Researchers from the University of Southern California, in partnership with the San Francisco-based non-profit Miracle Messages, wanted to study the effects of giving homeless people a monthly stipend to see where the money would go and what would happen to the homeless people afterwards.
They gave $750 to 103 homeless people in San Francisco and Los Angeles for a year. What they reported was that most of the money went to food, which was about 36.6% of the total monthly spending, then housing at 19.5%, transportation at 12.7%, clothing at 11.5 percent, and healthcare at 6.2%. The rest went to "other expenses".
Despite the stereotype that homeless people use most of the money they can scrounge to fueling their substance addictions, that wasn't the case based on what the researchers observed. Only 2% of the monthly stipend went to drugs, alcohol, and cigarettes. From that portion, most actually went to cigarettes.
Furthermore, the researchers indicated that after six months, the number of people spending time unsheltered had decreased from 30% to just under 12%.
Another initiative was also launched by Denver, wherein they gave 800 homeless people a monthly stipend, from $50 to $1,000, and saw many of those participants getting jobs, paying off debt, and getting housing among other results.
Stockton, California did a similar study and it also resulted in positive outcomes.
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