# Jobless Folks Who Stand At Intersections With Signs **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 12, 2011, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jobless-folks-who-stand-at-intersections-with-signs/585257 "2011-06-12T22:48:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2011, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jobless-folks-who-stand-at-intersections-with-signs/585257/61 "2011-06-18T05:54:06Z")
Look around carefully for their parked car. Often times it’ll be a fairly new and obviously expensive model. Pro beggars can rake in very big bucks. I’m sure there may be some homeless mixed in with the pros. But, I suspect a homeless person that stepped into a pros territory might get roughed up. Much like drug dealers, certain corners are claimed and defended by whoever uses them. ---
**Author:** ![RandMcnally](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b782af/32.png) [@RandMcnally](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RandMcnally)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2011, 5:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jobless-folks-who-stand-at-intersections-with-signs/585257/62 "2011-06-18T05:58:55Z")
> [@Johanna](#): > > I’m fine with giving to the needy. Here in the DC area, though, I have come to resent the Roma population of professional beggars because they’re shameless scammers. Like the women who walk around with a “baby” strapped to their chests which is no baby but a doll that is so swaddled up you can’t tell without looking closely. They are expert in using a special whiny tone of voice that is so irritating it makes people give them something just to make them go away. I’ve never heard American panhandlers whining like that. The Americans talk normally, which makes me like them better. When the Roma first invaded this area in the late 1990s, they went straight for the mosques and claimed to be Muslims, because they know that Muslims are soft touches charity-wise. Until the mosques wised up to them and chased them away. They never went in the mosques, which they would have done if they were really Muslim, they just hung around outside and tag-team hassled everybody coming and going, whining to beat the band. Last month there were a couple women, one with a real baby and one with a fake baby, working the parking lot at Micro Center. Look, I’m really sorry the Roma have been persecuted in Europe, the Holocaust and all that (which was bizarre since they originated in India and therefore are real Aryans, unlike those damn Nazis). They experienced truly inhuman horrors and are still being persecuted over there to this day. They deserve justice and human rights same as anyone. But that still doesn’t make it OK to scam the public so brazenly just because Americans are notoriously soft-hearted. For one thing, they ruin it for the genuinely needy. That is not cool in my book. You know, I really had no clue there were Roma in the United States. I don’t know why, but I just never thought it. I thought they were all in Europe. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2011, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jobless-folks-who-stand-at-intersections-with-signs/585257/63 "2011-06-18T06:20:17Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > I understand this, but I’m also aware that 1) someone who is abusing also has to eat. They can’t be using ALL their money on drugs I don’t know of a municipality without food kitchens and community support. So yes, they could absolutely be using all their money on drugs. ---
**Author:** ![EvilTOJ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ee59a6/32.png) [@EvilTOJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EvilTOJ)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2011, 6:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jobless-folks-who-stand-at-intersections-with-signs/585257/64 "2011-06-18T06:46:16Z")
> [@Imasquare](#): > > Very often they are mentally ill or suffering from drug / alcohol problems. > > I almost became homeless myself after a longish bout of chronic unemployment. I look able bodied, and I don’t look obviously mentally ill. But I was suffering from crippling social phobia that was making it impossible to even attend a job interview let alone perform well enough to get a job. To an outside observer I appeared to be too lazy to work. > > I suspect that there are many mentally ill amongst the homeless and long term unemployed. So asking for money from strangers and throwing away your dignity to do so was a lot less stressful social-wise than going to a job interview? I believe you, I have social phobias too, but the wording sounds off. In Portland we are a very homeless-friendly city and we get all kinds of beggars. Some are people down on their luck, and some are just scammers who know that they can make lots of money tax free from people. There’s no way to tell, so they get nothing from me. Here’s a [Willamette Weekly](http://www.wweek.com/portland/article-4122-panhandlers_inc.html) article on the panhandling industry here. It’s six years old but still relevant. A lot of the street kids in Pioneer Square are there because they want to be, not because they have nowhere to go. ---
**Author:** ![Digital\_is\_the\_new\_Analog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a88e4f/32.png) [@Digital\_is\_the\_new\_Analog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Digital_is_the_new_Analog)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2011, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jobless-folks-who-stand-at-intersections-with-signs/585257/65 "2011-06-18T14:10:01Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > But you didn’t just give him money, you worked with him. That’s a huge difference. Just handing out cash is a bad idea. Helping is a good idea. Yep..exactly. Just a drive by hand-out of money tends not to be useful. Money/gifts/support in the right environment can be. As stated upthread by many people, money to charities that are good at the support part is one of the most useful ways to help. -D/a [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jobless-folks-who-stand-at-intersections-with-signs/585257.md?page=3)