Eleven year old Joseph Martinez smiles for the camera in Los Angeles, California, December 19, 2011. Martinez lives at the Union Rescue Mission shelter in the skid row section of Los Angeles. In a report issued earlier this month, the National Center on Family Homelessness, based in Needham, Massachusetts, said 1.6 million children were living on the streets of the United States last year or in shelters, motels and doubled-up with other families. That marked a 38 percent jump in child homelessness since 2007 and Ellen Bassuk, the center's president, attributes the increase to fallout from the U.S. recession and a surge in the number of extremely poor households headed by women. Picture taken December 19, 2011. To match Feature USA-HOMELESS/ REUTERS/Jonathan Alcorn (UNITED STATES - Tags: SOCIETY BUSINESS EMPLOYMENT)