Seattle Statistics on Homelessness and Housing

(The Seattle area, the nation’s 22nd largest by population, has the third most homeless people, behind only Los Angeles and New York City.)

Since the end of the financial crisis, Lubarsky says, Seattle has added roughly 100,000 jobs, but barely 32,000 new homes and apartment units. “We’ve underbuilt every year since 2010.”

Source: ‘My Generation Is Never Going to Have That’

The most extreme (housing) shortages are in a handful of states, including Washington, California, and Oregon, where tech hubs are driving income inequality.

The affordable housing shortage is acutely felt in metropolises like Seattle and San Francisco, where job growth in the tech industry draws an influx of newcomers with generous salaries in need of housing.

Source: For every 100 families living in poverty on the West Coast, there are no more than 30 affordable homes

Note how closely those figures line up. If you add 100k jobs and only build 32k new housing units, is it at all surprising that there are only 30 affordable homes for every 100 needy families?