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I designed an experiment in college once to pretend to be a beggar on the weekends to see how much money I could raise. The human ethics commission shot it down. I was going to have three or four people go out in rags with one rather expensive item, like designer shoes, or a fancy watch mixed in with the rags. Now that I am not in college I am tempted to see what I could do on my own. I think it would be great to do a little youtube series on bumming.
 
I ran out of gas once on my Briggs & Stratton mini-bike in 1968. Pushed it home and never did that again.

Funny, though... in the past 4-5 years, I've been panhandled 3 separate times by the same young couple on foot with a plastic gas can.

Seems it always happens at the Beaverton Fred Meyer. What a coincidence.
 
I ran out of gas once on my Briggs & Stratton mini-bike in 1968. Pushed it home and never did that again.

Funny, though... in the past 4-5 years, I've been panhandled 3 separate times by the same young couple on foot with a plastic gas can.

Seems it always happens at the Beaverton Fred Meyer. What a coincidence.

I bet they are huffing the gas to get high.
 
In Salem at the I5 to Hwy 22 intersection and the Hwy 22 to Lancaster street. There is a organized group of beggars. I drive dump truck and work out of a gravel pit that is just a few blocks from these two intersections some days I go past these people working their "shift"s a dozen times. The same core of 5-6 people have been working these two sites for the last 5-6 years. Younger people seam to tag on throughout the year. I have watched them get on expensive recumbent bicycles to rid off at the end of their "shift" I have seen them walk into the Home Depot parking lot and get into decent looking cars and drive off.
Recently Depot or one of the other property owners sent some guy with a small tractor with a brush cutter to level a huge briar patch in a traffic triangle at the entrance to the shopping area. In the middle of it was a HUGE pile of trash and many "camps". Once laid bare the mess was hauled away. Yet the group still showed up to work their "shifts"

Now I'm not a social scientist but I know a few things. 1. these people are lazy 2. these people use drugs and booze 3. These people have found an easy way to make a living. 4. its a very good living as they haven't moved in 5-6 years. 5 they won't stop until the source of income is reduced.

There is often someone begging at the entrance to the Winco/Shopko center near there too.

Welches con man in Portland area: Welches con man getting around (Jack Bog's Blog)
 
However we can give out tons of food stamps to humans, and the thought is they don't become dependent and unable to fend for themselves?

I believe that the .gov members who want to provide handouts know it causes dependence as well as lack of desire to fend for oneself. The dependents won't bite the hand that feeds them, which is why the libs have a stranglehold (especially in the People's Republik of Oregon). The welfare recipients keep voting for those who keep feeding them.

Why go find a job that requires WORK when you can sit on the couch and get a check from uncle sam?
 
Twice I have been aproched at the grocery store parking lot while putting my grocerys in the car by a young man well dressed holding a new gas can asking for money for gas as he just spent his last money on the gas can and his vehicle is over there(with a general point) and out of gas. Each time at a different store. I gave nothing.
 
I choose to give through reputable charities that are doing good things to help folks through tough times. I don't give cach to beggers that will just smoke, drink, inject it.
 
I have a lot of charity in my heart. I give yearly to a great local charity - Human Solutions - super, honest people there. http://www.humansolutions.org/

I know many top charities are money scams where the top execs make giant lumps of $$ and the poor rarely see a thing. Example, the billion raised for Haiti Relief. Pretty much NONE of that ever made it to Haiti and all of it went into the pockets of scammers wearing $3k suits.

Just last weekend I took two large garbage bags full of blankets, t-shirts, socks etc DIRECTLY to homeless people living under the ramp (Alder I think) leading into downtown. Then I know they are getting it, not being 'charged' by some for-profit scam like DePaul.

That said, I despise beggar/scammers - especially the "my mom and I just ran out of gas on the highway and we are desperately trying to get back to Seattle ...." BS. I have no problem telling those aggressive scammers to F-off.

When I see a homeless person scrounging, pushing a cart around, I think 'that person will someday be better off than most Americans". Post economic collapse they already know how to survive. I respect that.

We will all be in it together and we have more in common with that homeless person than you do with trillionaire bankers that will soon pull the rug out from beneath us. http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/
 
I will never give a dime to panhandlers for a couple reasons. first being that it drives me nuts when the bleeding hearts stop traffic to hand them money. Second, I heard a couple years back of a couple in the Ashland area that were bragging online about making like 40k a year panhandling, all tax free of course. The only homeless person I give money to is an older gentleman who if I had to guess has some kind of mental issues, but he has no cardboard sign and he just walks around all day and drinks coffee. I have bought his coffee many times and whenever I see him at the plaid pantry or dutch bros I hand him whatever cash I have on hand. Normally I wouldn't but I feel like this guy has problems that are not drug and alcohol related and he never asks for anything.
 
I had a man approach me at a parking lot at SE 82nd and Foster. I watched him stop every person going through Wells Fargo drive-thru when I first got there. He was clean, very enthusiastic, casually dressed and gave me some sob story about his daughter being in the hospital and he needs a bus ticket. He said he needs $11, and he also mentioned that if all I had was $20s that he has $9 change and he was going to pay back and give me his ID as well. I said no, at which point he said "do you not want to help me go see my sick daughter?" I said no again. His enthusiasm went away and he simply said "okay, have a nice day." And walked away back to the drive-thru. Whenever their story sounds like a sales pitch, I tune out and they lost a customer.

Another lady came up by the train station downtown and asked for money because she just got out if prison and had no money to go see her kids. I have no sympathy for felons. Once again, sales pitch.

Last one, I promise. I'm picking up my mother in law at the train station. I walk by a beggar on the corner and he asks for money. I said "no cash". Literarily 30 seconds later on our way back to the car, we pass by same guy an he asks to money again. I say "you just asked me 30 seconds ago." His response was:" hey man, I talk to 500 people a day. I can't remember everyone." Wow, not even 30 seconds of short term memory. I wonder if he'd ask me again if I did give home money. My bet is yes.

I have not been approached at gas stations yet.
 
Speaking as a person whose job it is to pick up the homeless of Multnomah County and take them to the hospital for whatever problem they make up that day;

Don't ever give anything to homeless people. They are a bunch of lazy, drunk parasites. Their numbers are growing due to the increased availability of free services for the homeless in Portland; many of the folks I pick up have recently emigrated to Portland for that reason. They are like dogs, if you feed them once they'll keep coming back for more and bite you if they don't get what they want.

I would love nothing more than to gather up all these people, put them on an island somewhere with a few months worth of food and let the group sort it out for themselves.

Signed - A Paramedic who knows at least 20 stinky, lazy homeless drunks by name
 
In Shoreline, there is a group of them that travel to intersections and hassle people. I followed the van one day to a house over by the theater in the Ridgecrest neighborhood. Hardly homeless, just scamming the system, and good natured people in the process.
 
I met a guy that was hiring him to replace his flooring in his kitchen. After talking with the guy he found out this home owner was a "begger" and made $150-$250 a day begging. Said most of the time he only "worked" till 1pm or 2pm.

Tax free!!!!

Tax man needs to hunt them down like the old moonshiners
 

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