Came across an interesting fact this afternoon, and I thought I should blog about it. A co-worker tells me about an article in the Time magazine about HomeLess in America. He says there are more than thousand homeless in San Jose alone, and similar number in San Franciso. I didn't believe him, and started searching for the right numbers.
I came across this article in SF Chronicle that counts homeless in SFO alone at: 6500.
I came across this article in SF Chronicle that counts homeless in SFO alone at: 6500.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/04/04/BAG416SGRA.DTL
Another site that had more info:
Another site that had more info:
http://www.endhomelessness.org/section/news/press/2009countsmap
Came across this article on wikipedia that counts the total US homeless population at 1% of the total population (~3mil), and of these 23% are war veterans: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homelessness_in_the_United_States
Just for comparison, this number (3 million) is about
Came across this article on wikipedia that counts the total US homeless population at 1% of the total population (~3mil), and of these 23% are war veterans: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homelessness_in_the_United_States
Just for comparison, this number (3 million) is about
- 30,000 times more than the number of people who died from H1N1 virus (swine flu) in US but it still receives very little media attention
- 60 times more than the number of people who die from common flu every year in US (~50,000), yet there is no flu-vaccine like drive to prevent this
- 60 times more than the number of road fatalities in US (~50,000), but still doesn't have a trillion dollar insurance like industry to safe-guard
It is sad to see these numbers - the richest country in the world not being able to provide for its citizens - especially for veterans who fought for the country & mentally disabled who can't fend themselves. But again, we are living in a market-driven economy, and we believe in Darwin's theory of survival of the fittest - or should we?
