Giving money to street people: Does it help?

Great Debates
41

There is a phenomenal agency in the Chicago area for women who have experienced homelessness that offers a wide range of services in an approach that is very holistic. In fact, one of the services involves teaching the participants the humanities in the view that impoverished people are often forced to do nothing but react to the world around them so that they never learn to reflect and be thoughtful in a way that will allow them to learn to hope and plan to be part of society. For more information on this agency, see www.deborahsplace.org.

Anyway, not even people who work with those who are homeless have reached a consensus on whether to give money or not. What everyone does agree with, however, is that making eye contact and responding is extremely important. It is debasing to be forced to ask for money for whatever reason. These people experience becoming invisible, which leads them to despise most other people and increases the distance between them and the help that might make the difference.

Anecdotally, though, not every panhandler wants to buy drugs or alcohol. I know of one person who panhandles for a living, who finally opened up enough to people who were trying to help, that the person allowed those people to take the person to a bank to turn the collection of change into a bank account. This person had about $3k, and is thinking of trying to learn how to do the things that are necessary to move into housing. (and yes, it takes skills not everyone has learned to live in housing).

So do whatever moves you, but do it respectfully.

42

Potter: “I can’t pretend to know all the causes of homelessness, or the best way to combat these, which is why I try to help provide resources for the professionals who have more of a clue than I do.”

Amen, Potter.

I agree that we are not equipped to take these people into our homes in an attempt to help them. I also agree with others that simply giving a few bucks to a homeless person may do more harm than good in some cases.

It seems the best thing to do is give what you can to a reputable charity but also, when you determine it is appropriate, give the few bucks or buy the hamburger, not being obligated to give something to every “rough sleeper” (love that term, Potter, it sure sounds better than “homeless” or “bum”) you come across. I think most people can usually tell the addict from the simply unfortunate and act accordingly. Sure, you’ll get burned a few times, but you’ll learn to distinguish between the addicts and cons and those who might benefit from a couple of bucks.

43

and

(both in response to my comment about insulting the homelessby assuming they are drug or alcohol addicts)
I kind of expected responses like this, but I’m still disappointed.

Suppose I needed (and I mean really needed) to borrow a large sum of money and I went to the bank; suppose the conversation went like this:

Mangetout: I really need to borrow five thousand pound to pay for my mother’s operation
Banker: Yes, of course, your ‘mother’ haha.
Mangetout: Um, yes, my mother, you see, she needs this operation and…
Banker: Mmm, you know, I had heard these high class prostitutes really are expensive, but I really didn’t think…
Mangetout: WHAT?!? you think my mother is a prostitute?
Banker: Oh no no no sir, it’s just that a chap just like yourself came in last week, turns out he had got himself into a right old pickle with some hired dominatrix. He wanted about five thousand too.
Mangetout: Well, that’s not why I need the money, you see, my mother, she…
Banker: Of course, of course, don’t worry; I won’t tell your wife why you need the money.
Mangetout: My wife already knows; she’s actually looking after my mother right now.
Banker: Whatever you say sir, now, would you like the money as cash, or shall I just make out the cheque to the prostitute in question…

I’d try another bank.

44

Of course you would try another bank. You’re not a beggar and therefore you can be a chooser.

Marc

45

I’m not sure if I understand your analogy yet, Magnetout. Can you elaborate more?

46

All I am trying to say is that I am prepared to afford homeless people dignity even though their situation does not often naturally provide much scope for it.

Yes, when asked for money by a homeless person, the thought “but they may spend it on drugs” has crossed my mind, but I feel that it’s an unsafe assumption to make that even the majority of them would be so wasteful.

Maybe it’s different where you live, but around here the homeless don’t ‘do it for a living’ - their lives are miserable and empty, sure, maybe it was their choice to start living on the streets (although often not, I suspect), but I’d wager that most of the homeless people in my area would welcome the opportunity to live in a house and hold down a job.

They are human beings - I’m prepared to afford them the dignity of still feeling insulted if I assume that they are drug addicts when they aren’t - if I say “I won’t give you money, but I’ll buy you lunch”, the implication is “I believe you’d spend the money on drugs/alcohol” - I can imagine that homeless non-addicts might still feel so insulted that they would (quite reasonably, IMHO) refuse the offer (which is the point I was making to start with)

47

If I see a person clinging to a cliff edge by his fingernails and refuse to holdout a hand to him, he’s going to come to the conclusion “this whole hanging thing ain’t gonna work; I’d better grow me some wings and fly away”

Chris; I think you have oversimplified the problems of being homeless to the point of absurdity.

48

Another former homeless person here.

If you had run across me in early winter of 1984, and it had crossed your mind to offer me money, would it have helped me? Let’s see…

a) Giving me $5 or less would’ve given me a meal. I would generally get one sooner or later anyway, including the free ones available at the city shelter, but the opportunity to get a better-quality meal would have been appreciated. Would it have crossed my mind to spend it on beer instead, insofar as I could get food (but not beer) for free from the city shelter later on? Yeah. I might’ve done that. I would’ve appreciated it either way. Your $5 donation would not, however, under conceivable circumstances, have changed my circumstances, and you’d be foolish to expect otherwise.

b) As a homeless person, I had really dismal connection to resources even when I had the money. Information plus money was always considerably more valuable than money alone. Free services were of enormous value. Might you have been able to offer me a place to do my laundry? A place to store some items so that, in order to own them at all, I did not necessarily have to lug them around everywhere I went? Would you be willing to take messages for me if I pretend your phone number is my own? Wow!)

NOTE:

These things would not necessarily change my circumstances either, in and of themselves, but they might tip the balance. Now that’s assuming that I’m me – lucid (if somewhat discombobulated a bit by the experience), educated (HS only, no college, but literate and informally cognizant of a lot more than HS level education would suggest), healthy, English-speaking, and generally blessed with the cultural advantages of growing up middle class in America even if I lacked most of the material ones at the moment. Even for me, being a person with a spotty work history (none of it recent) and no college and no contacts to speak of made it hard to land and keep a job.

[/NOTE]

c) So if you really wanted to make a difference, you could hire me. And cut me some slack initially, allowing for such things as the fact that I might be really hungry (perhaps you could pay me some right away, or take me out to breakfast the first day or something?) and still don’t have a home and probably won’t for some time (1st month, last month, half a month security, two references???). But an ongoing job, yeah, that would eventually make an enormous amount of difference.

d) It doesn’t have to be money, and it doesn’t have to be extending yourself in a way that involves ongoing risk to you. (Believe me, I do understand why you’re reluctant!) Buy me one of those phone cards that let me make calls. Go into the laundromat and make a deal with the owner, have the owner make out a homemade “coupon book” for doing laundry that you pay in advance for. Or perhaps you would buy me a PO Box and give me the key, my own address at which to receive mail? Incredible, you just made it plausible for me to submit a resume! Got an unused AOL “screen name” or the right to create an additional username&password with your ISP? I could use the library’s computer!

e) Being conversational with me as one city-dweller to another, and perhaps discussing politics, illiteracy in our public schools, or why you like one architectural style more than another…you have no idea how nice it is to have a real live conversation with a non-condescending person! Of course I will hope it will be an ongoing friendship, but I’ll understand and appreciate it anyway even if it’s just of the moment.

49

And AHunter3 is the less than 1% of the panhandlers. A big difference between being homeless and being a ‘bum’ and being a ‘panhandler’.

Better than 98% of ‘panhandlers’ chose to continue that life style once they find themselves in it.

Those that want out work at geting out.

I give on ocasion and I do so to make me feel better. What I give personally to a street person will (as Allen said) probably not do much for the person. I rarely give a $1.00. 25¢ is my usual.

The honmless shelters do a lot of good and to find what it is like out there, go volunteer at one for a while. Put your body where your mouth and money are. (generic you thankyouverymuch)

As for taking in a stranger who is a phanhandler/bum/unknown and giving them run of your home… well… good luck!!!

The world is Round,
It is not Fair,
It is just Damm Round !!!

50

Really? who compiled that statistic?

For the record, I don’t think the situation here in the UK is in any way similar; it’s actually pretty near impossible to climb up out of the “can’t get a job because you have no fixed abode/can’t get a place to live because you have no regular income” loop without sustained external help. I’m not saying that giving a few pounds to someone provides that kind of help in any way; I just see it as a small act recognisinga fellow human in need; sometimes that might make a small difference to the recipient’s morale, if nothing else.

51

Before you get all sanctimonious about certain homeless people who don’t seem to be doing anything to extract themselves from the situation–

(sorry, GusNSpot, in your case perhaps not “before”)

How much effort do you think you’d expend to do something about a situation if you were convinced that it would be to no avail? How about if you didn’t possess the cultural knowledge and skill-set that tells you how to go about changing your situation?

Hey, YOU THERE! You, the one who isn’t a billionaire! How can you just keep subsisting on wages and making a few tiny investments for your miserable pathetic retirement? Why the hell aren’t you negotiating some deals to launch some speculative enterprises and acquire some capital funding to secure your base? It’s because you’re lazy! If you weren’t lazy you’d have your name on at least one major industry by now!

Tax 'em all, let 'em suffer with HMOs and public trans and public schools. Why should we feel guilty about exploiting the middle class and giving so little back? If any of them cared to better their situation, they could certainly do so! Nope, money is for the rich because only the rich have bothered to help themselves to it, and it isn’t like anyone’s keeping the others from doing likewise. They just have no bloody aspirations.

52

A decent gym membership in my area is about $150-$200 a year. Beats the hell out of paying rent to have a clean place to shower and such. If you can’t get cleaned up enough to have a chance in a job interview your doomed to continue with a financial death spiral. Not to mention you probably have a locker which you can use to pretty safely store a few personal items. Without the overhead costs of rent/mortgage and car payments, power bills, etc you can make a part time minimum wage job go quite a ways. Of course this all becomes far more complex if you have a family.

53

If I’m reading your quote properly, you are making drawing the analogy between “me:: homeless person” and “rich guy:: me.” If I got that right, I think the comparison is innacurate because I am not asking for rich guy to bail me out of my problems without return on his dollar. The typical handout situation I am familiar with is a case where a stranger that I know nothing about wants money without any service or good in return. I don’t even need something material to get a return. In fact, knowing that the money I give them actually helps them get out of their situation beats the hell out of a my window being washed. The thing is, I am having real difficulty believing that when I give money, I am helping them out of their situation.

If I misread your quotation, sorry. I don’t yet understand what you’re trying to say.

54

Not being a genuine rich guy, I can’t pretend to speak for their attitudes or perspectives, but it is entirely possible that many of the rich consider the resources of the world to be theirs. You and I are allowed to keep some of what we earn merely because at a minimum it constitutes better care for the masses than if they didn’t, but beyond a certain point I suspect that only a few of the rich see any reason to genuinely consult us or respect our opinions before using our varous governments’ budgets to accomplish what they deem appropriate for those budgets to accomplish. (Yes, the governing class is largely composed of people wealthier than I am…and probably wealthier than you are). Sorry, this paragraph is approaching the hijack zone –

Quite aside from whether or not you ask or expect help or consideraton from the rich, though, the point I was making was that the typical homeless person is no better situated to rise from his/her current position than you are to rise from yours.