When Your Car Becomes Your Home

An under-studied segment of our country’s homeless population are those who are experiencing “vehicular homelessness.” These are people who sometimes choose, but are often forced, to call their cars their home. The reasons are manifold, including unmanageable rents, bad credit, too much debt, and often just bad luck. For her new article, “I Live In My Car,” New York Times reporter Rukmini Callimachi went to the outskirts of Seattle to spend a few days with a family living out of their sedan in a church parking lot. We’ll talk to Callimachi about the dozens of people she met, both car dwellers and those trying to help them. And then we’ll speak to a researcher from UCLA to find out how they’re studying the topic in Los Angeles.

Guests:

Rukmini Callimachi, correspondent, The New York Times

Madeline Brozen, deputy director, UCLA Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies

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