Is giving a homeless person $750 a month to help them get back on their feet enough to secure stable housing?
Researchers at USC tried to answer that question and came up with a less than solid conclusion: maybe.
According to a Longlong study published this month, of those who did not receive cash, 48% left their homes, compared to 43% of the homeless control group who did not receive cash.
Although those earning $750 a month were 20% more likely to be fully built, the difference was not large enough to warrant improved outcomes, said Benjamin Henwood, director of USC’s center for housing, housing and health research.
At the same time, the study found participants used money to bring more stability to their lives and overspent on essentials such as food, transport and clothing – not drugs and alcohol.
“These findings highlight the potential and limitations of cash transfer,” the authors wrote in the report.
Henwood puts it this way: “It wasn’t like, ‘here’s the money – boom, it’s all better.’ But we saw that it changed people’s trajectories. ”
The study was a partnership between USC’s Center on Homelessness, Housing and Equity and Messages for Miracles, a non-profit that distributed the funds.
At the end of 2020, Miracle Messages launched a pilot program in the San Francisco Bay area and found that six out of nine homeless people who give $500 a month are able to secure stable housing.
To test those findings on a larger scale, non-profits combined with USC researchers and distributed, through Debit cards, $750 per month for a year to the homeless in San Francisco, Oakland and La County.
Participants were able to spend the money as they chose. About 5% of the money spent on the so-called experimental substances – 3.4% on Activate, according to 0.7% on drugs, according to the investigators examined the participants and analyzed.
There was no reported increase in drug and alcohol use among those receiving the money.
Most of the money went to food, followed by housing, “other” spending, transportation and clothing.
Investigators said items in the “Other” category include things like paying for maintenance, reducing debt and helping family.
Although $ 750 a month, in almost all cases, is not enough to rent an unrestricted apartment in southern California, Henwood said that for some participants they made a simple life and took the time to find a subsidized place.
In one case, Henwood said a homeless woman secured a federal housing voucher that pays most of the tax to private donors. He thinks the landlord is more willing to rent from him because he can at least see some money in his bank account.
The findings differ somewhat from the initial results released after six months of study.
After that, Henwood and other researchers found that most of the money goes to the essentials, but they also found that the people who receive the money are likely to come from living on certain streets, which would include residential areas.
After a full year, not only was the change from house calls to permanent homes not statistically significant, but there was also a change in the number of people in the prevention area.
Henwood said more studies with a larger sample size would help answer whether the payments have an impact on households’ downsizing positions.
Given the results, the authors recommend future financial support programs paired with targeted assistance to find housing. And they say policymakers may also want to look at programs that provide more money — and do so, over time, given that the study found that less money was spent on drugs and alcohol.
