Knocking on Our Window - Why Every Sponger Wants to Come to America
My wife was listening to the news when she turned to me and asked, "How many of these people who hate our country come here and get on welfare and assistance?" I told her the word is out that America is ripe for fleecing.
My business partners hired a cab for the trip. Every time we stopped for traffic during the three hour drive, a bunch of women and children would come knocking on the passenger window begging for money. The first time this happened the cab-driver pleaded with me not to give them any money: "Please, sir, if you give but a single coin to even only one of them, others will see and we will be surrounded by so many that we not be able to drive away."
I don't know how true it is, but he even intimated that word of my generosity would spread ahead of us faster than a speeding bullet and that we would be swamped by harassing beggars on every stop ahead of us because these beggars were part of a gang with better communications than the Pentagon.
I later learned that begging in India is part of a large scam business (1) much as welfare in America is one gigantic fraud.
I think it is too late for us in America. They tap on our window and we give them welfare, food stamps, even scholarships (and in gratitude they leave bombs in public places). Now every lazy bastard in the world knows that idiot American shlubs work like dogs so that they won't have to.
Now what do we do?
Notes
(1):
About.com India Travel, India Beggars and Begging Scams: What You Should Know
Sadly, in relation to begging in India, there is often more than meets the eye. While the poverty is real, begging is quite often carried out in organized gangs. For the privilege of begging in a certain territory, each beggar must had over their takings to the gang's ring leader, who keeps a significant share of it. Quite a bit of welfare work in India has been directed at reducing begging, with varying degrees of success. The most common problem is that beggars are so used to begging that they actually prefer not to work. Many of them also make more money from begging that what they would if they did work.
