Homelessness in America is a centuries-old concern, one that predates the nation itself. That deep history was the subject of a panel at “Beyond Shelter: The Business of Ending Homelessness in America,” a two-day symposium November 20-21 at Harvard. Co-sponsored by the Harvard Advanced Leadership Initiative, the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation, and the Joint Center for Housing Studies, the event examined solutions proposed by Harvard faculty for today’s crisis—setting the stage for a wide-ranging conversation about how past policies can be mapped onto current national challenges.
Jeff Olivet, senior adviser at the Harvard Initiative on Health and Homelessness (IHH) and former executive director of the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness, opened the morning panel by discussing the history of homelessness from the seventeenth century to the present day.
In the 1640s and throughout the colonial era, individuals with disabilities, mental illnesses, or those displaced by war moved along the eastern seaboard without stable shelter. Early American responses were heavily shaped by English Poor Laws, which aimed to distinguish the “deserving” from the “undeserving.” This framework continues to influence public attitudes and policies today, noted Olivet.
Poorhouses and almshouses began appearing across the country in the eighteenth century, and expanded largely in the nineteenth century. Boston built one of the first in the 1730s. These institutions were designed to contain poverty rather than alleviate it, however. As Olivet described, the facilities resembled “a debtor’s mental health institution,” mirroring some aspects of today’s carceral systems.
The first coordinated federal response didn’t come until much later. Homelessness grew dramatically during the Great Depression, prompting the creation of the Federal Transient Service in 1933, a New Deal initiative that “housed a million and a half people in the next three years,” Olivet said. It offered not only shelter, but also healthcare, dental care, job support, and even arts programming. It was shuttered in 1936, when federal resources were redirected towards Social Security.
A massive housing construction boom following World War II offered a brief respite, resulting in a surge of new homes, including nearly 300,000 affordable units between 1945 and 1970. For a brief period, a combination of strong wages, expanding social programs, and ample housing supply created the conditions for mass stability across the U.S. economy, including a decline in rates of homelessness.
“From 1940 to 1970, homelessness essentially disappeared from the American landscape,” Olivet said. Although overcrowding persisted in some cities, large-scale, visible homelessness was not characteristic of American life.
That changed in the 1960s and 1970s, as the population expanded and cities grew. President John F. Kennedy, A.B. 1940, wrote the Community Mental Health Act into law in 1963, aiming to move people from institutions to community-based care—but that solution ultimately fell short. To work, it would have required substantial investment in both housing and mental health services. As Olivet said, it was “a great idea…except the housing and community mental healthcare never materialized.”
At the same time, Vietnam veterans began returning home with psychological and physical injuries that strained existing resources. By the late 1980s, the number of families experiencing homelessness had surged. “In the last 50-something years, we have disinvested in affordable housing,” Olivet noted. “Between 1972 and 1992, the federal government cut 80 percent of its investment in housing. And we’ve seen that persist.”
The Role of Universities
Despite this long history, academia has only recently turned its attention (and substantial resources) towards the problem of homelessness.
At Harvard, there were no courses or sustained research programs focused specifically on homelessness until the creation of the Initiative on Health and Homelessness (IHH) at the T.H. Chan School of Public Health six years ago. The initiative was founded on a simple premise: universities must play a central role in helping to both understand and find solutions for homelessness. Its long-term aspiration is that every school of medicine, public health, and public policy will ultimately host a dedicated program connecting students, scholars, and practitioners to the field.
Later symposium sessions on November 20 addressed IHH’s current projects and aims. Howard Koh, Fineberg professor of the practice of public health leadership, co-led a discussion with Lecia Adams Kellum, CEO of the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, on solutions designed from academic and private partnerships. One compelling project involves using social media to elevate stories of unhoused individuals and reduce stigma.
Amanda T. Yarnell, senior director of the Center for Health Communication at the Chan School of Public Health and a lecturer in its department of social and behavioral sciences, helped launch a “Public Health Creators” program in 2023 that trains social-media influencers to spread evidence-based health information. In conjunction, her team studies how these creators help reshape health narratives and behavior online.
“If we’re going to make any difference to the problem of homelessness in America,” Koh said, “we need to have influencers tell their stories in a humane and medically accurate way. So again, trying to humanize the conversation.”
Koh shared a moving example of a young man who spoke about growing up homeless in L.A. “He was living in his car, he was living in abandoned buildings, but he discovered social media. Now he has several million followers. He’s doing well. Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson, who has lived experience [of being homeless] saw his content and donated a car to him.”
Gillian SteelFisher, director of the Harvard Opinion Research Program and the Global Polling Unit at the Chan School, is conducting national polling on homelessness and public attitudes toward potential solutions. Another of her projects goes directly to the source, surveying shelter residents to better understand how they perceive the reintegration options available to them.
Across the panels, speakers made it clear that homelessness is neither new nor inevitable. Its persistence reflects decisions, both historical and contemporary, that can be reshaped with sufficient will, coordination, and investment. Panelists pointed towards several levers for change, including mental health and emergency resources, public safety infrastructure, private investment, and more.
Many of these broad needs, however, ultimately boil down to creating more housing. Panelists offered a range of solutions that included reuse, shared housing, and permanent supportive housing, as well as rent vouchers and subsidies to make existing units more affordable.
“We need better mental health systems,” said Olivet. “We need better substance use treatment on demand. We need to continue to take care of our veterans, people exiting violent relationships. But if we don’t fix the housing crisis, we will never solve homelessness.”
