@woodcutter Not sure where you live or how you define panhandlers. I define panhandlers as anyone asking for money (agressive or not agressive). In my town, there are panhandlers (or homeless people) on just about every street corner. That used to be pretty rare until 2008, at least in my part of town.
Any one of us could lose our job at a moment’s notice. That is exactly what happened at my company. 25 people out of a staff of 80 were laid off with no notice. In the industry in which I worked, other similar companies also laid off a big percentage of their staffs. So it’s not like we could go to the other company to get a job, because the jobs are gone. Most of those people, if they’ve been lucky, have been able to find some sporadic temporary work, but no one in that group, that I’m aware of has been able to find any type of full time work, and no one has found a job that pays the same amount of money. Some of my friends have lost their homes, and most people that have lost their jobs, also had to give up their health insurance and many of those people, because they are in their 40’s or over, cannot get health insurance because of pre-existing conditions. A number of people that I know, either as friends, or relatives of my neighbors have had to move in with family and sell most of their possessions. A couple of my friends decided to retire early, which means that they will never receive their full Social Security benefits. It’s bad.
I see people on the street corners at the major intersections every single day. Some of them have signs that say “Will Work for Food” only there’s no one to hire them, because the people that still have a house can’t afford to pay someone to mow their lawn or paint their house or trim their trees like they used to be able to do. Back in the “good old days” you would likely only see a few homeless people in my area, now and then, and some of them were pretty scary looking (most likely because of mental illness) but now I see all sorts of people, all ages, men and women, sometimes with kids, sometimes with pets. But like I said, so far, everyone that I have given food or water or money too has been very gracious. I try to do what I can (which isn’t much), because the alternative is much worse.