The homeless issue is, IMHO, a mental health crisis. We as a society didn't want to pay for the freeloading mental health patients, so now we have the homele

The homeless issue is, IMHO, a mental health crisis. We as a society didn't want to pay for the freeloading mental health patients, so now we have the homeless. In 1955 there were 560,000 patients in all mental hospitals across the united states, private, public and government. In 2010 there were 43,000 psychiatric beds in the United States, or about 14 beds per 100,000 people—the same ratio as in 1850 In 1950 there were 300 state psychiatric hospitals in the U.S., with 320,000 patients, today there are about 180 hospitals, with and about 20,000 patients.