Urban Exile: The Growing Problem of Homeless Senior Citizens
by Erika McNamara
If asked, the average person would probably describe a homeless person as a thirty-something male, addicted to some substance, too lazy to go out and find work. But thanks to the Great Recession, this demographic of the thirty-something being homeless is changing. It is rude in our culture to ask someone their age so I rarely do. But there have been times when homeless individuals have proudly told me how old they are. In one such conversation, a homeless woman I see almost every week quite proudly told me she was 59-years-old, living on the streets, and making it day-by-day. I am not sure which part she was most proud of—the age or the being able to endure something so awful at her age part. She is making it day-by-day and faces living her senior years without a stable place to live, or even the hope of ever having a roof over her head again. It is hard enough to imagine being homeless, hungry, and sleeping on the ground, but now imagine your grandmother doing it for the rest of her life. 
Pay the rent/mortgage for the house or pay for prescriptions. This is a dilemma a family here in Michigan faced. The family opted to take care of their 76-year-old grandmother. The family home was foreclosed upon, and they all took up residence in a tent at a nearby campground for three weeks with the elderly woman. This grandmother was fortunate to have members of her family to help her. There are many elderly individuals out there who have outlived friends and family; these individuals are truly all alone in this world. In Houston a 90 year-old World War II veteran applied to the VA for help for the first time in his life after finding himself homeless. It seems inconceivable that a gunner from the WW II could be homeless. However, consider this all homeless Vietnam Vets will be senior citizens in the next ten years. Sometime in the future, there will be homeless 90-year-old Vietnam Vets wandering the streets of our country.
Today more than ever before seniors are in debt without the prospect of ever being able to pay off their obligations. In fact a recent study found that 20 percent of all bankruptcy filings in the United States may be attributed to individuals 55 years and older. Likewise, the numbers are also pretty staggering in regards to the number of seniors who are homeless in our country. In 2008, The Department of Human and Urban Development reported there were 43,450 individuals in homeless shelters over the age of 61. Estimates for the next ten years predict the elderly homeless population will increase by 33 percent and this number will increase to fifty-four percent by 2050. That will mean almost 100,000 homeless individuals over the age of 61 will be wandering the streets of American cities within a few decades. Last year the Michigan Coalition Against Homelessness estimated there were 720 homeless individuals over the age of 65 living in our state.
Currently, one in three senior citizens in our state is financially insecure. Countless older adults struggle to maintain employment, with medical issues and with the day-to-day living of life. Many wait for a time when they will be eligible to use government-assisted housing options through senior housing initiatives of social security. The real irony of the system should not be lost on anyone. It is no longer true that working hard, living frugally, and saving money guarantees one will have a place to live after the age of 65. Cultures around the world revere the elderly, and celebrate the lives of those individuals lucky enough to have lived into their 80s and 90s. However, as our population is aging; there are millions of individuals in the upper age brackets who no longer have family or friends to lean on in the event of a tear in the fabric of life.
The Senior Community Service Employment Program has been in place since 1965. This program provides job training for low-income seniors while paying them minimum wage. Unfortunately, due to the recent budget cuts this particular program’s funding was reduced by 45 percent, or a $ $11,697,900 loss for the state of Michigan to assist seniors. Without this job training, many of the seniors in this program will not be able to find work and would have no income at all. Reflecting on the ever-increasing aging population is an interesting new trend that many in the pop media love to beat to death. The new mantra is, “What about the old people?” instead of the time-enduring, “What about the children?”
As a society we have to begin to come to grips with the fact that there is a real problem on our horizon for senior citizens and the family and friends of senior citizens. Our national, state and local officials have to find more effective ways to meet the needs to seniors—to help them stay in their homes so that they will not become a part of an ever-growing population of people with nowhere to go but out on the streets. Logan’s Run is a novel about an Earth in the future that is so over-populated that in order to maintain the resources of the planet the government legislates the maximum age for an individual to be 21-years-old. The population is kept in check, resources are not used up, and poverty is eradicated.
Throwing people out of government programs, health insurance policies, etc…because they are a drain on available resources appears to be the solution of some policy makers in the United States. Instead, the question people should be asking themselves is this: “How do I want to be treated when I reach the age of 65?” The answer to the question is not about going to a financial planner, saving money, working hard. These seniors did all of that. This is about developing resources and policies now to help those who require it now, as well as to help those who will require help in future years to come. Who will these people be? Perhaps you or perhaps someone you know.