Is it true that the number of homeless people in Germany has soared?

According to German media reports, the German government estimates that there are about 860,000 homeless people in Germany, a substantial increase compared with 20 14. And this number is expected to increase to1.2000 in 20 18. What caused the sharp rise in this number?

In 20 14, the number of homeless people in Germany was estimated to be 335,000; In 20 16, the number climbed to 860,000. Of these 860,000 people, 440,000 are refugees. The German Federal Working Group for the Homeless (BAG), which released the data, pointed out that the "homeless" here are not necessarily people who have no shelter and sleep on the streets, but also people who live under fences, people who live in shelters and refugees in refugee camps. In the autumn of 20 15, Germany experienced a large-scale refugee tide. In the past two years, Germany has received about 1.2 million refugees.

Thomas Specht, the head of BAG, said that foreign immigrants did greatly aggravate the situation, but there were other reasons that led to the increase in the number of people. The data shows that even if 440,000 refugees are excluded, there are still 422,000 people who have no housing to live in, and most of them live in institutions. Of these 422,000 people, 52,000 are vagrants sleeping on the streets, an increase of 33% over two years ago. In addition, 8% (32,000) of the 422,000 people are minors.

Spector said that since 1990, the number of social welfare housing in Germany has dropped by about 60%, and the current number is only1200,000. Meanwhile, community, state and federal governments continue to sell existing houses to private investors. In addition, rents in Germany are also rising. This makes many people can't afford to live in a house.