I would imagine that in today’s mostly cashless society panhandling can be a bitch.
But they have other options to make money. Many homeless cant work because of appearance, mental illness or asocialization. And those people are telling people they are homeless when they are not. That is fraud. As in a charity cant misrepresent to get people to give them money.
Ive been asked for food or beer coming out of the grocery store.
“Those people” are a tiny minority of the people out there asking for help. Please don’t use them as an excuse not to share.
Its actually better to give to homeless agencies. This way the money goes to help with food, clothing and housing rather than alcohol and drugs.
The pregnant woman had a sign that said “please help.” She didn’t say she was homeless.
Begging for money can’t be fun and I’m sure isn’t easy. Not too many people with money in the bank are going to stand outside begging. The fact that a few (perhaps) do, seems like such a small issue compared to the real problems homeless people face.
There are plenty of valid reasons to decline to give to panhandlers. For me, the fear of being scammed by a wealthy imposter isn’t one of them.
I already covered that, madsircool:
If you’d watched the video, the pregnant lady in the Mercedes had an apartment in a very nice section of SD County. As I said above, its more helpful to give to agencies that help the homeless.
Yeah, but maybe she was having trouble paying her rent at that apartment.
But, we don’t disagree. It is undoubtedly more helpful to give to agencies that help the homeless. But I’m not sure give that pregnant woman $5 is hurting anything either.
Consider, though. Do panhandlers tend to hang out in exclusive, wealthy neighborhoods, or do they ensure they are in the path of poorer, working class folks who would be more likely to have cash on them?
Anyway, I never give a thing to panhandlers. Not money, not a snack. I just assume they’re putting on a show. Not that I expect they’re wealthy or that they don’t need money, I just figure they have a way of ensuring their basic needs (short term, day to day, at least) are being without my help, and the show is to make me think that they’re living hand to mouth with no other means of support or a source of food.
I don’t buy it. Quite literally don’t buy it. To the extent they may have longer term needs, I am not satisfied that handing out cash on street corners is the way to help them—or the millions of people who work, for that matter—whose long term needs aren’t being met either (eg: health care, retirement, etc).
That is a convenient opinion, but my informed opinion is that it can get that bad, and much worse.
I’ve looked back over the whole thread. Perhaps I’ve missed it (you know how it is… new interface, infinite scrolling, etc…). What is your opinion informed by?
Three years of being homeless, followed by 35 years of assisting the homeless.
In the last place I lived, there’s a rather infamous female panhandler that wears a dirty white blanket and very little else all year round, even in the cold. I found out after living there for some time that she’s the daughter of a wealthy family and has an apartment to go to whenever she wants. She just prefers living that way. I think there’s some mental illness going on there.
In a weird way I respect her balls 
but man its so wrong.
I appreciate your anecdotal experience.
Thank you ever so much-that just dripped with sincerity. 
But what if the person has food, clothing, and housing, but lacks alcohol and drugs?
This sounds like 3/4 of the Hollywood community during the current pandemic. 
Some times I do - usually not. One way to guarantee that I WON’T give anything is if they write something like “God bless you.” Let their delusion take care of them! 
One of my favorites was a guy on Madison Ave just outside the train station in downtown Chicago. Tho it was 2-3 decades ago, I can still hear him, “Help me, PLEASE. I’m raising funds for food and shelter.” One day one of the suited lemmings near me said, “So am I - it’s called a JOB!”
On several instances I saw such folk dropped off at and picked up from their “workplaces.” Not saying it is a “scam” - but they put effort into it and had a support network.
Also got a kick out of when people would be irate if someone gave them a piece of fruit or something!