Racial Discrimination Is a Pipeline to Youth Homelessness

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), in their 2019 Annual Homelessness Assessment Report, shows people of color experience homelessness at rates disproportionate to their share of the American demographic pie. According to HUD, Black and African American people comprise 40% of all people facing homelessness, though they are only 13% of the U.S. population. Hispanic and Latine people make up 22% of the homeless population and 18.5% of the overall U.S. population. And Indigenous people face homelessness at about three times their population share of 1.3%.

Pathways to youth homelessness include problematic foster placements or aging out of foster care, poverty and economic disadvantage, lack of access to housing, uncompleted high school education, and criminal justice involvement, particularly in Black communities. These pathways reveal the ongoing harm caused by systemic racism today.

According to statistics cited by the Movement for Black Lives (M4BL), about one in three Black and Indigenous/Alaskan Native children and one in four Hispanic and Latine children live below the poverty line in the U.S., compared to one in nine white children. In 2019, Black families comprised just over half (52%) of all families experiencing homelessness, according to HUD.

In addition, M4BL says, “Black youth are systematically profiled and targeted by police, and make up 35% of arrests of people under 18.” Black youth in general are twice as likely as their white peers to be arrested, and Black women ages 18-19 are four times as likely to be arrested as white women the same age. What is even more harsh is that Black children are nine times more likely than white children to receive an adult prison sentence once arrested.

Journalist Justin Worland, writing for Time magazine, notes that where housing is concerned, “The obstruction of Black homeownership, among other factors, has left Black Americans poorer and more economically vulnerable, with the average Black household worth $17,000 in 2016 while the average white household was worth 10 times that.”

According to the Canadian Observatory on Homelessness (COH), young people experiencing homelessness in Canada include a disproportionate number of individuals from “racialized communities,” or communities of color, and newcomer communities of refugees and other immigrants.

Indigenous youth, in particular, are extremely overrepresented among all young people facing homelessness. Indigenous people comprise just 4% of the national population, but they are more than 30% of all young people experiencing homelessness in Canada. For these youth, homelessness means more than not having a roof over their head. It implies a disconnection from important cultural elements such as human kinship, earth, water, animals, spirits, traditional songs, ancestors, and more.

Young people of color make up about 19% of the Canadian population, but comprise more than 28% of all youth facing homelessness in Canada. And young refugees and immigrants comprise another 10% of all young people without a place to call home. Together, young people of color, newcomers, and Indigenous youth make up more than two-thirds of all young people facing homelessness in Canada.

Racial discrimination in terms of wages, job opportunities, housing, and education line the pathway to youth homelessness. One in five families of color live in poverty in Canada, for example, compared to only one in 20 white families.

Racism has existed in Central America and Mexico for centuries with deep roots in their colonial past and much of it targeted against Indigenous populations. Systemic ethnic discrimination against Indigenous peoples is particularly common in countries like Guatemala and Mexico which have high concentrations of a variety of indigenous peoples.

Youth from Black and Afro-descendant communities along the Caribbean coast of Central America, such as the Garifuna and Creoles in Honduras, Nicaragua, and Guatemala, are discriminated against because of their darker skin color. However, the colonial past of Central America and Mexico and the mix between Europeans, native Indigenous peoples, Afro-descendants, and others has also resulted in a broader gradient of skin colors.

The darker your skin, the more you are discriminated against. This is commonly referred to as colorism, the prejudice or discrimination within a racial or ethnic group favoring people with lighter skin over those with darker skin.

According to a 2018 study from the World Bank, Afrodescendents in Latin America are 2.5 times as likely to live in chronic poverty compared to white and mestizo people.

Both Indigenous and Afro-Latino communities have historically had limited access to economic advancement as well as to elite spaces, leadership, elective positions, and political decision-making. This contributes to the racial, ethnic, and social hierarchies that exist across Latin America.

In the U.S., young people who identify as Black or African American are 83% more likely to experience homelessness than their white peers, according to a 2017 Chapin Hall (University of Chicago) study of youth homelessness. The same report indicates that nonwhite Hispanic youth are 33% more likely to experience homelessness than white youth. Black and African American people make up 13% of the U.S. population, but comprise 45% of those facing sheltered homelessness, according to HUD’s 2021 Annual Homeless Assessment Report. 

In Latin America, the darker your skin, the more likely you are to face discrimination—this is known as “colorism.” A 2018 World Bank study found that Afrodescendants in Latin America are 2.5 times as likely to live in chronic poverty as white or mestizo people. 

And young people of color make up 19% of the Canadian population but 28% of all youth facing homelessness in Canada. Indigenous youth, in particular, are overrepresented among young people experiencing homelessness. Indigenous people comprise just 4% of the Canadian population, but they are 30% of all young people facing homelessness in Canada. This information is according to the Canadian Observatory on Homelessness. 

Racism is a pipeline to homelessness. It changes the way systems see and interact with you, the opportunities you’re afforded, and the dreams you’re allowed to have for yourself. Racism shows up in the form of pay disparities, housing bias, and unequal graduation rates, for example.

At Covenant House, we see the scars of racism and prejudice every day in the form of poverty, homelessness, and human trafficking. People often equate racism with episodic blasts of horror, yet the reality is that it is a daily occurrence. For children, especially teenagers, the impacts can be harmful and long-lasting. Racial discrimination is considered by psychologists and social workers to be an adverse childhood experience (ACE).

The trauma of such experiences can cause a range of negative and harmful impacts (“Reaching Teens,” 2nd edition). Research also shows that the presence of caring adults and positive relationships are protective factors that can mitigate against the harsh effects of adverse childhood experiences, including racism.

At Covenant House, nearly 90% of youth served in the U.S. and Canada are young people of color—56% are Black or African American. Our trauma-informed model of care addresses racial and other traumas experienced by young people facing homelessness and survivors of human trafficking.