[TRANSCRIPT]

Michael Schwartz

The homeless of America are getting old. There were 306,000 people over 50 living on the streets in 2014, a 20% jump since 2007. They now make up 31% of the homeless population.

This aging population adds to the challenges in addressing the crisis of poverty in the United States. Many older homeless people have been on the streets for a generation, a legacy of the recessions during the late 1970s and early 1980s, federal housing cutbacks, and the crack cocaine epidemic.

Many have bounced back and forth between prison, mental health clinics, and rehabilitation centers before ending up on the street. Experts say the life span for a homeless person on the street is 64 years.