Homelessness has been attributed to personal defects rather than to socioeconomic conditions. This study uses a unique dataset containing the number of people in family units in emergency homeless shelters in Missouri to examine structural effects on family homelessness, summers(S)/winters(W), 1993-2001. This panel contains a nearly complete enumeration of emergency shelter populations within the central cities and suburban, smaller metropolitan, and rural counties of Missouri. Generalized estimating equations (GEE) demonstrated strong impacts of economic decline within counties on family...