Can you recommend some documentaries or books about the homeless in the US?

[skipos]

I recently saw Dark Days, which is a great documentary about homeless people living near Penn Station.
http://imdb.com/title/tt0235327/

FWIW, I am particularly interested in interview-based books or documentaries. It is tempting to dismiss the homeless when they hit you up for change on the street, but I am sure many of them have heartbreaking stories of how they ended up that way. And a quarter of all homeless are veterans... ugh.

[illinoisprogressive]

1. You should start with some works on the depression and new deal

this gives a good overview of what has been a standard democratic issue. The depression was the catalyst for the new deal by FDR.
It also gives you the understanding and bones of what is being fought for today by the democrats as a whole and why Kennedy is so passionate about that and education.
One of the best was a book I stumbled onto years ago called The glory and The dream. You can probably get it at a used book store or the library or amazon.

[Cleita]

2. When I grew up homelessness wasn't an issue. FDR's New

Deal had been put in place. In the sixties LBJ signed in the War On Poverty, which added new policies to helping the poor aspire to middle class. Reagan destroyed it all. I first started seeing homeless about 1979. Although the infrastructure had been destroyed before then in California, Jerry Brown's budget surplus in California was able to postpone the crash. But the crash did come in the early eighties. We have been spiraling down ever since.

The Jarvis Ammendment, Proposition 13, started it all in California. You could start there.

[illinoisprogressive]

3. I agree with the 80s as

I was a young divorced struggling mother who felt the chop of reaganomics.

[Warpy]

6. We all did, but marginal workers were hit especially hard

because as money flowed upward, all the inner city mansions that had long been rooming houses for marginal workers were snapped up by all the people Reaganomics favored, as many as 30 working people evicted, and those mansions restored to single family dwellings housing as few as two people.

There were simply no places left to go for people who washed dishes, bused tables, cleaned offices, and did the thousands of dirty jobs the cities relied on.

Plus the deinstitutionalization that had begun under Reagan in California took place in every state, forcing mentally ill people who lacked the capacity to care for themselves out onto the streets.

I don't think it's possible to overestimate that man's damage to this country, starting at the bottom. Clinton was no better, as he wasted his first two years passing NAFTA and GATT and diddling around with a loser of a universal health care plan that left insurance companies in place.

I worked in Boston in the 80s, and while nursing salaries were far from princely, they did pay the bills and allow me to take some small advantage of city living. I always wondered what the clerks in all the stores did for living spaces. The shit wages they got didn't go far enough for food in that city.

This country has turned into a hellhole for anyone who isn't rich, white, and male. Everyone else lives in fear of losing their jobs to outsourcing or economy measures, losing their spouses, losing their homes to foreclosure, losing their health insurance (if they have it) if they lose their jobs, of getting sick, itself, of getting too old to work and finding out their pensions have been looted and social security has been whittled down to nothing.

We're overdue for a revolution. Let's hope the pigs respect the system enough to allow us a peaceful and legal one.

[Cleita]

9. That's true in California too. The marginal housing that

poor people were able to afford suddenly became real estate gold, because the reduction of property taxes to 1%. It started a boom of speculators ready to improve and flip for profit properties that once housed the poor and the working poor.

[Stargazer99]

12. A men! You've got it figured out while those who still

have a home, food and medical care are asleep at the switch. The Rep/Cons COUNT ON THE GENERAL PUBLIC not caring or knowing the reality of life for many Americans. This country is a shame in its present state, I hope the Demos can repair some of the damage the "more equal than others" have rained on other human beings.

[A-Schwarzenegger]

4. Here's the site of the leader of the fight for the homeless in LA...

http://tedhayes.net/

[Mnemosyne]

5. Rachel and Her Children: Homeless Families in America

by Jonathan Kozol 4/2006 reprint edition, 1988 originally p.

http://www.powells.com/biblio/1-0307345890-0

Synopsis:
The story that jolted the conscience of the nation when it first appeared in "The New Yorker"

Jonathan Kozol is one of America's most forceful and eloquent observers of the intersection of race, poverty, and education. His books, from the National Book Award-winning "Death at an Early Age" to his most recent, the critically acclaimed "Shame of the Nation," are touchstones of the national conscience. First published in 1988 and based on the months the author spent among America's homeless, "Rachel and Her Children" is an unforgettable record of the desperate voices of men, women, and especially children caught up in a nightmarish situation that tears at the hearts of readers. With record numbers of homeless children and adults flooding the nation's shelters, "Rachel and Her Children" offers a look at homelessness that resonates even louder today.



Excellent book. Good view of Raygun's Amerika. I lived it for a time, it really stunk.

[BlooInBloo]

7. For an appetizer, you can't beat The Grapes of Wrath.

[seaglass]

8. The Mole People by Jennifer Toth. I loved the book but while

searching for the author's name for you, I ran across some controversies about its truthfulness. I'm not sure what to think now, but it would be my recommendation.

[Bluerthanblue]

10. "Under the Bridge"...

is a poigniant book of writings by people experiencing homelessness in NH.

It's not a recent publication, but should be available-

here are some links to NH info- including one with three films about homelessness- (a bit dated as well)

http://www.geocities.com/nhutbp2001/newspaper.htm

http://www.afsc.org/newengland/nh/finalafscyouth/nhhomelessfs.html

http://www.afsc.org/newengland/bigcat/tpc.php?TID=212

http://www.geocities.com/nhutbp2001/memorialnames.html

Thank you for your compassion and desire to know more.


blu

[silverojo]

11. K&R

Very valuable links, about an issue that's reaching crisis proportions.

[bobbolink]

13. There's a big need for videos about homelessness

This is something I noticed a long time ago....


Homelessness can be seen as low priority by the dearth of material on it. Some is very good, but quite dated.

We need an Al Gore speaking up on Homelessness!

Thanks for asking about this!

[Bluerthanblue]

14. here are a few more, with links online-

Taylors Campaign

http://www.richardcohenfilms.com/taylor's.htm

the next two have online viewability-

Faces of Homelessness- part one of a you tube documentary

http://www.flixya.com/faces-of-homelessness

17yr old who made documentary On the Rivers Edge
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/04/12/earlyshow/series/heros/main687598.shtml


edited to try and get first link to work- there should be only an apostrophe, not a back-slash???
but it won't go away - sorry

[skipos]

15. Afternoon kick!

Thanks everyone!