On any given night in the U.S., anywhere from 700,000 to 2 million people are homeless, according to estimates of the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty. That’s approx. 0.7 % of the total population. The majority are single men and/or African-American. One fourth of homeless have been homeless for at least five years.

Take a look at this graph from the NSHAPC, National Survey of Homeless Assistance Providers and Clients.

In Russia, an estimated 4 million on a total population of 140 million are homeless, which is almost 3 %. Given the local climate it is no surprise that hundreds of people die in the streets during winter.

Exact numbers of homeless people is very difficult to ascertain given the transient nature of the homeless population. People who sleep on friends’ floors, stay in squats and other insecure accommodation are often not known. Even rough sleepers are difficult to count as people bed down at different times, move about, hide away and travel on all night buses (source).

Without your own house, it is difficult to have and enjoy private property. Hence you are more likely to suffer poverty. Without a house or your own place in the world and without your own intimate and personal things, it is obviously more difficult to have a private life. The four walls of your private house protect you against the public. See these posts on the importance of privacy and property.

Independence, self-reliance, autonomy, and therefore freedom are capacities which rely heavily on private property and a private place. Private property and a private place are also important for the creation and maintenance of relationships. When you have your own house and your own place in the world, you can live in a particular world, in a very concrete social context of friends, enemies, neighbors and other types of relationships. A place in the world is always a place in a particular community.

Therefore it seems that homelessness is not only a violation of a human right as such (the right to housing, article 25 of the Universal Declaration) but makes it very difficult to enjoy other human rights as well. Examples are the right to the absence of poverty (also article 25 of the Universal Declaration) and the right to private property (article 17 of the Universal Declaration), but it also hinders freedom in general, freedom in the sense of independence and autonomy.