Human Right to Housing Report Card

Grading U.S. Policy

This report by the National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty grades the United States on its response to homelessness as compared to internationally-recognized standards.

According to international standards, the human right to housing consists of seven elements: security of tenure; availability of services, materials, and infrastructure; affordability; accessibility; habitability; location; and cultural adequacy.  This report card, a shorter update to a more comprehensive 2011 report from the Law Center, gives the U.S. letter grades on each of them.  It also offers common sense solutions the U.S. can adopt to better meet the housing needs of homeless and poor people.

The report recommends an additional investment in federal homelessness prevention programs of at least $1 billion per year.  It also calls on Congress to increase funding for federally-subsidized housing, make the Protecting Tenants at Foreclosure Act permanent, create a federal living wage, and end the criminalization of homelessness.

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