I tip the coffeeshop I go to, because I always order decaf, and they have to run to some room in the back to get the decaf beans, but they never treat me like I'm hassling them.

But onto panhandlers...
I too frequently encounter people asking for money wearing better shoes than I could ever afford. I've come across too many situations where I've had no money but could help the person with their stated situation yet the person refused when they found out they weren't getting money. Case in point the dude who came up to me when I was relaxing on my porch, asking me for 3$ for gas (his "car" was "stuck" at a nearby "service" "station"). I had no money but I did have a jerrycan with 2 gallons in it for my lawnmower and offered to lend him that. "Fuck you man", that's what he said.
I've bought people food before at the convenience store or whatever, but I hate the idea that people are taking my money to buy beer - when I don't make too much, and beer is a payday treat in my household.
My one exception is cigarettes, I'll always give 'em a smoke. Which leads to the last story in which I was acosted by a panhandler, only two days ago. It goes like this:

Guy: Hey, you going to work?
Me (walking to the bus stop to go to my shitty job, my lunch in a grocery bag): Yup
Guy: Man, I wish I could find a job. (he was 20something, healthy, no reason he couldn't work?)
Me: Eh
Guy: Hey you got a spare cigarette?
Me: A man needs a smoke. Sure. (I give him one)
Guy: (looking at my 500ml Diet Rite poking out of my lunch sack) Man, on a hot day, I'm walking around out here....could sure use a coke.
Me: (pissed off) Here's your smoke. A man needs a smoke. Not my pop.

Too many experiences like that, give 'em an inch and they try for the whole freaking map.

Johnny 13 wrote:"Why lie? I just want a beer" signs don't move me, possibly because I have never wanted a beer.

You have revealed yourself as some kind of fucking freak from another planet.

If I saw you, I would take pity on you and give you spare change.

I don't know, I'm greedy. If I were rich I think I would be glad to give some money out.

I only give out to little kids (yeah, here in Argentina we have kids that are from 5 to 10 years old begging for money )

Case by motherfucking case i say. If you are rude you get nothing.
I have no problem giving out my change. Demand that i give out change?
Kiss my 2 job working ass. Make me laugh? well thats worth something.

I think this was posted on here at some point....I liked it enough to keep it.

I never give anything but a cigarette to people who aren't disabled for the following reasons: a.) it's not that difficult to find a job, and even if you don't like flipping burgers or mopping floors, it's at least a decent living, b.) if one is unwilling to get a job, it's not difficult to live off of half-eaten meals and half-smoked cigarettes people leave on restaraunt terraces and in corporate ashtrays- the 19 year old anarchist crusties in Santa Cruz do it just fine and c.) I used to volunteer at a harm prevention center (needle exchange) and about 97% of the people I delivered clean needles to would go spanging to afford their junk, and while I'm more than willing to help drug addicts live safely, I'm never going to help them be drug addicts.

I think this is more than fair. Anyway, I make an extra lunch to bring to the legless man a block away from my office building every morning because he's not mentally or physically fit to do well for himself, and I think he'd be malnurished otherwise.

Non-deformed beggars are either lazy, drug-addicted, or both, though, and I'm not codoning that bullshit.

If you are a subscriber, please check this article out. A quick analysis of how many/most street residents are in fact very transiently (so to speak) homeless, while a small percentage are serious hard cases that are very difficult to get into homes and jobs.

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/prem/200406/mcgray

The Abolitionist - Douglas McGray

With his dark tailored suits and his silver banker's coif, Philip Mangano looks like a liberal Democrat's idea of a conservative Republican's idea of an advocate for the poor—which, as the Bush Administration's homelessness czar, he happens to be. It is difficult to imagine Mangano fasting on the Capitol steps in a ratty Army-surplus jacket, as the late activist for the homeless Mitch Snyder once did, much less winning over the bleeding hearts in the nonprofit world by promising to apply the President's governing philosophy to their cause. But the latter is precisely what he does. "Any investment we make will be research-and-data-driven, performance-based, and results-oriented," I heard him declare on a cold March morning in New York City, to a gathering of social workers and housing advocates. It is something he has said again and again.

Mangano's message is as pure an example as can be found in government of "compassionate conservatism," which argues that traditionally liberal social concerns can be advanced through such conservative principles as responsibility and accountability. Though this was the centerpiece of George W. Bush's 2000 presidential campaign, the "compassion agenda" heralded in the President's inaugural address seemed to dissolve in the face of partisanship, underfunding, and an all-consuming foreign policy. What was once a unifying theme is now likely to be invoked by his rival as evidence of Bush's hollowness. "What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith, but has no deeds?" John Kerry recently asked an audience in Jackson, Mississippi, quoting from the Book of James. Mangano is nevertheless making a compelling case for compassionate conservatism in an unlikely field.

And case-by-case. I get hit up either actively or passively 2 or 3 times a day during the work week. I hate getting bullshitted (bus, gas, etc.), but I buy folks dinner and give them a couple bucks. I'm sure I'm practicing some type of self-deception, but you can sort of tell if someone's a straight shooter or not.

And a quick story illustrating my asshole tendencies that I need to change. Woman begging with her two kids in a Walgreen's parking lot. As usual, my hardnosed city self turns away while my wife says, "Oh, we should do something for them." It's the day before Easter, and she wants to build them each an Easter basket in Walgreens. I say no, the mom will be offended by our charity and acting like she can't provide for her kids. Short story, my wife wins, we give the kids each a bag full of candy and the mom 20 bucks. Those kids hugged my wife and the mom almost started crying. It's hard for me to feel like there's any scamming going on, since as was said earlier, the gift to this family clearly means more too them than holding on to the money means to us.

When I was living in Champaign a dude walked up to our porch and asked my roommate for money. He had a sob story about being from out of town and needing money to repair a flat tire so he could get home. My roommate asked what kind of car it was. The guy answered and my roommate asked him to hold on a second. My roommate went in to our backyard and returned with a worn, but acceptable, used tire that he was pretty sure would fit the guys car.

The guy had too much pride to admit that he was lying, so he reluctantly rolled the tire down the street towards his "car". Not only was it funny, it also helped tidy up our yard.

It depends.

Here is Chapel Hill, we have a great homeless shelter that you'd expect to find in a liberal town. By "great" I don't mean that it's any substitute for a place of one's own, but it's nicer than any other one that I've seen.

The food that gets donated to it is surprisingly high quality. Back when I roasted coffee, we used to bring them week old beans. The homeless in Chapel Hill were drinking prime quality Ethipian Yergacheffe one week, New Guinea Sigri Select the next.
I loved that. I felt like it was nice that these guys had great Java (often literally) even though life was clearly tough for them. The restaurants brought good food to them as well.
So when I saw the residents of the shelter panhandling in front of businesses on Franklin street, asking for food money, and hassling the patrons of the restaurants that gave the shelter food, I got a little irked.

Then it dawned on me that I was assigning *my* morals and values on to people who don't really follow societal rules in the first place. If I were down and out, what I deemed "appropriate" would probably be different.
I still didn't give them change because I donated to good causes and knew that a hot meal, a shower and a bed was only a block away, in a really cool, recently remodeled building.

My policy these days is to give to people who obviously need it. I can't give to everyone because I don't carry a wad of bills on me. When I see a jam band kids asking for money, I practically sneer. The "get a job" instinct takes over, mainly because I feel they are stealing "business" from the truly needy.
I have a hard time walking by a guy in a filthy sleeping bag, who looks 20 years older than he probably is, without giving something. That guy has no options and if I can help buy him a meal, great. If it's a beer, so be it. It might cheer him up for 5 minutes, and that's cool.

I don't give to healthy 20 year olds with backpacks, people who are beligerant, or happy hustler types. I'd rather give it to people who couldn't get a job under any circumstances. We live in a country that's predicated on the idea that successful people should step up on their own, rather than have the government do it for them. The problem is, people don't do that. They really need to get with it because the hallmark of a great society is how well downtrodden are taken care of.

I also give to charity because I feel the people who work at the soup kitchens are pretty good at getting people who want a meal fed.

I had a hard time giving in India, Thailand, Kenya, Tanzania and Cambodia because if you give to one, people just come out of the woodwork to the point where it's unmanagable. It's hard to walk by a girl who had her arms lopped off by the Khmer Rouge without offering help. So I only gave when there was nobody else around, a sad as that is, but that was surprisingly often. We did give to community programs that we were told were doing good work.

I encourage everyone to give money to charity, even if you don't have much. You have a lot more than most people in the world, and even 20 bucks can go a long way. Pick a solid charity that gets results, and then give what you can, domestically, internationally or both - whichever place has your heart.

I just can't believe that anyone, other than the jam band kids, chooses to live this way. Even if only 3 out of 5 people I donate to have no other options, I'm happy to help those 3, and I'll consider the rest an acceptable loss.

-A

There will always be exceptions that make you reconsider giving money to panhandlers. But overall, I doubt many people are panhandling because it's a good deal for them. Consider what would have to go wrong in your life before you would be standing by a freeway exit ramp all day with a handmade sign begging for money.

If I were in dire straits and for whatever reason had to panhandle, I would appreciate it if someone gave me whatever they could spare. If you can't spare anything, then so be it. If you can, do it.

Not crap.

My ex used to work at a place in downtown MKE where they gave the employees free bus tickets as a perk. Since she always caught a ride to work with a friend, she used the bus passes as a substitute for spare change.

"Excuse me, got any spare change? I need to get on the bus."
"No, but i have some bus tickets."

They usually took them, either genuinely needing to get on the bus or figuring they could sell them to someone else.

Another time, someone walked up to me at the bus stop and asked, "You paying for the bus with cash?"

"Yeah." (i'm too lazy to go buy buss passes.)

"I'll sell you this one for $1.75." (Which is the cost of a bus ride in cash)

"Yeah, sure, OK." I mean, what the hell? Either way i'm spending $1.75, and this way he gets to use it for something else. Made sense to me.

But otherwise, yeah, case-by-case basis, usually depending on my mood. In Riverwest, like Yale said, if someone asks you for change, there's always a chance that person's gonna stick a gun in your side and take more than your change, and since a bunch of our friends (and bandmates) have had that happen to them, it's more good sense than paranoia.