Welcome to the Empire Files podcast. This is your host, Abby Martin. This is the audio of our show.

You can watch the episodes on our YouTube channel or at the Empirefiles.tvy.

Homelessness is a major issue in the United States, a widespread reality in almost all major cities,

so much so that it's become accepted as just a normal state of affairs.

But Americans might be surprised to learn that homelessness did not always exist as a major phenomenon in the U.S.

In fact, the term homeless people didn't even appear in U.S. newspapers until the New York Times in 1983.

Fast forward to today. It's a dominant and growing feature of our economic system.

The reasons are no mystery. The top cause of becoming homeless is being laid off from your job.

50% of homeless people spent their childhood in the foster care system.

And the fastest rising sector of the homeless population today

are black women who served in the U.S. military,

a large percentage of whom are sexual assault survivors.

Having enough data is not the issue. Here in the richest

country in human history, it is well understood. The problems are systemic, and the politicians

from local to federal refuse to help. I talked to one city council candidate who wants to change

that here in Los Angeles, the

epicenter of the crisis. Nithia Rahman is running for LA City Council in District 4, which

includes Hollywood, Korea Town, and beyond, on a platform of ending homelessness. As an urban

planning expert, she has worked on the issue both as a city employee and as an activist.

I joined her at her campaign office where she's planning to challenge the interests of big real estate developers

to discuss the epidemic in LA and the broader United States.

Let's look at the system right now because we have a tragic irony with the way that the system set up,

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