Vets make up a quarter of U.S. homeless, report says

WASHINGTON — Veterans make up one in four homeless people in the United States, though they are only 11% of the general adult population, according to a report to be released today.

And homelessness is not just a problem among middle-aged and elderly veterans. Younger veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan are trickling into shelters and soup kitchens.

The Veterans Affairs Department has identified 1,500 homeless veterans from the current wars, and says 400 of them have participated in its programs specifically targeting homelessness.

The National Alliance to End Homelessness based the findings of its report on numbers from Veterans Affairs and the Census Bureau. Data for 2005 estimated that 194,254 homeless people out of 744,313 on any given night were veterans.