| Attempting to Work While Homeless |
| In the viewpoint of many people the solution to all homelessness is for people to simply "get a job!". That sounds like a good idea, but getting and maintaining a job to afford housing while homeless is hardly that simple. |
| For those with homes, cars, good clothing, phones, and all the typical necessities of everyday life it can still be difficult to find and keep work that actually pays a good living wage. When a person has none of these things, maintaining meaningful employment is a hundred times more difficult. |
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| There are several factors involved in maintaining a job. Those who have never been without such basic necessities take them for granted and assume everyone has access to them. |
| Adequate Sleep Having to sleep on the ground and dealing with rain, thunderstorms, oppressive heat or freezing cold, mosquitoes, and night foraging animals can make it difficult or impossible at times. Add to that the very real danger of being attacked, robbed, beaten, or even killed, and then try to get some sleep. |
| Working close to others demands good hygiene. Not being able to even shower frequently, or have clean clothes, rules out any employment like this. |
| Keeping Clean Any indoor work demands being clean and outdoor labor work requires being able to clean up afterward. Sleeping outside in your clothes doesn't help. Some places provide showers for the homeless, but due to location and time they are unavailable to most in need. Getting appropriate clean clothes is a major problem. When clothes get dirty and wet they stay that way. Few places will help people with washing clothes for free. |
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| A Place for Belongings Keeping a supply of clean clothes and personal items is extremely difficult while living outside. If your things are stolen or vandalized (often burned) it's considered to be your own fault for not having housing. Carrying everything around (even if that were possible) doesn't help in maintaining a "normal" appearance. |
| Having to sleep out in some bushes in your clothes isn't ideal for getting a good nights sleep and being ready and presentable for a days work. |
| Transportation Relatively few homeless have cars, or can afford to keep them running. This leaves the bus system, bicycles, or walking. Some areas have good bus systems, but they don't always go where the jobs are. With waiting, transfers, plus walking it can take hours. A trip that takes 20 minutes by car can take two hours or more by bus. You would think that bus systems could get people to jobs early in the morning. The bus system where I live (PSTA in Pinellas County FL) is fairly good, but most buses don't run early enough for a person to get to a 7AM job, even if the bus runs on schedule. I live close to Tampa, Florida, and there are work opportunities there and a bus system. So, why don't I use it? I live in another county, which has it's own bus system, but there is no connection from here for the regular buses. The two bus systems could cooperate, but they don't, so you simply can't get from one to the other. |
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| Communication How can an employer reach a homeless person who applied for work? Being without a mailing address or phone number makes it very difficult. If a temporary agency needs someone for an opening they choose from those they can reach immediately. Most employers will not even consider anyone who doesn't provide a phone number. |
| Commuting by bus has it's drawbacks, especially when you have to walk for miles and wait in the rain. But if the bus doesn't run past the job until after work hours start it won't do you any good. |
| Conflicts with the Law (or the Community) Police don't generally bother people sleeping outside unless it's private property or visible to the public. With public pressure on authorities to eliminate the homeless it keeps getting more diffucult. I've been stopped by police repeatedly just for walking to work early in the morning. "Normal" people don't walk to work in the morning when it's still dark. |
| Undue Suspicions While some employers may be understanding, and even flexible on terms, knowing that a person is homeless, most are not. If you don't show evidence of a place to live people automatically assume you're a criminal. Many employers won't consider anyone using a shelter as an address (even if it is discrimination). Many homeless people don't have any good job or personal references either. |
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| Food Until that first paycheck, which could be weeks, you still need to eat. There are some places that provide free lunches or dinners for the homeless but, especially for those trying to work, may be inaccessable due to time of day or location. Some soup-kitchens have been forced to close as a means of "eliminating the homeless". I know of one mission that had been serving free breakfast and dinner to anyone coming in for about 20 years that was ordered by the city to stop providing meals on the grounds that they didn't have adequate parking. Most of the people coming there didn't have vehicles, but it was a convenient way of stopping them from helping people. Many churches provide free groceries, but it doesn't help a lot with nowhere to cook, or even store any food. . |
| While there are plenty of simple labor jobs available, they usually require a strong back and don't pay enough to live on, and don't provide insurance if you get hurt either. |
| The Cost of Housing With minimum wage work, even if it's full time, it's difficult to rent even the cheapest rooms and then afford other necessities like food. Renting an apartment may require putting $1000 down (if not far more) plus proving adequate wages to qualify. The cost of housing has been going up much faster than wages in much of the country. A good job requires having housing and affording your own housing requires a job. |
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| Competition Even for some of the hardest, dirtiest, and dangerous low paying jobs there is competition. It's not unusual to have dozens of applicants for one job opening, and employers don't choose based on the person's need. |
| Some may think that a homeless person can just go to a public shelter and get all the help they need. In reality, even if the local area has a shelter it's probably full to capacity. If a person is fortunate enough to get in, they are likely limited to only a few nights. Even then, the shelter isn't responsible to provide any further assistance that may be needed. Could you get a job and save enough to rent a room simply by having a bed and a shower for a few nights? |
| While some consider camping out to be fun, trying to sleep under a sheet of plastic in the rain and then getting up at 4AM for work isn't. |
| There are some unavoidable facts to all this. Being able to get, and maintain, a job which will pay enough to make it possible to get permanent housing usually requires having housing and other assistance to get started. Without some kind of assistance unemployed homeless people are likely to stay that way, no matter how hard they try on their own. |
| www.homelessamerican.com HOMEPAGE |
| These are some basic factors in being able to get, and keep, a meaningful job while being homeless: |
| Comments, suggestions, or questions? email me at clyde@homelessamerican.com |
| Having Proper Identification With increased government controls on acquiring identification, like state I.D. and birth certificates, it's harder to get your own papers even if you were born in the US. In order to get a copy of your own birth certificate you have to show proof of identification. To get identification, you need a birth certificate. For many people, it can take months of government red tape just to prove they are an American citizen. If you can't get any identification you can't work, even if you were born in the United States and have lived here all your life. If your wallet with your I.D. is stolen you have to start all over again, as if you were an illegal immigrant. |