Golden Job?

He was there; standing in the cold of a near zero wind chill looking for the food money at the end of the 69 and 67 exit. Our family had just gotten done eating brunch at Waffle House. I love Waffle House hash browns, and we're heading home looking forward to an enjoyable afternoon. There he was. All bundled up, the light just turning red placing us well within his sphere of influence. I was looking through the ash tray. No change. We had no paper cash. The homeless must really hate the credit card revolution. So there we were left with guilt trying to avoid eye contact.

We had several extra people in our van and I exclaimed my desire to find some money, and someone asserted that those people earn incredible amounts of money with these scams on a yearly basis. $50,000 a year in this case was the assertion in this case. I am not accusing any one of insensitivity. I freely admit that I only look for money when wind chills reach below 5 degrees, or the heat index soars to about 99. Anything in between and they are on their own. Someone else has to give them their daily bread. They are not "working" hard enough to get my loose change. The scam idea has crossed my mind. I have heard that they "make" $50,000 a year. The youtube video of Ted Williams, the homeless man with a golden voice, going viral with over 13 million hits in a week, has not helped my cynicism this week. From homeless to radio in a week. It would be ironic if a he got a gig with Prairie Home Companion. I am so pleased for Mr. Williams. I hope that everything works out for him, and that after the tide of publicity starts to recede, it leaves him on the shore and doesn’t drag him back to the tarpaulin tent in the park.

I guarantee that in a car with four riders at least one of them will put voice the $50,000 a year cynicism. Where did this idea come from? I know of no news outlet, other than maybe the Onion, that has put together a report of an individual who earns that kind of money panhandling.  I have never spoken with a person who saw the Dateline, Sixty Minutes, or 48 Hours that had the report. Yet, nearly everyone I know can tell that panhandlers make tons of money a year.

With that kind of acceptance of the truth, I have a few questions. For the sake of these arguments, I am prepared to agree that "every pan handler in  the state of Indiana makes $50,000 a year". It is true. I saw it on Datelne, Sixty Minutes and 48 Hours.

So pan handlers routinely make $50,000 a year. They obviously have decent homes and even drive nice cars which which they park far away from the intersections they work. A family of 4 clears $120,000 with mom and dad working and the two high school aged children working 4 nights a week on evenings and some week end work purchasing their own incidentals and putting a bit away for college. All of it tax free. All kept in tin cans in the back yards of their $150,000 houses.

Given these facts, I have five questions.

1) Did you know that by the generosity of the American commuter and the detritus of our cup holders, we support these brave individuals at a higher standard than the government does with no overhead costs? When we give them a quarter they get an entire quarter's worth of value. According to USDA data, rural income in non metro areas in 2003 stood at $23,000 per capita. This figure includes more than $214 billion in direct payments to those individuals. So without the government's help, we are doing a better job taking care of a jobless person's income than Uncle Sam. If I can remember accurately, I believe that the Social Security Administration is "guaranteeing" to pay me $17,000 a year of my own money back to me at the age of 70, while hoping that I only live to 71. I could pan handle part time for that year; catch a cold and die and do as well as accepting social security.

2) Why do people care if there are people making $50,000 on other people's donations? There are people out there making a lot more on our donations than bums. For example last year Dan Coats and Brad Elsworth asked for your donations to help them get a $150,000 a year job in Washington D.C. We gave Coats $4.7 million and Elsworth raised $2.3 million. Numbers that are so staggering and disgusting that we turn our attention to the panhandlers making $50,000 a year. I say if we don’t begrudge the politicians for their panhandling out of sheer audacity, let’s not begrudge a bum making $50,000 a year when they get no paid time off; especially when they don’t even raise our taxes.

3) If you make that kind of money why don't you have a summer and winter operation. Be the ultimate snow bird. With a little bit of investing savvy, you could have a summer home here in Indy and a double wide in Florida; or at least Georgia, Arizona, or California. Sure, you don't want the kids to be scarred from having to move around so much. But with a $50,000 income ($100,000 in a two earner family) you could afford some counseling, play station 3 or something to take the sting out of living in a warm climate year round. Of course this would mean that our brethren in the south would bear more of the burden from taking care of the panhandlers from all over the country 5 months out of the year.

4) If they are making so much money, why isn't everyone doing it. $100,000 (for a two earner family isn't huge money. But it is certainly more than the $67,000 estimated 4 person family median income in Indiana. Based on pure economics more than half of America should be out pan handling. There are no barriers to pan handling. No permits needed. Just a bag and a sign and I suppose a coin sorter and viola you are in business. Panhandling should certainly be easier than waiting tables. So if there is more pay (which I agreed to at the top) all of those waiters and waitresses should be heading out to 465 with cup and sign in hand.

5) If panhandling for $50,000 a year is a horrible thing. If that is the problem, why don't we conspire against pan handlers and keep them from these kinds of windfall profits? No, I am not talking about legislation or higher taxes. Economics will take care of these profiteers. On Monday morning, everyone who thinks that people who panhandle and make too much money, should head out to their nearest interchange and start begging. Within a month, all of the profits would be driven out of panhandling.

Example; say we can support 100,000 pan handlers at $50,000 a year. If suddenly 1,000,000 Americans showed up and started begging for cash, the average income of panhandlers would shrink to $5,000 a year because our capacity to give did not increase. Are you going to stand out along the street for $5,000 a year? No, and neither would the bums. They would quit and do something more lucrative like get on welfare. Sure after the bums quit the "wages" would go up, but the only people left in panhandling would be those who a month earlier felt that begging was a disgusting thing and they would be glad to quit and go back to the jobs they left.  In essence, panhandling would become a job that Americans wouldn't do.

So what would happen then? We would hire illegal immigrant panhandlers who would come in and beg at a quarter of the wages the current profligate panhandlers. I wouldn't be jealous of a panhandler making $12,250 a year. Would I?

 

Take care.

Roger.