National Coalition for the Homeless
2201 P. St. NW ❜ Washington, DC 20037
Phone: (202) 462-4822 ❜ Fax: (202) 462-4823
Email: info@nationalhomeless.org |Website: http://www.nationalhomeless.org
Employment and Homelessness
NCH Fact Sheet #4
Published by the National Coalition for the Homeless, August 2007
This fact sheet examines the relationship between work and homelessness, including the
contribution of unemployment, underemployment, and low wages to homelessness. It also
assesses the employment barriers faced by homeless people, and strategies for overcoming those
barriers. A list of resources for further study is also provided.
THE CONTRIBUTION OF UNEMPLOYMENT AND LOW WAGES TO
HOMELESSNESS
Media reports of a growing economy and low unemployment mask a number of important
reasons why homelessness persists, and, in some areas of the country, is worsening. These
include stagnant or falling incomes, and less secure jobs that offer fewer benefits.
WAGES AND INCOME
While the last few years have seen growth in real wages at all levels, these increases have not
been enough to counteract a long pattern of stagnant and declining wages.
Low-wage workers have been particularly hard hit by wage trends. As recently as 1967, a year-
round worker earning the minimum wage was paid enough to raise a family of three above the
poverty line (Sklar, 1995). From 1981-1990, however, the minimum wage was frozen at $3.35
an hour, while the cost of living increased 48% over the same period. Congress raised the
minimum wage to $5.15 per hour in 1996, and it has not been raised until 2007. In 2007,
President Bush signed into law a plan that would increase the minimum wage to $7.25 an hour,
over two years. This increase has not kept up with the ground lost to inflation in the last 20
years; thus, the real value of the minimum wage today is 26% less than in 1979 (The Economic
Policy Institute, 2005), worth only $4.42 in real dollars (AFL-CIO, 2005). Full-time year-round
minimum-wage earnings curr