Why are Veterans Homeless

The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) state that the nation’s homeless veterans make up twelve percent of the adult homeless population. The majority are single, living in urban areas while most probably suffering with mental illness, alcohol and or substance abuse. To add to these tragic statistics, homeless veterans are younger on average than the total veteran population. Approximately nine percent are between the ages of eighteen and thirty, and forty-one percent are between the ages of thirty-one and fifty. However, only five percent of all veterans are between the ages of eighteen and thirty, and less than twenty-three percent are between thirty-one and fifty. Along with these homeless veterans, an additional 1.4 million are on a road to no longer having a place to call home.

Veteran are forced into these situation that leave them without a roof over their heads due to poverty, lack of support networks, and inability to adjust after returning home. Research has proven that those who have the greatest risk of becoming homeless are those who become socially isolated after being discharge. This isolation causing low marriage rates and high divorce rates which means at the very least every one in five veterans are living alone. Their war riddled minds do not allow adaptation to home easy, enabling them to become employed. Which enables their ability to provide for themselves let alone someone else, this further isolating them. Leaving the people who fought to protect our freedom alone with no one to turn. Unless people fight to aid them live a life they deserve, like the ones we live today made possible by their struggle.