# Beggars making 6 digits? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 5, 2005, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884 "2005-10-05T14:37:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![saoirse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/5daacb/32.png) [@saoirse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/saoirse)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2005, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/21 "2005-10-05T18:43:14Z")
I witnessed shift change at an expressway exit last Friday. A young man, in his 20s was coming off and a young woman in her 20s coming on. He gave her the “Homeless and Hungry” sign, and then they started making out. From my car I shouted “Hey, get a room!” I think on the right corner, a bum could make a lot of money, if he was there all day. They usually aren’t, though. They usually take turns on the decent corners, AFAICT. So they’d get maybe four hours of begging in a day. ---
**Author:** ![Schnitte](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/schnitte/32/9033_2.png) [@Schnitte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Schnitte)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2005, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/22 "2005-10-05T18:43:54Z")
> [@Oslo Ostragoth](#): > > [Not so fast](http://blogcritics.org/archives/2005/08/24/020301.php). It appears to be the case in Denver just this last August. > > (The actual survey is no longer on the Denver Post site, but there are plenty of references to its content.) From that site: > [@](#): > > 42% of the population has given money to panhandlers in the past year and the average person there gives $1.84 each time he or she is approached by a panhandler, for a total of about $25 a year. This adds up to an awful lot of money - a total of over $4.6 million, divided among about a thousand panhandlers. That’s an average of about $50,000 per active panhandler per year How’s this? You’d suppose $4.6 million, divided among a thousand people, would result in an average of $4,600 per capita. ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2005, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/23 "2005-10-05T18:56:23Z")
> [@Oslo Ostragoth](#): > > [Not so fast](http://blogcritics.org/archives/2005/08/24/020301.php). It appears to be the case in Denver just this last August. > > (The actual survey is no longer on the Denver Post site, but there are plenty of references to its content.) Well, I’m sure that someones personal opinion self published on the internet is a good and respectable source of accurate checked facts. No need to ask where he got the figure of 1000 panhandlers from. It’s bound to be reliable, whatever it was Nobody would simply maqke up numbers to support their preconceived opinions, would they. such a thing wouldn’t bear thinking about… ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2005, 7:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/24 "2005-10-05T19:00:45Z")
Good point, **Schnitte**. Checking their math: Denver has a population of approximately 555,000. 42% of that (233,100) giving $25 each would generate $5.8 million. (This is probably an overestimate, since people under a certain age aren’t part of the population contributing). > [@Schnitte](#): > > From that site: > How’s this? You’d suppose $4.6 million, divided among a thousand people, would result in an average of $4,600 per capita. ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2005, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/25 "2005-10-05T19:15:17Z")
> [@Schnitte](#): > > How’s this? You’d suppose $4.6 million, divided among a thousand people, would result in an average of $4,600 per capita. Well spotted. That didn’t occur to me. That’s even assuming the 1000 figure is right. How come they’re building 3,000 housing units, then? ---
**Author:** ![Oslo\_Ostragoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/a9a28c/32.png) [@Oslo\_Ostragoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oslo_Ostragoth)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2005, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/26 "2005-10-05T23:45:20Z")
> [@Peter Morris](#): > > Well, I’m sure that someones personal opinion self published on the internet is a good and respectable source of accurate checked facts. > > No need to ask where he got the figure of 1000 panhandlers from. It’s bound to be reliable, whatever it was Nobody would simply maqke up numbers to support their preconceived opinions, would they. such a thing wouldn’t bear thinking about… Exercise your Google fu. You will find a lot of pieces making similar claims, which I assume were published in the original Denver Post article. If anyone can find it, that would be terrific. ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/27 "2005-10-06T00:20:33Z")
> [@](#): > > 42% of the population has given money to panhandlers in the past year and the average person there gives $1.84 each time he or she is approached by a panhandler, for a total of about $25 a year. How does that work? 42% of the population has given money at least once in the last year. And the average donation each time is $1.84. Therefore 42% of the population gave $25 dollars last year. There seems to be a major factor missing here, namely how often that 42% donated. For those figures to be correct the _average_ person will need to have donated to panhandlers 14 times last year. No only is there nothing to support that figure but it seems quite ridiculous given that the article keeps saying how much of a deterent panhandlers are. ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/28 "2005-10-06T00:45:16Z")
Either the Philadelphia Weekly or the City Paper gave a few figures I’m inclined to believe. IIRC, on a good corner on a good day it was possible to make $8-10 an hour. While some panhandlers are not homeless, they rely on government programs that a job would make them ineligible for. That bottom rung job at McDonalds means losing rent assistance, food stamps, health insurance, etc. People telling tales of junkies and winos with huge amounts of cash are either mistaken or lying. When these people get money, they convert it into their drug of choice as quickly as possible and put that drug in their bodies as quickly as possible. There are several homeless people around Frankford Terminal who have very obvious addictions. You know whether they’ve gotten money recently by whether they are carrying a bottle or are intoxicated. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/29 "2005-10-06T00:56:50Z")
> [@CookingWithGas](#): > > WRT to the OP, I do remember a 60 Minutes (or similar) story on a guy who was more a con man than a beggar. He would go into the subway station in a suit, and approach businessmen with the line that his wallet was stolen, could they give him $5 to get home? This worked pretty well and the guy claimed to make 6 figures. Funny how a person will give $5 to someone in the same “club” but nada to a homeless person. To make six figures at $5 a pop, working 50 hours a week, no weeks off, never taking a break during your 10 hour shift, you would have to fool someone with this scam an average of every seven minutes. I think the guy was full of shit. ---
**Author:** ![SmackFu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/53a042/32.png) [@SmackFu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmackFu)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/30 "2005-10-06T02:17:59Z")
[The Denver survey (PDF).](http://www.downtowndenver.com/news/Panhandler%20-%20Q%25.pdf) Have at it. ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/31 "2005-10-06T02:19:53Z")
Catherine “Katie” Hebert, the Sticker Lady. She lived with her husband (both Hare Krishna) and family in a +$300,000 home in Hamilton, but commuted by late model Jetta to Toronto to beg. More recently, she has been sighted begging in Montreal. Here are some links that include portions of the original article run by the Toronto Sun: [http://ilx.wh3rd.net/tracklink.php?msgid=5392208](http://ilx.wh3rd.net/tracklink.php?msgid=5392208) [http://forum.canadianparents.ca/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=203590&page=9&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=&fpart=1](http://forum.canadianparents.ca/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=203590&page=9&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=&fpart=1) [http://houseaddict.com/showthread.php?t=2547](http://houseaddict.com/showthread.php?t=2547) [http://www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/TorontoSun/News/2005/01/16/900045-sun.html](http://www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/TorontoSun/News/2005/01/16/900045-sun.html) Here are a couple of links to articles about her showing up in Montreal: [http://archive.wn.com/2005/01/22/1400/montrealtimes/](http://archive.wn.com/2005/01/22/1400/montrealtimes/) [http://www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/TorontoSun/News/2005/01/26/910601-sun.html](http://www.canoe.ca/NewsStand/TorontoSun/News/2005/01/26/910601-sun.html) ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/32 "2005-10-06T02:32:25Z")
Back in university, one of my frat brothers tried begging at the corner of Bloor and Spadina for a few days, just to see how much he could make. I can’t recall exactly how much it worked out to, but I recall him telling me that it better than minimum wage. Presently, I know a fellow who is a begger who has a car, a home (a cabin on someone else’s land that he used to own), and a spouse (from a wife swap – no joke). He supplements his income from selling weed (that he grows on the land he does not own, which causes great consternation for the fellow who owns it when the cops drop by). He does quite well at begging. When he was my client (he was being sued by the wife he swapped for the land he did not own --again no joke), opposing counsel said to me after an examination: “I can’t win against him; he looks like Jesus Christ!” That being said, however, although there may be the occasional street beggar that does well, obviously most scrape by in a marginal existence that to me would be a living hell. ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/33 "2005-10-06T02:46:09Z")
> [@Muffin](#): > > (he was being sued by the wife he swapped for the land he did not own --again no joke) That’s really poor wording on my part. To clarify, he and another fellow swapped wives. The wife he swapped away sued him. She sued him for the land on which their home was built. He did not own the land. She sued him for the “house with running water,” but his answer was to insist that she have it, given that it was a shanty made from rubbish, and the only running water was when he ran with a bucket from the well. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Slant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c57346/32.png) [@Mr.Slant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Slant)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/34 "2005-10-06T02:47:17Z")
> [@smiling bandit](#): > > SNIP > Another one is to take your kid along and say you need a taxi. Works all the time. I fell for it once, too. > > The second time in a week, though, I figured it out. 😉 One time in Athens, GA my wife got hit up by a beggar who “needed money to get a ride to Atlanta”. My wife, being very charitable, very bored, and very cynical, offered to drive the lady to Atlanta. “Go ahead, let’s go back to my car. I’ll drive you.” The lady made ten kinds of excuses as to “Oh, honey, I can’t ask you to go that far!”. My wife kept trying to persuade the lady it was OK. Beggar wound up just walking away. ---
**Author:** ![furt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/439d5e/32.png) [@furt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furt)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/35 "2005-10-06T03:31:07Z")
My own anecdotes come from working in several homelss shelters. I know several of them that told me they could make $40 or more in a day (this was 1992-1999). It beat minimum wage (although in most urban areas, the lowest paying jobs pay better than the official minimum wage), with the other trade-offs being pretty obvious. The idea of a panhandler making big bucks is pretty unlikely IMO, for the reason that anyone who would found themselves reduced to begging would be unlikely to have the life skills needed to maximize the income potential. i.e., not taking a drink before your shift is over, finding a safe place to keep your money, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Corporate\_Hippie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/65b543/32.png) [@Corporate\_Hippie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Corporate_Hippie)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/36 "2005-10-06T03:40:16Z")
There is a beggar that sometimes shows up near my college (Drexel University, it’s an urban campus), that goes up to people, tries to befriend them, and then asks for some bus fair to get to a shelter. I’ve run into him on three seperate occasions, and he always tells a slightly different story, but with a few common details. He always says someone (sometimes a cop, sometimes a U. Penn student) had just called him an n-word. Then, when the marks express their sympathy (because how can you not?), he says something like “but you Drexel kids aren’t like that, I like you guys.” It always strikes me as a really effective technique to elicit guilt (by dropping the n-word) and to create a sense of comradary (telling the people _they’re_ not like that.) I never give the guy any money, but I always walk away thinking what a good scam it is. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/37 "2005-10-06T04:03:28Z")
Even if we assume that it’s possible for a beggar to make $10 an hour (= $20,000 a year), which seems to be what many people in this thread are claiming, that’s not remotely close to a six-figure income. It’s apparently easier to make money with a scam where you dress in a suit and ask people for money to get home because you lost your wallet (although you risk arrest more for the scam). So the answer to the question in the OP is, “No, you can’t make anything near six figures.” Begging may or may not be a scam, but it’s not a very good scam. Every day I see hucksters on late-night TV infomercials pulling off scams that make a lot more money than that. ---
**Author:** ![Fromage\_A\_Trois](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a88e57/32.png) [@Fromage\_A\_Trois](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fromage_A_Trois)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/38 "2005-10-06T12:51:10Z")
When I worked in a shop in town, a homeless guy was often in front of our shop selling the Big Issue (a magazine homeless people can sell, and keep the profits). He was quite good at it, had a lot of the banter with the public. My colleague spoke to him and suggested he come and work for us, he’d be a great salesman, but he declined, saying that he could earn more selling the magazine each day. He was probably right. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Slant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c57346/32.png) [@Mr.Slant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Slant)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 1:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/39 "2005-10-06T13:09:12Z")
**Fromage A Trois** , I guess that almost counts. Bear in mind, though, I’ve read magazines similar to what you probably could have gotten from that guy, and they were actually worth the $1 I paid for them. I get the same kick out of _The Final Call_. What you’re looking at there is a homeless person working for a living. ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2005, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884/40 "2005-10-06T14:40:36Z")
> [@Fromage A Trois](#): > > When I worked in a shop in town, a homeless guy was often in front of our shop selling the Big Issue Yes, but those guys aren’t beggars, they are actually doing a job and EARNING money. Good luck to them. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/beggars-making-6-digits/324884.md?page=1)