Introduction

For this project, I am analyzing the rate of homelessness in the United States from 2007-2022 as depicted by maps and graphs. Then, I will be examining one county within North Carolina specifically, Mecklenburg County and I will analyze their homeless population since April 2019- March 2022 as a case study. I chose Mecklenburg County out of curiostiy since it has a high population and a large urban area. After looking at all the data, I will be taking a deeper look into why these homelessness rates are the numbers they are for specific years with the help of research. These homeless statistics are all estimates due to the challenge of counting the homeless and because they typically do not want to be counted. I amp articularly interested to see whether homelessness increased during the pandemic and whether it remains the same now or decreased in Mecklenburg County. I retrieved my data from https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/homeless-population-by-state and https://endhomelessness.org/homelessness-in-america/homelessness-statistics/state-of-homelessness-2021/, and found the additional data on Mecklenburg County at https://mecklenburghousingdata.org/welcome/housing-data-snapshot/.

Graph of Homelessness Over Time from 2007-2020

Below, you’ll see a bar graph I created in Tableau to see the total population of homelessness over time in the United States from 2007 to 2020.

Over time, homelessness has decreased then increased. In 2007 and 2008 it is shown to be the years with the highest estimate of homeless individuals with 2020 following behind. In 2007 was the start of the last recession which most likely carried over to the high homeless rates in 2008. After that 2020 was the highest which most likely was caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

2021 Homelessness US Map

Next I will show you a map of homelessness in the United States in 2021.

According to the map, New York, Hawaii, California, and Oregon are the states that have the highest estimated homeless population in 2021. This graph has a rate of 10,000 people so that each state would show an accurate portrayal at which states do have the highest number of homeless individuals.

2022 Homelessness US Map!

In comparison to the 2021 map, below, you will see a map of the United States to see the total population of chronically homeless individuals in 2022.

Looking at this map, it is clear to see that the number of homeless people is larger in states that are bigger and have larger population, but because of this, I put a rate of 10,000 on each state, to see which states have the largest homeless population. According to the map, California, Hawaii, Oregon and New York all have the highest homeless population in 2022, which is similar to 2021.

Lets visualize this in another way…

I generated a bar graph (below) that shows which states have the highest homeless population.

When looking at this bar graph, it clearly shows which states have the highest homeless population. New York, Hawaii, Oregon and California are the top 4 states which is similar to 2021.

Mecklenburg County

I have also decided to zoom in and look at a specific county as a case study.

Below is a line graph showing an estimate of how many people were homeless in Mecklenburg County over time from April 2019-March 2022.

Looking at homelessness over time in Mecklenburg, I was not surprised to see that 2020 was seen to have a highest homeless estimate. This could be due to the start of the pandemic and individuals losing their jobs.

Conclusion

With the data that I analyzed, I found that homelessness in the United States was high in 2007, 2008 and 2020 due to the recession and the Covid-19 pandemic. The states that had the highest homelessness rates were New York, Hawaii, Oregon and California in both 2021 and 2022. I also found that 2020 had the highest estimate of homeless people in January of 2020 in specifically Mecklenburg County, which shows that the pandemic caused homeless populations to rise. Which confirmed my original hypothesis that the pandemic increased the homeless population in 2020.

From research, I was able to find why New York, Hawaii, Oregon and California all have high homeless rates. New York has a high homeless population most likely due to job loss, eviction, and inadequate affordable housing. California’s homeless rate is high due to mental health, addiction, poverty, job loss, and lack of affordable housing. Oregon’s homeless population is mostly due to increasing rents in the past few years. Lastly, Hawaii’s homeless rates are both due to systemic and social barriers like unemployment, poverty, rising of rent, domestic violence, drug abuse etc. Overall the data was revealing on a larger scale.