Social workers have traditionally considered the homeless and the elderly separate constituents. However, Dennis P. Culhane, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania and one of the country’s leading authorities on homelessness, predicts that in the next 10 years, the number of elderly people experiencing homelessness in the United States will nearly triple, as the final wave of baby boomers ages out.
Culhane found that while the first half of the baby boom generation entered adulthood riding the winds of economic prosperity, those who were born during the second half, between 1955 and 1964, faced entirely different circumstances as they came of age. Through no fault of their own, their destiny was tied to a place and time in history that hindered their ability to prosper in the same way the first wave of boomers did. This second wave entered their 20s just as back-to-back recessions ushered in a period of economic stagnation, hampering their attempts to build careers. They struggled against housing and labor markets crowded by their generational predecessors. The resulting higher home prices and lower wages fueled a lopsided competition that made it significantly tougher for those who were poor and less educated to gain a foothold in the economy. To add insult to injury, the H.I.V./AIDS epidemic surfaced around that time and crack cocaine hit the streets. As a result of this confluence of circumstances, the drug trade emerged as a choice of desperation for unemployed and underemployed young men and women. Violence, addiction, and mass incarceration brought profound changes to the lives of these second wave boomers, and thousands of them ended up on the streets.
Since then, it’s these younger members of the baby boom generation who have remained the dominant homeless population in the United States — cycling in and out of shelters, bouncing in and out of apartments whose rents have risen higher than their limited income can afford -- aging before our eyes, even if it seems sometimes that we refuse to see them.
The forces that set the stage for the tripling of the older homeless population in the next decade were at work long before the pandemic took hold. For years, researchers have compiled abundant data outlining the magnitude of the problem. One in 10 households includes someone age 65 or older, and their declining health is measured in part by the 6 in 10 who have more than one chronic health condition, like heart and lung disease or diabetes. If nothing changes, an additional 2.4 million of the poorest senior citizens in the United States will be homeless in 2038.
Social workers recognize that beyond their accident of birth, homeless second wave baby boomers also suffer from the more generic causes of homelessness like poverty, chronic health problems, mental illness, substance abuse and addiction, domestic violence, lack of affordable housing, evictions, hospital and armed services discharges, trafficking, and trauma. It is these generic causes that social workers focus on when offering support to the entire homeless population. No one can change the unfortunate circumstance of birth that predisposed the second wave of baby boomers to a higher risk of ultimately ending up homeless, but social workers can support the elderly who find themselves homeless through direct intervention.
Social workers can link clients without homes to temporary housing and transitional shelters to help them have some shelter and rehabilitation. When these clients are elderly, they qualify for unique Federal and State programs that are not accessible to the younger population. The elderly homeless are often not aware of the support programs available to them so social workers guide them to the appropriate sites and services.
Social workers can assist clients with government programs for the elderly focused on rent assistance and eviction prevention by screening applicants to determine eligibility, interviewing and assessment, and counseling.
Social workers can help elderly clients find access to health services and help them get and utilize Medicaid and Medicare services they are often not aware of.
This blog has researched and written about the tidal wave of elderly baby boomers swamping our social services sector. We regret that our research missed this distinction between the first and second wave of aging baby boomers and the unique risks that the second wave has had to face. It is vital to their well-being that concerned citizens are made aware of the unique challenges they face.
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