessness crisis. The purpose of this research is to inform decisions around philanthropic giving: unlike an academic piece of research, our work here is focused on action.

The United States is the largest economy in the world, and yet it is failing to live up to its promise. America’s homelessness crisis is one symptom of a failing social safety net. Americans’ life expectancy has been declining since 2020,[1] US infant and maternal mortality rates are by far the worst in the industrialized world and continue to rise, and the United States is home to the largest population of incarcerated people in the world. These failings, among many others, have particularly impacted communities of color and reflect a lack of investment in the American people. As our economy has grown, so too has inequality; the United States is the most unequal high-income country in the world.[2]

[1] The decline has been more precipitous for Black, Indigenous, and Hispanic populations.

[2] As measured by the Gini coefficient.