The incarcerated population at risk of homelessness and discrimination

The Incarcerated Population
Name:
Institution:
Course:
Instructor:
Date:
Abstract
This paper is about risks the incarcerated population face after release from prison and is mainly concerned with homelessness and discrimination. Finding a place to live after prison and building a successful life is quite challenging. Before finding stable jobs, which are extremely rare, and addressing the health-related problem, shelter is often the priority. Previous research indicates that specific demographics facing discrimination and the risk of homelessness include women and individuals released from prison, which is the primary objective of this paper. Although few people released from prison find their way to marginalized housing, it close to homelessness. Sadly, the existence of policies that criminalize homelessness increases the likelihood of formerly incarcerated being rearrested.
The Incarcerated Population
In the United States, incarcerated people are ten times likely to be homeless than normal individuals, as indicated in the most recent 2008 statistics data from the bureau of justice survey. The data further shows that about 15 percent of inmates were homeless before incarceration, indicating that they have nowhere to go after doing their time. Individuals that experience multiple imprisonment face twice more possibilities of being homeless than those returning from the first imprisonment in a cycle known as the revolving door of incarceration (Moschion & Johnson 2019). The government's Dire interventions are necessary following statistical reports that people spending more than four years in the community are still twice vulnerable to homelessness as the general public. The development of an interagency support system is necessary to find good homes and long-term support for the incarcerated.
Identifying the homelessness level among the formerly incarcerated population is a critical step in finding a solution to housing insecurity. The housing insecurity metrics provide a realistic analysis of formerly incarcerated people denied access to permanent housing (Lustick et al. 2020). Reports indicate that housing insecurity challenges are three times more than homelessness, thus contributing to the community by vulnerable population minimal. The significant challenges of those reentering from prison include but are not limited to discrimination by state housing authorities and private property owners, adding to affordable housing shortages. The exclusion from the housing has adverse implications to both the released population and the general economy. The screening criteria employed by property owners rely mostly upon criminal record checks, thus the broad discretion to punish individuals after incarceration by denying them proper housing.
Stringent housing application requirements such as credit checks and massive security deposits lockout released people from accessing quality housing. Other necessities include professional references, which in most cases is not available for incarcerated people. Imposing systemic barriers on the population locked up for an extended period, thus being out of the labor market, poses other detrimental effects. Reduced health care services related to homelessness lead to incre...