If you want to understand the origins and solutions of the American homelessness problem, a really important starting point is to understand that the problem mostly exists in places where *there are lots of jobs and the labor market is really strong,* not in economically depressed areas.
It's not a problem of a weak economy - the economy being strong in these areas makes it *worse* by increasing local jobs without adding homes - the problem is housing supply, particularly supply in a handful of extremely expensive metro areas like Los Angeles that build virtually no new housing.
It also seems like the people who can afford to move in turn into NIMBY reactionaries because they don't want to see poverty around their very expensive new house *and* don't want to see their property values decrease so the only solution is disciplining the unhoused.
