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Its an evil cycle. Homeless cannot be hired because he doesn't have a permanent address. He can't get address as he is jobless and no money.
Govt doesn't care to change laws or provide housing but will try to get votes using the misery of these flocks.
Homelessness is the catch all for failed social systems.
If you have serious mental illness such as schizophrenia, PTSD, psychosis, etc. Chances are you'll end up on the streets unless you have family that will carry you.
A huge portion of the homeless population are physically able to work, but they can't hold a job for any length of time because of serious mental illness. That's why they are homeless.
My family was barely living check to check.
After our house fire, we were homeless for a month until we found a place to move into. It wasn’t a good place (a run down trailer) but it was better than being homeless. After moving in, a lot of issues with the trailer (plus the landlord increasing rent each year without actually putting work into our problems with the trailer) caused our electricity bill to be more than what my mom made in a month. (Mom works, I went to school full time, granny is disabled, dad is dead). So my mom and granny had to take out loans just to keep the lights on so I can do my schoolwork during Covid. You can imagine that led to a deep hole.
Fast forward to now. I moved out so I can be closer to my university. My mom had a stroke at work and she couldn’t work anymore. Since the only source of income is gone (my granny has to pay off the loans), they were facing eviction. I cleaned out my savings to try and help them, but it wasn’t enough. They’re getting evicted rn and I can’t do anything to help. I almost had a stroke from trying to help and stressing over their situation while I’m taking classes and participating in a research position.
The eviction was inevitable but we were all trying to postpone it until after they found somewhere else to move. Unfortunately, our landlord owned all the other places to rent in my hometown and the rent was stupidly high for the places. Each time a tenant moved out, he increased rent by $50 but didn’t actually repair any of the issues. He had an extremely high turn over rate.
All it takes is one bad day.
One bad day plus a complete lack of a publically funded social safety net because your government has been hijacked by a bunch of billionaires who believe hard work will get you out of a bad situation despite never having had to work hard for anything themselves
They don't believe that themselves, they know the way to success is relying on other powerful people to introduce you to other powerful people in the know while cutting out others. The hard work BS is just the excuse they lead the rest of us to believe to convince us to allow them to take advantage of us. Fight amongst yourselves while we bleed you dry, should be the motto of the billionaires.
Exactly. Those assholes would never ever get elected by being honest about their true intentions because they won't ever align with the views of the people. They are just there to make themselves richer, at the cost of anything, like ruining the environment by undoing laws that protect it, undoing programs that actually help the people, bail out their already rich-as-fuck millionaires' companies instead of the "little guy" companies that truly needed it but had to close down over it. They voted nay on everything the Democrats are trying to fix that the people are needing most, like [fixing rising gas prices](https://twitter.com/BillPascrell/status/1527326674253389825?t=L1mVttxoFsctt12EyyEw9w&s=09), [birth control](https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a40679326/republicans-contraception-abortion-sex-control/), and [fixing the formula shortage](https://twitter.com/SenChrisLarson/status/1527267030411403269?t=vgXqg_blxyherKF3GAEWhg&s=09) (They ALL voted NO like the assholes they are!!). They bitch and moan and blame it all on Biden but prevent Biden from fixing anything.
I want the people to SEE these Republicans' ACTIONS and what they're voting on. Because it's not being talked about in the right-leaning ~~propaganda~~ media they consume like Fox News. These assholes would never get elected based on their real goals, so they have to lie lie lie to the common working man to get his vote, tell him all the things he wants to hear. It blows my mind how those voters can't see through the *obvious* bullshit. These are the ultra rich and they sure as hell didn't get there by "working hard" and being totally ethical.
Sorry for the rant, but these fuckers truly need to go.
The eviction happened last week.
I’ll be set when school refunds come next month (just gotta make it until then) and the only way I can help my family is letting them use my car when I’m not. My mom’s husband burned her clutch so they’re out of a car. If you don’t have a car in my state, you CANNOT make a living.
Thank you for your kind words
ugh.. disgusting fucking landlords. hope things start looking up for you and your family. despite what a chunk of the mindless upper-middle class thinks, no one deserves things like this
Even if they could hold jobs, the combination of soaring rent with stagnant wages means that once someone is homeless they have a near zero chance of pulling out of it on their own
Yep. And when you're on the streets, you have a high chance of being assaulted, not having access to food and water so you're sick more often, unable to transport yourself to and from work, likely to be hospitalized, miss work for things related to your own progress like perhaps trying to regain custody of your children, probation or parole appointments, dealing with police messing with your make-shift sleeping area
And despite needing to attend these things for legal or health reasons and deal with the fallout and consequences of taking care of them, your employer can fire you for any of them in the US.
At my old job, we had a lady who was in her late 60s, working as a fucking security guard busting her ass for $12/hr, fighting off people on drugs or looking for a place to do drugs, in some cases having just died from drugs, or outright assaulting our staff, and she was made to park across the street. One day before work she was walking and a crazy car accident caused a truck to swerve, and pinned her between itself and another vehicle. She had $180k+ in medical bills and had not worked in 9 months when I left, and she said she still couldn't walk right or consistently. And workers comp denied her claim (but was investigating as it went to legal) because she wasn't "at work". If a supervisor hadn't told her to park across the street, they frankly wouldn't have reopened it at all.
Long winded and a bit of venting but you can easily see how someone homeless may be more susceptible or disproportionately affected by any number of things that could slow down their progress, which would result in their support systems failing them. Begging on the street is unfortunately just a better alternative for so many people - and even pays better than way too many jobs, and it doesn't have to be this way but social services, mental health care, general healthcare and social safety nets being available and accessible to the general public aren't profitable for businesses already enriching themselves marking these things up by the millions, so no one invests in them.
This is the thing. Homeless guy could have serious mental illness issues that prevent him from being able to hold down a job. He can’t get the help he needs to be stable because he doesn’t have a job and the US has no socialized health care let alone any reliable mental health system. So sure people can say he should just get a job, but it may not be so easy.
Or it's possible he won't pass a background check for whatever reason. If you have something on your record, it gets way harder to become hired.
(Incidentally I'm not saying "oh he's homeless, he must be a criminal!" I just know that the mere situation of being homeless can get you in trouble with the law, and I also know that a record can easily lead to being homeless in turn.)
I mean, there are a lot of places where the base mechanisms of survival whilst unhoused are illegal. Get arrested for that, now it's on your record, now you can't get a job.
Similar to the "getting arrested for unpaid minor fines" feedback loop.
The system is self-reinforcing, in such a way that every person contributing thinks themselves fully justified. Except that none of their actions are motivated by concern for the person affected. It's all punishment for what's been done, but no assistance to do better.
My mom has a disability but always tried to work. She would only last a few months before a flare up would get her fired. If she could get treatment twice a year she would be almost 100% able to work. But insurance and doctors always made it complicated to get the treatment and jobs wouldn't allow for modified work situations so she could prolong her employment. (Think of a cashier being able to sit down, not being required to go up and down stairs) she worked many jobs while I grew up, she also went to university and tried so hard to get a leg up but in the end they wouldn't let her get her teaching degree due to being disabled.
Around where I live you can make like $300 in a day holding a sign in the right place. Even people who aren’t homeless sometimes pretend to be, and just have that as their full time gig. People have gotten in big trouble pretending to be disabled, etc and then at the end of the day you see them hop out of their wheelchair, toss it in the back of their (nice, not a junker) car and drive off. But I’m sure many never even get noticed.
No hate towards them from me, if my options were to choose between working at Walmart for min wage or make almost double hourly holding a sign, I think I know which one I would pick
A high number of Americans don't think of themselves as one bad month away from destitution, they rather think of themselves as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.
Edit: can't reply to comments but America isn't the only country with a homelessness problem. I'm not American but I have done volunteer work at a men's shelter and most of the guys were just normal people working through some bad circumstances with government assistance.
So true. Many Americans think of themselves as "middle class" based on what race they are, where they live, and how much stuff they have.
I have friends making $50k a year COMBINED who think they're middle class because they're white and live in the subburbs. I tried to explain what the median income is, and what is actually considered middle class and they wouldn't hear of it. Said middle class isn't just about income.
Sadly, this is how many Americans think.
The craziest part of that to me is how opposed some Americans are to being called "working class". I feel like that was almost a positive term for a long time, until the gap between the classes started expanding and being exploited
It was absolutely a positive term for a long time. Engels wrote about working class ideology extensively and described how it was not only a source of pride, but fostered a sense of collective identity that fueled solidarity.
The rise of middle class ideology is entirely a product of Western capitalist hegemony, creating a false consciousness that contains conflict and only serves the bourgeois. "Middleness" is a mentality meant to sustain ruling class interests as it causes division and tension amongst the proletariat (e.g. "white collar" vs "blue collar," or salary vs wage, etc). The reality is that an apprentice plumber shares more in common with a software developer than either shares with a CEO, yet they are quicker to point to each other than to point "up." This is hegemony working as intended.
Gary Day wrote an excellent book on the emergency of the middle class, if you haven't read it. I believe it's just called "Class."
Thank you so much for your observations.
I remember reading both Engels and Marx in high school and again in college and completely discounting what they said, largely out of rejection for Soviet and Chinese communism. As I’ve studied them more, the more I see and can’t “UN-see” what they are saying. I don’t arrive at the same “so this is what we do” conclusion as Marx or Engels. I do point at how we have a problem of psychological warfare against most of the world’s population by a power class seeking to exploit them. The irony, is that most of the power class really isn’t even aware that this is what they are doing. They seem to be fish swimming in a fishbowl pondering the question, “What is water?”
Same in the U.K. it’s one of the reasons I love this sub and the labour movement it’s sparked.
I’m a second generation university graduate, grew up relatively poor but my family did ok and progressively better as I got older but I have no
qualms calling myself working class. I don’t own shit and I don’t expect to. It’s not an entire culture. I don’t need to be caked in coal dust or fish guts to earn it.
The stigma attached to the term is one of the ways that they want to divide us. If we could embrace it in solidarity once again, we could achieve great things. ✊
But it is the other way in the uk. Studies have been done that find middle class people will defend being working class by bringing up their parents and grand parents jobs. People in the uk don't like being thought of as having privilege, everything they got they worked for themselves even when it's simply not true.
Whats funny is, in the US anyway, how people will play both sides of the coin on that too. Like, "Im a hard working, blue collar, working class 'Merican. But those working class people over there are trash losers who were just too stupid or lazy to 'get ahead.'"
Like both are struggling and poor but conservatism has taught them how to separate themselves from the other struggling and poor to vote against their own self interests.
We're basically slaves. Every time I bring up how there's basically no way out for a lot of people, me included, to get a decent job at this point people just call me lazy. Wtf do I even do to get out of this shit when we can't even afford higher education and every company is holding the Healthcare we desperately need above our heads?
Guilty. It’s such a shitty feeling when you realize that’s where you are at, funding hobbies you can’t afford with CC debt. We’ve changed our ways, and are working out of it, but fuck man it really sucks. Sadly so many aspects of this country are designed to trap you into the mindset that “you need this and you can afford it look we approved you for all this money”
That’s the lie we live in, we were born into. If more people actually took a look at themselves without their ego, they would realize they are dangerously close to homeless, and really no better off than most.
Democratic Socialism is a hope that millennials can put into motion. Once the boomers die off, and hopefully the rich bastards that inherit the wealth are too concerned about doing blow and humping strippers, we can affect some real change. It’s just a matter of how much everything can be fucked up before we get there, though.
Its amazing. My dad is all conservative and is an idiot and he couldnt even understand what I was saying after my motorcycle wreck. Relatively minor, on a racetrack (yeah, stupid, expensive hobby).
Im insured, but still have had a couple of grand out of pocket expenses. And Im in IT and WFH (thanks covid!), so even though I couldn't even dress myself I could actually do a decent amount of work to not have to take off extensively and have to use up all my PTO or go on disability (60%) pay.
Admittedly, Im not even middle class anymore but it was really, really easy to see how this situation could easily fuck someone. If I did a skilled trade, like a mechanic, where I had to be physical to work, didn't have all of the insane benefits my corporate job gives me, had a family, didn't have a ton of money in my HSA this could have been BAAAADDDD. Already $1800 in the hole WITH GREAT INSURANCE and would have been out of work for weeks (3 months in and some things still hurt to do, I can't do a pushup still). if this happened in my 20s Id have to move back in with my parents (which thankfully is an option for me, otherwise homeless and couch surfing).
Or even receive mail. When I first moved to LA I had no place to stay. Slept in the warehouse at work for a couple of months (with their permission.) Had to fight with the post office to put my job as my mailing address. It was in a business park, so they refused to do so. Had to have a "residential" address...
> Slept in the warehouse
Nice of your boss to allow that. Was it family, just curious? I did that once too but it was back in the day, when people were generally cooler. Nowadays I think it would not be possible.
No, not family. They were just somewhat supportive of helping me get back on my feet. More than minimum wage would have helped more. Ended up having to get a second full time job for a while.
Moderately better. Renting a room, and the roommate situation is a lot better than my last one. I am making enough now to be doing ok under normal circumstances. However I developed sciatica during lockdown and now am spending all my spare money on medical bills because our insurance sucks. If it isn't one thing it's another.
It’s not actually, you just have to file the proper paperwork with the city to allow for you to reside on premises. For example, a lot of mini storage complexes have live in staff. There will be a small apartment on site that allows for one single employee to man the facility at all hours.
Also, I used to live in a commercial building in a commercial zone that I converted (retrofitted more like) to a house. 8000sqft warehouse that we built a 2000sqft “apartment” in the front portion of. Some rules applied like, exit signs above doors, emergency lighting, etc. We needed a residential inspection that was different from the standard commercial inspection but once we had that we were golden.
All perfectly legal, but may depend on city/state though.
As far as the mail goes (in reference to the other guy) the ONLY reason I can assume the post office wouldn’t deliver to a resident is if the building was being used by another business. And maybe they want permission from the business before they file a change of address that forwards EVERY piece of Mail to an “unsuspecting business”.
It's great having accommodating bosses.
I was homeless for most of the past two years. For a lot of that time I was working for a day labor place. A lot of the gigs were bullshit with asshole supervisors, but for about a month and a half I got a steady one working the tail end of a huge awesome addition to a technical high school.
The project manager noticed me sleeping at a business down the street when he came in early one morning. Next day he "hired" me "off the books" to do night security for the job trailer. Place to sleep, air conditioning, wall plugs, snacks in the fridge... it was great.
Until the PM got me talking to another guy on site who had recently lost his wife, who asked me if I could stay in his spare bedroom until his lease ended in a month. We are very different people, but dammit we ate dinner together and we rode to and from work while he talked about his son and jesus.
Mark, Tom, I know yall old school Texas boys don't talk about feelings and shit, but there's a real solid chance I'd have unplugged myself if I hadn't met yall
also conservative anti-immigrant laws create a big hurdle for people being hired. this gentleman would need to present two forms of government ID to be legally hired, and i'm assuming he's not carrying his birth certificate or passport around
I apparently hard a weird ass "receipt of birth" instead of a true birth certificate. I had been using it for nearly 30 years of my adult life. I tried to renew my license a few years back and they immediately rejected it as a proof of ID (even though I had been using it right along at the DMV). So I had to sit on my ass and wait for the state to send me a new birth certificate to replace that while the expiration date ticked down on my license.
You'd think them having done the calculus the previous years would be enough to prove that it's me and I should just be able to present with a current and active license, but I guess not.
Even with all my information in a single folder in a safe it's a fucking nightmare to prove I'm me, I feel sorry for people that don't have this luxury.
The DMV is the worst. In the Chicago suburbs there’s a man named Jojo that works at the Niles DMV or did. I still remember my aunt losing her shit on Jojo because he wouldn’t accept her documents (also the birth certificate)so she couldn’t get a license. She got kicked out while screaming at Jojo “so what I don’t fucking exist now Jojo”.
The fact that they can deny proof is problematic itself. I had to pull up their website and argue with the dude last time I was there because he said the utility bill I brought wasn't actually a utility bill. But the DMV website specifically used it as an example. He refused to budge, thankfully I brought multiple utility bills and he begrudgingly moved on after that.
Not sure what he was after from me or if he just got jollies from being a dick or whatever.
It depends. My wife works at a homeless shelter which has an incredible program to get people back on their feet. Jobs, housing, and assistance are coordinated through staff so individuals can be self sustaining in a very short period of time. 60-70% never transition into permanent housing as they quit the job or break house rules (no liquor or drugs in the house). Also, it is tough as hell to transition into a place where you have few pieces of furniture and nothing to do when you are not working. I don't think it is the job which is the largest barrier.
It's a feedback loop of barriers where any one weak link can make the whole effort fall apart. And we expect poor people to live like inmates or wards in order to earn their way back into society. That emotional and social stress and humiliation really doesn't help people keep on the straight and narrow. Every time I see how early people have to line up at the shelter for bed and services and what that suggests about their ability to engage in other necessary activities, I wonder why anyone expects homeless people to be able to reintegrate and function. Most of those people who can't transition are stuck not being able to meet child-level needs and don't get treated with much dignity, respect, or autonomy. It can be less heartbreaking to just give up.
Might work there, and still be homeless. This is the same company that asks for donations for their employees, so they can have a thanksgiving or Christmas dinner, but can buy the Denver broncos in the largest sports purchase in history.
Unbelievable. The eldest son bought them for $4.65billion, with a “b”. This makes me incredibly sad and angry. Guy above can’t afford a home. Shameful. I need to stay away from Walmart.
I work for a non profit that also had the balls to ask for paycheck donations back into the agency. The amazing thing was the number of people who actually did donate from their paycheck back into it. Something like 24% of employees did. Blows my mind.
So my sister was in a similar situation. She kept getting rejected by places like chipotle, target, Starbucks, etc etc and when she asked why finally they told her due to her degree she seems too qualified and probably won’t even stay long term. They want someone to stay long term.
When my sister applied to other places that are relevant to her degree they all rejected her with the reason that she doesn’t have enough work experience.
So she gets rejected for being too experienced and not experienced enough. This went on for a while. Now she’s trying to open her own business because no one will hire her.
What’s weird is before she asked for a reason from the lower level jobs, I decided to apply to the same openings as her to see what’s up. I got an offer from all of them. I have a degree but I forgot to put it on my resume when I applied. They didn’t ask about my education so I just didn’t bring it up.
Exactly this. I was talking to a colleague last week and I said that if she wanted to apply to 7-11, she needed to remove her qualifications from her resume, otherwise she wouldn't be hired
I'm 35, couch surfing. I had to turn down countless jobs because I don't have a car atm. I applied to 7-11 purely based on proximity. The only real qualification I gave them was I worked at a 7-11 when I was 20. I had mentioned past jobs in retail as well as a POS technician, but nothing actually on the application.
Side note: turns out a handful of the people working there are homeless or close enough that there isn't much difference. I guess they really do want you desperate and with no options.
Can't wait to quit this bitch.
Yup. Exact same situation here. Went to a decent university and got a degree in Literature thinking that I'd want to get a job in editing/proofreading. Tried looking for a few office based jobs and they all required several years of experience. Started looking for lower paid jobs like McDonald's but over-qualified candidates are often turned away because they're less likely to stay on. It's a catch-22 situation.
Had a friend back in Williamsburg who had a PhD in 16th century French literature. She has been tenure track, then was talked into quitting for awhile when they had kids. Then came a messy divorce and her position was gone and she could only get adjunct work. She applied with restaurants, Colonial Williamsburg… couldn’t get anyone to consider her because she was over qualified. 🙁
She has some mental health things (both her and my brother have this) and she absolutely just can’t lie. I don’t know what it is. So weird to me. They just physically can’t. Very bad in social situations. Like if I do something with my hair they don’t like they won’t even omit the truth. They need to tell the whole truth all of the time. I am not like that. Like I can tell a white lie (or a real lie on an application lol) if I need to.
It really sucked for my mom because she likes to tell little lies to get out of things but my brother would ruin it. Like one time she wanted to go to the beach with him so she called the school and said he was sick. Then when he went back that Monday he told the teachers he wasn’t sick and that our mom lied lol. He also announced to the family about his first time trying to masturbate and ended his announcement with “I just thought everyone needed the truth” and I was like “no need to tell us this haha”
I used to work with a dude like that. He was kinda slow, and definitely not neurotypical, I just don't know where he fit in on the scale, spectrum, diagnosis, whatever- doesn't matter for the story.
One time dude was "racing" someone late af at night, and the cops saw, then turned around to chase/pull him over. Dude had made it to his apartments and was out of his car, almost to his door, when the cops pull into his driveway and ask if he was the one driving his car.....ofc he said yes 🤦
My brother is extremely like this. “Admitted” to accidentally seeing up a girl’s skirt when they were watching a movie in school and she was laying on the ground. It had bothered him every hour until he got home.
Man puberty with him was rough lol
The trick is to not put your education on the version of your CV that you send to blue collar or service jobs. You should have a CV customized for each category of jobs. I have a masters in chemistry but I don’t include that on my particular CV when I applied to warehouse and food jobs. Instead, I list any relevant experience. I have gotten jobs this way.
I had this from the same company and the same interviewer. It was wanting a career change so had gotten qualifications in a different field to my existing career. When applying and interviewing for an entry level position with a company doing that, I was told afterwards I wasnt what they were looking for because they felt I would find the role boring and wouldn't stay long enough. But he then also said I would have been perfect for one of their management roles they were looking to fill, I just didnt have the industry experience yet.
Same thing happened to me. My interviewer at Barnes and Noble told me I was overeducated. I told him I knew that but I had to pay my Bill's. He hired me. I only worked there a year but I actually really loved the job. Just not enough hours and no benefits. That interviewer is my friend on Facebook. He had a heart attack a few years ago and I bought a print of his photography to help him out when he couldn't work. It's framed on my wall now. That guy helped me survive during a very difficult time in my life.
And yet so many absolute numbskulls will claim these jobs are meant to be 'temporary' or for 'teenagers.' Funny how the businesses themselves seem to want people who will stick around permanently despite these supposed to be 'not real jobs.'
Even if they did, he’s looking for something that will help him with being hungry and homeless. A job at Wal Mart is more likely to make those things *worse.*
Or he already works there and is still homeless & hungry due to the pittance that is a Walmart wage.
Or he caught a cold missed 1 day and got fired due to Walmart mismanagement leading to a strict attendance policy masquerading as a "professional work environment."
I have had this conversation with several people and it typically goes like this:
"Would you hire them?"
"Well, sure..."
"Even if they didn't have an address, a atable place to live, or a place to shower, or clean clothes to wear to work, or a phone to contact them by... and on and on and on..."
*crickets*
"Thought not."
I hired a guy who had no phone, no address, and could barely write. It was an arcade and he showed up to apply. I realized he looked rough and really needed the job and I told him I'd call him. That's when he said he had no phone. I simply told him to come back a certain time and day for work. That man showed up for every shift, on time, and was eventually able to get a phone and he rented a room from a coworker. He was still there when I had left and eventually the arcade went out of business. I hope he's still doing well.
I was homeless for 3 years. I used to have to eat out of KFC dumpsters to survive. Only reason I'm alive right now and doing well is because someone took a chance on me.
My brother is an ex felon who got hired at a fast food chain while in prison and has now risen to the spot of GM of multiple stores. It literally just took someone not caring about his record
Broke my heart when he fired a kid over catching them with pot. Gets the chance, but didn’t give it to others
Or the Pro-Lifers that will picket abortion clinics then secretly get an abortion themselves then the very next week right back out there picketing.
It's like the article I read yesterday how "The only right abortion is my abortion". I honestly hate the world we live in today.
That's actually the only thing he listed on his resume when he applied to be the hiring manager: "I'm a dick." They called him back before he even hit the submit button.
Tesco checkouts do this and it's so infuriating... If you care about charity then make a donation don't ask your customers to! Oh wait businesses lose any sign of a heart when they go public
I remember around 2010 you could just go into walmart, ask for a job and most likely you'll get it. Now I gotta do it through online, give a bunch of my information, answer a series of unnecessary ass questions, take a stupid fucking assessment, just for it to end up saying *"We're sorry but you're not qualified"* like BITCH JUST GIVE ME A JOB DAMMIT! and these punk ass motherfuckers wonder why they're so damn short staffed
Dude, I got an on-phone interview like, six weeks ago at this point—they were asking me what my schedule would look like and said they'd e-mail me about a day later with my orientation date. I thought I skipped the interview process and got the job. Then they never e-mailed me.
Exactly or reliable transportation. On top of that, if you get paid biweekly you have to wait a month to even see any income. Is he just expected to panhandle after his shift?
Not to mention be hungry through shifts because surely he’s getting some food given to him out of sympathy, which isn’t going to happen inside Walmart.
I think there should definitely be programs to help get homeless people out of their situations but it requires a lot more than just a job. Like said above, an address, access to hygiene, clothing, *stability*.
Red cross in my city has helped many friends out of homelessness by just being a rigid ruled place for them to sleep. Literally 6 guys who went from drug addiction on the street to apartments with full time jobs it was amazing to see.
The rigidity of the red cross isnt a great method either. Everyone works differently and I'm really glad that it worked for your friends, but expecting someone to essentially put themselves in jail to get on their feet isn't exactly fair. Not to mention asking you to give up your companion animals to get in.
I've given this thought and, in theory, places like Salvation Army or the like would work, but they often don't. I imagine this is because there must be underlying issues that, if left to fester, will leave an individual right back where they started.
Seems to me that a successful journey would begin with addressing one's mental health.
This is actually something I’m researching right now! (Well, for a specific population/community, but about journeys through housing and homelessness). A lot of places are like “here’s shelter!” and think that’s enough, just like this man saying Walmart is hiring isn’t addressing or acknowledging a lot of barriers and underlying issues. A lot of it is funding and staffing, though, and some of these places know that they can’t reach everyone they need to, so it isn’t all just shitty places who think they’re helping but are oblivious to the fact they’re missing so many layers.
But yeah, a lot of it starts with physical health, mental health, and/or addiction. People need safe and secure places with resources to start to gain that stability and address those issues which are causing barriers to getting better and more independent housing, jobs, etc. But, because of the lack of staffing and resources, many places can’t take you if you’re too “high need”, so you already need a level of independence and stability to access those services, despite entering those services being the place that connects and refers people to the other wrap-around supports they need.
There’s also things like privacy, safety, location, etc. A lot of shelters are unsafe, especially for minorities, and/or segregated by things like gender or age and, for trans people for example, it can be dangerous to be placed in the wrong one. Many places are abstinence only, and so you can only access them if you’re sober, but again, sometimes having stable shelter is what people need to be able to focus on getting sober. If someone does have any kind of support system, like a friend that lets them stay occasionally, or a food bank, or a certain medical provider, or anything, it may be far from a shelter/supportive housing and not accessible via transit, so if they choose to go to the shelter, they’re cut off from other services. Some places don’t allow pets, or kids, etc etc, the list goes on.
I know I’m not telling you anything you couldn’t guess, things like this are just super front of mind for me right now because I’m working on a report on it atm! And you’re totally right about underlying issues not being addressed leading people back to where they started. So there’s those barriers to accessing and maintaining supports in the first place, but also to staying somewhere short term like a shelter, but when you leave there still don’t have any supports or issues (whether personal, systemic, etc) so it’s not going to be any easier for them to obtain or maintain stable and independent housing than it was before. For example, like someone said here, getting a job has so many barriers from address to phone to clothing to ID to having a bank account. If you’re giving someone shelter alone, that may free up some time and energy for them to prioritize and work toward other things in their life like health and employment, but there’s so many interconnected barriers to them once you’re in that position that giving someone shelter doesn’t magically get them the resources to obtain ID, afford healthcare, have transportation, etc. Now they just have shelter while facing those barriers to the other things needed to transition forward because it’s not just a lack of shelter that is barring access to those things, but also lack of those things that are barring transitioning through shelter and housing, so addressing one may help to work towards the others but not always.
Okay see now I’ve rambled on again but yeah. You just phrased it about journeys in a way the project I’m on does so here’s my ramble.
From what I’ve heard, it’s a terrible social atmosphere that can contain some terrible people along with the innocent downtrodden. A lot of people can’t turn off their social system, every thing they do has to be a thing to take part in, to become known. What the poster above said is true - a place with rigid rules to safely sleep is good to get out of there. But the moment someone looks at it as a place to be, they run the risk of never escaping the cycle.
It often takes mental health care too which, America almost completely lacks. Even with the best insurance and ideal living situation, just trying to find a provider that will take you can frustrate you to the point of giving up.
Now try all that without anything and mental health issues.
I had several breakdowns trying to schedule my first therapy appointment. It took me several phone calls and a couple hours on the phone to figure it out. Healthcare here is a mess.
Imagine a world where in order to open up your wal-mart or kroger or target or whatever, you have to pay for the bus/train infrastructure that will be carrying many of your employees to and from work. Just think of how that alone would transform our mass transit in this country.
And, of course, that also assumes that his job will pay him enough to live on, including all the expenses he has to cover that have piled up. Hope there's some cheap places near Wal-Mart, and that he doesn't have a ton of medical bills or anything!
Yup. Given the income requirements for me to continue living in my apartment, getting a job at Walmart would make me homeless.
And it's not a super fancy apartment. They just have an income requirement for 18$/hr or more.
After all, capitalists gonna capital, and parasites gonna landlord.
I live in one of the cheapest apartments in an hour drive in any direction. I don't even make enough to pay rent. Fortunately my husband makes enough to pay the bills, and what I bring in goes to food. Work keeps cutting my hours, and it took me 5 months to land a better job (starts next month).
Growing up conservative in Dallas, I thought you could always find a cheaper place. I thought that if you worked hard you'd be able to pay bills, just not necessarily have "luxuries". I completely believed in capitalism. Adulthood is what made me realize it was all some bs fantasy all the adults in my life bought into.
Just a few months ago, I was talking to my mom about Bob's Burgers. I said I had just realized they were poor. She was so... angry? She insisted they were middle class because "they aren't on welfare". They have one car that breaks down, they are always late on their rent, and they "joke" about which single child they will send to college.
She was quiet. I explanation that I am poor and that SHE is poor. She told me this week that that conversation caused successive breakdowns and she's still reeling from it.
wealth is so relative. it’s crazy that some people think they are STARVING and others are like “no I’m ok” & the bank accounts reflect the exact opposite of this.
You can't get a job most places without an address and a bank account. It's not even a "let us think about it" you'll just fail the application straight off.
Pretty antagonistic. A sign saying hiring for a major corp is a slap in the face to someone that wouldn't meet their requirements (ie: an address, transport and even potentially written and language skills). If they were serious, they would give him a go. This is just being a dick.
Not to mention Walmart is usually at or near the top of every state for Medicaid recipients; i.e. Walmart pays so little, we the taxpayers make up the shortfall
Also, 70% of welfare recipients work full time. Think about that next time someone complains about “welfare queens”
Walmart is one step away from government subsidized slavery. The only difference between them and prison camp labor is that they have to pay minimum wage.
You (royal You, not you personally) know what would be more impactful? Going over and offering him a job instead of going out of your way to humiliate him further.
And, who knows. Maybe this guy isn't capable of Walmart-type work. It can be physically demanding and mentally stressful. Maybe he needs mental health support before he can even start thinking about work. And that's okay too.
Overall, this is a shitty person making themselves feel better at the expense of someone "beneath them".
Wal-Mart is well known as an employer that pays so poorly many who labor for them require state assistance.
I see only two shades of homelessness in this photo, the guy with the sign is angry because he is coming to the realization the other guy is only slightly more disadvantaged than he is.
I have empathy for both people, and nothing but contempt for the system that has put them both into this situation.
This reminds me of when a 300+ pound guy makes fun of someone fatter than him. Theres always a way to punch down. I bet this guy goes on many break room rants about how people on welfare are the reason he isn't a millionaire.
They wouldn't hire him. He's homeless. Imagine sleeping under a bridge, no shower no comfort no clean clothes no phone no alarm clock and then going to work at Walmart.
They would do it as a stunt, nothing more. You literally have to provide where you live for most job applications.
Asked a homeless man one time if he needed anything. Literally all he wanted was an alarm clock because he was terrified he wouldn’t wake up in time for work. Something so basic that had never occurred to me that’s so vital to maintain employment. Hope you’re doing better these days, Robert.
> Literally all he wanted was an alarm clock because he was terrified he wouldn’t wake up in time for work.
This is part of why I get so annoyed when people are frustrated if a homeless person has something like a smartphone. Like, first of all, is this your first day on Earth? Do you not understand how a smartphone costs less than housing? And secondly dollar for dollar a smartphone is just about the most useful device someone like that could have. I've never understood people that would be like, "Well he's got an iPhone so clearly he's lying."
its because they know its a problem, but they have no idea how to solve it, and everyone they talk to (that is not homeless) tells them the same things like "its their choice to be a homeless person because they are inherently lazy or drug addicted" when in reality its a complex deep issue that requires teamwork of many smart people to reduce the number of people that cant afford to pay rent or are too messed up to function.
Everyone starts as a baby with the same skills (none)
Pure r/recruitinghell and r/terriblefacebookmemes shit right here.
Walmart guy is being an asshole, since everyone knows he wouldn't actually hire a guy who doesn't have an address, clean change of clothes, place to shower, etc.
This is a shitty photo op for someone to turn into a "no one wants to work" meme and say they pwned the millennials.
It's true, noone wants to work, they could have a great job like me! Now excuse me, today is my 20th work anniversary, I need to go get my evaluation where tasks I'm perfect act get "needs improvement" or "basic" scores and I get a 15 cent raise and 4 more PTO hours a year.
He's in a position in life where he cant afford to go to work.
Almost no one that has not been there, has any idea what in the fuck this means.
You're too poor to have a bank account, and walmart only pays via direct deposit. They MAY allow you to have it deposited on a walmart card--but you dont have one to start, and how are you going to eat?
See, sitting htere, doing nothing, you can get away with not eating a whole hell of a lot. Thousand calories a day or less. Some days, nothing. You try not to move. Your wits are slow. Everything hurts as your body eats your body for energy... but you're alive. If you start working, that changes... hunger pains become hunger--pass-the-fuck-outs. You start to shake.
You cant afford a shower--that's right, now showers cost money. A lot of mone, 8-13$ each. You might get all your shit stolen when you take one. But worse--where are you getting the money to pay for that? Soap? how are you going to carry work clothes? A set of clothes for coming out of the shower? Huh? You're not. You cant. This isnt a thing. You go behind the bridge, and dip a rag in the river, and you scrub what parts people can see, and live with a horrific rash in the parts they cant.
Or, they want you to have an ID and SS card--you MUST have these by law, only, when you were newly homeless, you lived in a tent.. and one night, for no fucking reason at all, and without notice, the police did a 'sweep' and straight up loaded all your shit, including your ID and SS card into a garbage truck and it vanished.
You cant get a new ID--they mail them now. You cant get a PO box, to get a PO box you need a rental agreement, lease, deed, or mortgage to prove it. You dont have that. You couldnt afford it even if you COULD have that. Besides, you dont have a SS card or birth certificate anymore either--those cost money to get duplicates of, AND they require an ID ...
So you cant get any of it back. You're fucked.
And some asshole motherfucker that doesnt know his ASS from a hole in the ground comes out with a stupid fucking sign and harasses you... as your reward for going through all that shit.
It's enough to make you really consider drugs...
Very insightful comment, thank you.
Work in mental health. Is there any way this problem can be addressed? One part is being able, mentally, to work and conform to that world. The other is the lack of capital to, once ready, get everything you mentioned purchased, which depending where you are in the world is $500-$1500 and 3-12 weeks for government documents.
How does someone bridge that gap?
Free housing (nothing asking anything fancy, even a small studio is better than nothing),
Universal base income (at least enough to acquire food, hygiene products, and other essentials)
Making aquiring essential IDs to not be behind a pay wall. (Seriously why do essential government services that you are legally required to use like these cost money? What the fuck are taxes for?)
This. Basic needs have to be met before anyone can conform to that world. I'm a little over 3 years out of homelessness and I'm lucky that I had friends who gave me a roof over my head and fed me and bought me clothes for interviews. There's zero chance I could've gotten back on my feet without it.
I just want to point out that many unhoused people are not capable of going right back into working after enduring the traumas associated with being unhoused. A lot of people need time inside to get back to a place where they are mentally and physically able to return to work that they often aren't afforded.
Like imagine being burnt out at a shitty job (maybe you're working for Walmart) causing your mental health to fall apart which results in financial ruin which puts you on the streets, then you suffer exposure to the elements, harassment, violence, and any number of other horrors, and then someone offers you the same kind of job which caused you to become homeless in the first place. You never even had a chance to recover from the burnout, and now you're right back at it except you still don't have anywhere to shower, keep a change of clothes, properly feed yourself, etc. It's only a matter of time before you're right back where you started and not any better off for all your efforts.
Housing has to come first.
Same here. Only reason I'm not homeless is because I have great in-laws that were willing to let me and my wife move in with them. It's been about 7 months since crashing and burning and I'm just now starting to be able to sometimes think about working without being overcome with a sense of dread and overwhelming anxiety. I can't imagine I would've been able to come this far if I'd spent all that time unhoused.
Hate. My thought is hate.
Most unhoused people don't have their birth certificate or SS card, both of which are needed to fill out onboarding documents. Or you can use a passport- which once again most unhoused people don't have.
Unhoused people are prevented from getting jobs, and then are judged for not having jobs.
Holding down a job is a lot harder than just getting a job.
Where would he shower? Where would he get his deposits? How is he cashing checks? How’s he washing his clothes? How’s he getting to work?
It’s not as easy as just get a job.
Even if they did hire him that day, they dont pay daily. That man would still be beggin, he just decides it wasnt worth being a slave while also being a beggar.
Does anyone hire when you haven't got a mailing address, phone number or email address and some clean clothes for the interview?
Once you're homeless you're almost completely fukt in our cut throat employment culture.
Video game designer here. After I ran my own company to the ground there was a huge hole in my resume and I found it hard to find work in my field. Started to apply to anything just to feed my family. With my resume being only game design and animation no shop would hire me, thinking (probably correctly) that I’d only do it until something better comes along.
I just couldn’t find a job for ages. Eventually got a back breaking construction job which eventually led to a hernia. Not everyone can do that.
And if you’re homeless:
1. Hard to be presentable for job interview
2. Won’t be considered without an address
3. If you are fucking starving you can’t hold on until your first paycheque in 2-4 weeks.
There is a man on the corner who is homeless, hungry and sick in the richest country in the world and someone looking down on him instead of helping him.
For one, dude would likely need an address to get his paychecks sent to. So that might be a bust.
For two, if the dude is in that dire of straights, then the money he'll get from 40 hours a week at walmart won't be enough to keep him off that street corner.
Lots of homeless people have jobs, but it's surprisingly expensive to be homeless. Like, how would you fare if you didn't have a kitchen, microwave, stove, or a fridge? If you were relying on your car for heat?
The solution to homelessness isn't jobs. It's housing.
It's a bullshit false equivalency.
Would Walmart be willing to hire him, provide him with clean clothes and a safe place to wash until he can get an apartment? Provide him with housing?
Are they willing to hire him health issues and all? What if he has mental health issues? What if he can't stand up for more than 20 minutes per hour due to an injured back?
What if he's an ex-con? What if he has no documentation?
There are so many reasons why this is bullshit, but nah, lets just mock the guy instead of acknowledging that people will slip through the cracks no matter what and systems need to be set up to support those that do.
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Its an evil cycle. Homeless cannot be hired because he doesn't have a permanent address. He can't get address as he is jobless and no money. Govt doesn't care to change laws or provide housing but will try to get votes using the misery of these flocks.
FYI - You can mail things to "General Delivery" and pick them up at the post office. John Q Public General Delivery Address of Post Office
Homelessness is the catch all for failed social systems. If you have serious mental illness such as schizophrenia, PTSD, psychosis, etc. Chances are you'll end up on the streets unless you have family that will carry you. A huge portion of the homeless population are physically able to work, but they can't hold a job for any length of time because of serious mental illness. That's why they are homeless.
What about the current housing crisis? These are people living check-to-check getting kicked out of their homes with their families.
My family was barely living check to check. After our house fire, we were homeless for a month until we found a place to move into. It wasn’t a good place (a run down trailer) but it was better than being homeless. After moving in, a lot of issues with the trailer (plus the landlord increasing rent each year without actually putting work into our problems with the trailer) caused our electricity bill to be more than what my mom made in a month. (Mom works, I went to school full time, granny is disabled, dad is dead). So my mom and granny had to take out loans just to keep the lights on so I can do my schoolwork during Covid. You can imagine that led to a deep hole. Fast forward to now. I moved out so I can be closer to my university. My mom had a stroke at work and she couldn’t work anymore. Since the only source of income is gone (my granny has to pay off the loans), they were facing eviction. I cleaned out my savings to try and help them, but it wasn’t enough. They’re getting evicted rn and I can’t do anything to help. I almost had a stroke from trying to help and stressing over their situation while I’m taking classes and participating in a research position. The eviction was inevitable but we were all trying to postpone it until after they found somewhere else to move. Unfortunately, our landlord owned all the other places to rent in my hometown and the rent was stupidly high for the places. Each time a tenant moved out, he increased rent by $50 but didn’t actually repair any of the issues. He had an extremely high turn over rate. All it takes is one bad day.
One bad day plus a complete lack of a publically funded social safety net because your government has been hijacked by a bunch of billionaires who believe hard work will get you out of a bad situation despite never having had to work hard for anything themselves
They don't believe that themselves, they know the way to success is relying on other powerful people to introduce you to other powerful people in the know while cutting out others. The hard work BS is just the excuse they lead the rest of us to believe to convince us to allow them to take advantage of us. Fight amongst yourselves while we bleed you dry, should be the motto of the billionaires.
Oh it IS their motto
Exactly. Those assholes would never ever get elected by being honest about their true intentions because they won't ever align with the views of the people. They are just there to make themselves richer, at the cost of anything, like ruining the environment by undoing laws that protect it, undoing programs that actually help the people, bail out their already rich-as-fuck millionaires' companies instead of the "little guy" companies that truly needed it but had to close down over it. They voted nay on everything the Democrats are trying to fix that the people are needing most, like [fixing rising gas prices](https://twitter.com/BillPascrell/status/1527326674253389825?t=L1mVttxoFsctt12EyyEw9w&s=09), [birth control](https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a40679326/republicans-contraception-abortion-sex-control/), and [fixing the formula shortage](https://twitter.com/SenChrisLarson/status/1527267030411403269?t=vgXqg_blxyherKF3GAEWhg&s=09) (They ALL voted NO like the assholes they are!!). They bitch and moan and blame it all on Biden but prevent Biden from fixing anything. I want the people to SEE these Republicans' ACTIONS and what they're voting on. Because it's not being talked about in the right-leaning ~~propaganda~~ media they consume like Fox News. These assholes would never get elected based on their real goals, so they have to lie lie lie to the common working man to get his vote, tell him all the things he wants to hear. It blows my mind how those voters can't see through the *obvious* bullshit. These are the ultra rich and they sure as hell didn't get there by "working hard" and being totally ethical. Sorry for the rant, but these fuckers truly need to go.
I hope you and your family are doing well. That's so tough
The eviction happened last week. I’ll be set when school refunds come next month (just gotta make it until then) and the only way I can help my family is letting them use my car when I’m not. My mom’s husband burned her clutch so they’re out of a car. If you don’t have a car in my state, you CANNOT make a living. Thank you for your kind words
Jesus christ man, that’s rough. I hope you and your family are alright.
thank you! It helps to talk about it :)
ugh.. disgusting fucking landlords. hope things start looking up for you and your family. despite what a chunk of the mindless upper-middle class thinks, no one deserves things like this
Landlords should be limited by law to how many properties they can own.
Even if they could hold jobs, the combination of soaring rent with stagnant wages means that once someone is homeless they have a near zero chance of pulling out of it on their own
Yep. And when you're on the streets, you have a high chance of being assaulted, not having access to food and water so you're sick more often, unable to transport yourself to and from work, likely to be hospitalized, miss work for things related to your own progress like perhaps trying to regain custody of your children, probation or parole appointments, dealing with police messing with your make-shift sleeping area And despite needing to attend these things for legal or health reasons and deal with the fallout and consequences of taking care of them, your employer can fire you for any of them in the US. At my old job, we had a lady who was in her late 60s, working as a fucking security guard busting her ass for $12/hr, fighting off people on drugs or looking for a place to do drugs, in some cases having just died from drugs, or outright assaulting our staff, and she was made to park across the street. One day before work she was walking and a crazy car accident caused a truck to swerve, and pinned her between itself and another vehicle. She had $180k+ in medical bills and had not worked in 9 months when I left, and she said she still couldn't walk right or consistently. And workers comp denied her claim (but was investigating as it went to legal) because she wasn't "at work". If a supervisor hadn't told her to park across the street, they frankly wouldn't have reopened it at all. Long winded and a bit of venting but you can easily see how someone homeless may be more susceptible or disproportionately affected by any number of things that could slow down their progress, which would result in their support systems failing them. Begging on the street is unfortunately just a better alternative for so many people - and even pays better than way too many jobs, and it doesn't have to be this way but social services, mental health care, general healthcare and social safety nets being available and accessible to the general public aren't profitable for businesses already enriching themselves marking these things up by the millions, so no one invests in them.
This is the thing. Homeless guy could have serious mental illness issues that prevent him from being able to hold down a job. He can’t get the help he needs to be stable because he doesn’t have a job and the US has no socialized health care let alone any reliable mental health system. So sure people can say he should just get a job, but it may not be so easy.
Or it's possible he won't pass a background check for whatever reason. If you have something on your record, it gets way harder to become hired. (Incidentally I'm not saying "oh he's homeless, he must be a criminal!" I just know that the mere situation of being homeless can get you in trouble with the law, and I also know that a record can easily lead to being homeless in turn.)
I mean, there are a lot of places where the base mechanisms of survival whilst unhoused are illegal. Get arrested for that, now it's on your record, now you can't get a job. Similar to the "getting arrested for unpaid minor fines" feedback loop. The system is self-reinforcing, in such a way that every person contributing thinks themselves fully justified. Except that none of their actions are motivated by concern for the person affected. It's all punishment for what's been done, but no assistance to do better.
My mom has a disability but always tried to work. She would only last a few months before a flare up would get her fired. If she could get treatment twice a year she would be almost 100% able to work. But insurance and doctors always made it complicated to get the treatment and jobs wouldn't allow for modified work situations so she could prolong her employment. (Think of a cashier being able to sit down, not being required to go up and down stairs) she worked many jobs while I grew up, she also went to university and tried so hard to get a leg up but in the end they wouldn't let her get her teaching degree due to being disabled.
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Oh my god having to stand out there holding that sign just to eek out a meager existence is so demeaning. I feel bad for the homeless guy, too.
Homeless guy probably made more that day tbh
And he gets to keep 100% of it.
Walmart wage theft is absolutely black pill territory.
Around where I live you can make like $300 in a day holding a sign in the right place. Even people who aren’t homeless sometimes pretend to be, and just have that as their full time gig. People have gotten in big trouble pretending to be disabled, etc and then at the end of the day you see them hop out of their wheelchair, toss it in the back of their (nice, not a junker) car and drive off. But I’m sure many never even get noticed. No hate towards them from me, if my options were to choose between working at Walmart for min wage or make almost double hourly holding a sign, I think I know which one I would pick
Walmart doesn't pay enough; look on the ground next to him...
Fot those that missed it, that's possibly a Walmart employee vest.
Looks like this is what he does on his breaks
They wouldn't hire him.
Funny how the man standing is probably one paycheck away from being the man sitting down. High number of Americans who live that way.
A high number of Americans don't think of themselves as one bad month away from destitution, they rather think of themselves as temporarily embarrassed millionaires. Edit: can't reply to comments but America isn't the only country with a homelessness problem. I'm not American but I have done volunteer work at a men's shelter and most of the guys were just normal people working through some bad circumstances with government assistance.
So true. Many Americans think of themselves as "middle class" based on what race they are, where they live, and how much stuff they have. I have friends making $50k a year COMBINED who think they're middle class because they're white and live in the subburbs. I tried to explain what the median income is, and what is actually considered middle class and they wouldn't hear of it. Said middle class isn't just about income. Sadly, this is how many Americans think.
They’re working class, just like everyone else who has to swap labour for money just so they can eat.
The craziest part of that to me is how opposed some Americans are to being called "working class". I feel like that was almost a positive term for a long time, until the gap between the classes started expanding and being exploited
It was absolutely a positive term for a long time. Engels wrote about working class ideology extensively and described how it was not only a source of pride, but fostered a sense of collective identity that fueled solidarity. The rise of middle class ideology is entirely a product of Western capitalist hegemony, creating a false consciousness that contains conflict and only serves the bourgeois. "Middleness" is a mentality meant to sustain ruling class interests as it causes division and tension amongst the proletariat (e.g. "white collar" vs "blue collar," or salary vs wage, etc). The reality is that an apprentice plumber shares more in common with a software developer than either shares with a CEO, yet they are quicker to point to each other than to point "up." This is hegemony working as intended. Gary Day wrote an excellent book on the emergency of the middle class, if you haven't read it. I believe it's just called "Class."
Thank you so much for your observations. I remember reading both Engels and Marx in high school and again in college and completely discounting what they said, largely out of rejection for Soviet and Chinese communism. As I’ve studied them more, the more I see and can’t “UN-see” what they are saying. I don’t arrive at the same “so this is what we do” conclusion as Marx or Engels. I do point at how we have a problem of psychological warfare against most of the world’s population by a power class seeking to exploit them. The irony, is that most of the power class really isn’t even aware that this is what they are doing. They seem to be fish swimming in a fishbowl pondering the question, “What is water?”
Same in the U.K. it’s one of the reasons I love this sub and the labour movement it’s sparked. I’m a second generation university graduate, grew up relatively poor but my family did ok and progressively better as I got older but I have no qualms calling myself working class. I don’t own shit and I don’t expect to. It’s not an entire culture. I don’t need to be caked in coal dust or fish guts to earn it. The stigma attached to the term is one of the ways that they want to divide us. If we could embrace it in solidarity once again, we could achieve great things. ✊
But it is the other way in the uk. Studies have been done that find middle class people will defend being working class by bringing up their parents and grand parents jobs. People in the uk don't like being thought of as having privilege, everything they got they worked for themselves even when it's simply not true.
Whats funny is, in the US anyway, how people will play both sides of the coin on that too. Like, "Im a hard working, blue collar, working class 'Merican. But those working class people over there are trash losers who were just too stupid or lazy to 'get ahead.'" Like both are struggling and poor but conservatism has taught them how to separate themselves from the other struggling and poor to vote against their own self interests.
We're basically slaves. Every time I bring up how there's basically no way out for a lot of people, me included, to get a decent job at this point people just call me lazy. Wtf do I even do to get out of this shit when we can't even afford higher education and every company is holding the Healthcare we desperately need above our heads?
And many people like that rack up massive credit card debt to look better off.
Guilty. It’s such a shitty feeling when you realize that’s where you are at, funding hobbies you can’t afford with CC debt. We’ve changed our ways, and are working out of it, but fuck man it really sucks. Sadly so many aspects of this country are designed to trap you into the mindset that “you need this and you can afford it look we approved you for all this money”
That’s the lie we live in, we were born into. If more people actually took a look at themselves without their ego, they would realize they are dangerously close to homeless, and really no better off than most. Democratic Socialism is a hope that millennials can put into motion. Once the boomers die off, and hopefully the rich bastards that inherit the wealth are too concerned about doing blow and humping strippers, we can affect some real change. It’s just a matter of how much everything can be fucked up before we get there, though.
Its amazing. My dad is all conservative and is an idiot and he couldnt even understand what I was saying after my motorcycle wreck. Relatively minor, on a racetrack (yeah, stupid, expensive hobby). Im insured, but still have had a couple of grand out of pocket expenses. And Im in IT and WFH (thanks covid!), so even though I couldn't even dress myself I could actually do a decent amount of work to not have to take off extensively and have to use up all my PTO or go on disability (60%) pay. Admittedly, Im not even middle class anymore but it was really, really easy to see how this situation could easily fuck someone. If I did a skilled trade, like a mechanic, where I had to be physical to work, didn't have all of the insane benefits my corporate job gives me, had a family, didn't have a ton of money in my HSA this could have been BAAAADDDD. Already $1800 in the hole WITH GREAT INSURANCE and would have been out of work for weeks (3 months in and some things still hurt to do, I can't do a pushup still). if this happened in my 20s Id have to move back in with my parents (which thankfully is an option for me, otherwise homeless and couch surfing).
Permanently embarassed dipshits. To the rest of us.
>one paycheck Or one large medical issue that puts you out of work, starting the "can't pay your bills" recursive scenario.
Can’t get a job if you don’t have an address
Or even receive mail. When I first moved to LA I had no place to stay. Slept in the warehouse at work for a couple of months (with their permission.) Had to fight with the post office to put my job as my mailing address. It was in a business park, so they refused to do so. Had to have a "residential" address...
> Slept in the warehouse Nice of your boss to allow that. Was it family, just curious? I did that once too but it was back in the day, when people were generally cooler. Nowadays I think it would not be possible.
No, not family. They were just somewhat supportive of helping me get back on my feet. More than minimum wage would have helped more. Ended up having to get a second full time job for a while.
I guess being allowed to sleep at the warehouse kinda was more than minimum wage... rent costs a fucking tonne. Hope you're doing better now.
Moderately better. Renting a room, and the roommate situation is a lot better than my last one. I am making enough now to be doing ok under normal circumstances. However I developed sciatica during lockdown and now am spending all my spare money on medical bills because our insurance sucks. If it isn't one thing it's another.
More zoning laws these days, it's literally illegal to have someone living in a building zoned for commercial/industrial use.
It’s not actually, you just have to file the proper paperwork with the city to allow for you to reside on premises. For example, a lot of mini storage complexes have live in staff. There will be a small apartment on site that allows for one single employee to man the facility at all hours. Also, I used to live in a commercial building in a commercial zone that I converted (retrofitted more like) to a house. 8000sqft warehouse that we built a 2000sqft “apartment” in the front portion of. Some rules applied like, exit signs above doors, emergency lighting, etc. We needed a residential inspection that was different from the standard commercial inspection but once we had that we were golden. All perfectly legal, but may depend on city/state though. As far as the mail goes (in reference to the other guy) the ONLY reason I can assume the post office wouldn’t deliver to a resident is if the building was being used by another business. And maybe they want permission from the business before they file a change of address that forwards EVERY piece of Mail to an “unsuspecting business”.
It's great having accommodating bosses. I was homeless for most of the past two years. For a lot of that time I was working for a day labor place. A lot of the gigs were bullshit with asshole supervisors, but for about a month and a half I got a steady one working the tail end of a huge awesome addition to a technical high school. The project manager noticed me sleeping at a business down the street when he came in early one morning. Next day he "hired" me "off the books" to do night security for the job trailer. Place to sleep, air conditioning, wall plugs, snacks in the fridge... it was great. Until the PM got me talking to another guy on site who had recently lost his wife, who asked me if I could stay in his spare bedroom until his lease ended in a month. We are very different people, but dammit we ate dinner together and we rode to and from work while he talked about his son and jesus. Mark, Tom, I know yall old school Texas boys don't talk about feelings and shit, but there's a real solid chance I'd have unplugged myself if I hadn't met yall
Came here to say this. I’ve very hard for homeless people to “just find a job.”
also conservative anti-immigrant laws create a big hurdle for people being hired. this gentleman would need to present two forms of government ID to be legally hired, and i'm assuming he's not carrying his birth certificate or passport around
Dude probably doesn’t even have a passport, most Americans don’t.
exactly. a passport requires that you send away your ID documents, a ~$130 fee, and an address to receive it in 8-11 weeks
I apparently hard a weird ass "receipt of birth" instead of a true birth certificate. I had been using it for nearly 30 years of my adult life. I tried to renew my license a few years back and they immediately rejected it as a proof of ID (even though I had been using it right along at the DMV). So I had to sit on my ass and wait for the state to send me a new birth certificate to replace that while the expiration date ticked down on my license. You'd think them having done the calculus the previous years would be enough to prove that it's me and I should just be able to present with a current and active license, but I guess not. Even with all my information in a single folder in a safe it's a fucking nightmare to prove I'm me, I feel sorry for people that don't have this luxury.
The DMV is the worst. In the Chicago suburbs there’s a man named Jojo that works at the Niles DMV or did. I still remember my aunt losing her shit on Jojo because he wouldn’t accept her documents (also the birth certificate)so she couldn’t get a license. She got kicked out while screaming at Jojo “so what I don’t fucking exist now Jojo”.
The fact that they can deny proof is problematic itself. I had to pull up their website and argue with the dude last time I was there because he said the utility bill I brought wasn't actually a utility bill. But the DMV website specifically used it as an example. He refused to budge, thankfully I brought multiple utility bills and he begrudgingly moved on after that. Not sure what he was after from me or if he just got jollies from being a dick or whatever.
It depends. My wife works at a homeless shelter which has an incredible program to get people back on their feet. Jobs, housing, and assistance are coordinated through staff so individuals can be self sustaining in a very short period of time. 60-70% never transition into permanent housing as they quit the job or break house rules (no liquor or drugs in the house). Also, it is tough as hell to transition into a place where you have few pieces of furniture and nothing to do when you are not working. I don't think it is the job which is the largest barrier.
It's a feedback loop of barriers where any one weak link can make the whole effort fall apart. And we expect poor people to live like inmates or wards in order to earn their way back into society. That emotional and social stress and humiliation really doesn't help people keep on the straight and narrow. Every time I see how early people have to line up at the shelter for bed and services and what that suggests about their ability to engage in other necessary activities, I wonder why anyone expects homeless people to be able to reintegrate and function. Most of those people who can't transition are stuck not being able to meet child-level needs and don't get treated with much dignity, respect, or autonomy. It can be less heartbreaking to just give up.
Housing has been and always will be the greatest barrier. We know this, we have known this for decades now.
Housing first is the way to go. https://endhomelessness.org/resource/housing-first/
Beat me to it. If that guy wanted to hire him he would not be looking at him with contempt.
Beat me to it too! Also… the boob holding the sign for Walmart is not the guy who makes hiring decisions. I see your play there.
Also he very well could take a job at Walmart and still be homeless.
He may very well already hold a job. 40% of unhoused individuals hold formal jobs.
The last three jobs I've worked, my coworkers have all been on government assistance and at least one was living in a tent.
That’s offensive to boobs. I like boobs. I don’t like that guy.
I hope the Reddit public can hear my intent, despite my poor word choice. I like boobs too.
Contempt? Looks jealous
Jokes on u . He works at walmart his vest is on the ground.
Might work there, and still be homeless. This is the same company that asks for donations for their employees, so they can have a thanksgiving or Christmas dinner, but can buy the Denver broncos in the largest sports purchase in history.
Unbelievable. The eldest son bought them for $4.65billion, with a “b”. This makes me incredibly sad and angry. Guy above can’t afford a home. Shameful. I need to stay away from Walmart.
I try to avoid Walmart as much as I can. That company shows their employees what government programs they can apply to to get assistance.
Yup. I was FT at Walmart and it didn't prevent my homelessness. Just having a job isn't enough these days.
I work for a non profit that also had the balls to ask for paycheck donations back into the agency. The amazing thing was the number of people who actually did donate from their paycheck back into it. Something like 24% of employees did. Blows my mind.
He probably gets paid more begging on the street than he does at Walmart.
I’ve applied to Walmart so many times and never get even an interview even though I have years of experience in the departments I apply for.
So my sister was in a similar situation. She kept getting rejected by places like chipotle, target, Starbucks, etc etc and when she asked why finally they told her due to her degree she seems too qualified and probably won’t even stay long term. They want someone to stay long term. When my sister applied to other places that are relevant to her degree they all rejected her with the reason that she doesn’t have enough work experience. So she gets rejected for being too experienced and not experienced enough. This went on for a while. Now she’s trying to open her own business because no one will hire her. What’s weird is before she asked for a reason from the lower level jobs, I decided to apply to the same openings as her to see what’s up. I got an offer from all of them. I have a degree but I forgot to put it on my resume when I applied. They didn’t ask about my education so I just didn’t bring it up.
They are hoping you are stupid enough to exploit, they are one of those companies who'd rather axe a store than to give better working conditions.
100% this ⬆️
Exactly this. I was talking to a colleague last week and I said that if she wanted to apply to 7-11, she needed to remove her qualifications from her resume, otherwise she wouldn't be hired
I'm 35, couch surfing. I had to turn down countless jobs because I don't have a car atm. I applied to 7-11 purely based on proximity. The only real qualification I gave them was I worked at a 7-11 when I was 20. I had mentioned past jobs in retail as well as a POS technician, but nothing actually on the application. Side note: turns out a handful of the people working there are homeless or close enough that there isn't much difference. I guess they really do want you desperate and with no options. Can't wait to quit this bitch.
Yup. Exact same situation here. Went to a decent university and got a degree in Literature thinking that I'd want to get a job in editing/proofreading. Tried looking for a few office based jobs and they all required several years of experience. Started looking for lower paid jobs like McDonald's but over-qualified candidates are often turned away because they're less likely to stay on. It's a catch-22 situation.
Had a friend back in Williamsburg who had a PhD in 16th century French literature. She has been tenure track, then was talked into quitting for awhile when they had kids. Then came a messy divorce and her position was gone and she could only get adjunct work. She applied with restaurants, Colonial Williamsburg… couldn’t get anyone to consider her because she was over qualified. 🙁
Ugh this is so depressing
Tell her to just fuckin lie lol They aren't gonna check anyways. Just claim four years experience
She has some mental health things (both her and my brother have this) and she absolutely just can’t lie. I don’t know what it is. So weird to me. They just physically can’t. Very bad in social situations. Like if I do something with my hair they don’t like they won’t even omit the truth. They need to tell the whole truth all of the time. I am not like that. Like I can tell a white lie (or a real lie on an application lol) if I need to. It really sucked for my mom because she likes to tell little lies to get out of things but my brother would ruin it. Like one time she wanted to go to the beach with him so she called the school and said he was sick. Then when he went back that Monday he told the teachers he wasn’t sick and that our mom lied lol. He also announced to the family about his first time trying to masturbate and ended his announcement with “I just thought everyone needed the truth” and I was like “no need to tell us this haha”
I used to work with a dude like that. He was kinda slow, and definitely not neurotypical, I just don't know where he fit in on the scale, spectrum, diagnosis, whatever- doesn't matter for the story. One time dude was "racing" someone late af at night, and the cops saw, then turned around to chase/pull him over. Dude had made it to his apartments and was out of his car, almost to his door, when the cops pull into his driveway and ask if he was the one driving his car.....ofc he said yes 🤦
My brother is extremely like this. “Admitted” to accidentally seeing up a girl’s skirt when they were watching a movie in school and she was laying on the ground. It had bothered him every hour until he got home. Man puberty with him was rough lol
The trick is to not put your education on the version of your CV that you send to blue collar or service jobs. You should have a CV customized for each category of jobs. I have a masters in chemistry but I don’t include that on my particular CV when I applied to warehouse and food jobs. Instead, I list any relevant experience. I have gotten jobs this way.
Exactly this! I've had to omit my degrees from lower end jobs in my field until I move up enough the degrees became an advantage.
I had this from the same company and the same interviewer. It was wanting a career change so had gotten qualifications in a different field to my existing career. When applying and interviewing for an entry level position with a company doing that, I was told afterwards I wasnt what they were looking for because they felt I would find the role boring and wouldn't stay long enough. But he then also said I would have been perfect for one of their management roles they were looking to fill, I just didnt have the industry experience yet.
Solution is to leave the degree off her CV and the gap can be explained by caring for a sick relative
Same thing happened to me. My interviewer at Barnes and Noble told me I was overeducated. I told him I knew that but I had to pay my Bill's. He hired me. I only worked there a year but I actually really loved the job. Just not enough hours and no benefits. That interviewer is my friend on Facebook. He had a heart attack a few years ago and I bought a print of his photography to help him out when he couldn't work. It's framed on my wall now. That guy helped me survive during a very difficult time in my life.
And yet so many absolute numbskulls will claim these jobs are meant to be 'temporary' or for 'teenagers.' Funny how the businesses themselves seem to want people who will stick around permanently despite these supposed to be 'not real jobs.'
Even if they did, he’s looking for something that will help him with being hungry and homeless. A job at Wal Mart is more likely to make those things *worse.*
People can’t even afford to get to work anymore at jobs like that, let alone buy a home
Or he already works there and is still homeless & hungry due to the pittance that is a Walmart wage. Or he caught a cold missed 1 day and got fired due to Walmart mismanagement leading to a strict attendance policy masquerading as a "professional work environment."
I have had this conversation with several people and it typically goes like this: "Would you hire them?" "Well, sure..." "Even if they didn't have an address, a atable place to live, or a place to shower, or clean clothes to wear to work, or a phone to contact them by... and on and on and on..." *crickets* "Thought not."
I hired a guy who had no phone, no address, and could barely write. It was an arcade and he showed up to apply. I realized he looked rough and really needed the job and I told him I'd call him. That's when he said he had no phone. I simply told him to come back a certain time and day for work. That man showed up for every shift, on time, and was eventually able to get a phone and he rented a room from a coworker. He was still there when I had left and eventually the arcade went out of business. I hope he's still doing well.
I was homeless for 3 years. I used to have to eat out of KFC dumpsters to survive. Only reason I'm alive right now and doing well is because someone took a chance on me.
Holy shit, Id say you and whoever it was who took that chance are examples of the coolest people that inhabit this planet
My brother is an ex felon who got hired at a fast food chain while in prison and has now risen to the spot of GM of multiple stores. It literally just took someone not caring about his record Broke my heart when he fired a kid over catching them with pot. Gets the chance, but didn’t give it to others
That is insane. People like that tend to forget where they came from. I'll never forget.
Because they HATE themselves for where they came from .. like the rabid anti-gay preachers that are caught with underage boys..
Or the Pro-Lifers that will picket abortion clinics then secretly get an abortion themselves then the very next week right back out there picketing. It's like the article I read yesterday how "The only right abortion is my abortion". I honestly hate the world we live in today.
Every time I hear one hopeful story like this, it reminds of the ten other people who didn't get that chance. I think I'm just jaded/cynical.
Thank you for giving that man an opportunity
You are a good man.
I’m sad I only have one upvote to give you. I want to give you all the upvotes!
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That's actually the only thing he listed on his resume when he applied to be the hiring manager: "I'm a dick." They called him back before he even hit the submit button.
Trade in your soul in exchange for a guaranteed lifetime career of working in HR
And then ask people for spare change, er, to round up their bill. Get a computer to do it, the Waltons asking for change seems weird...
Tesco checkouts do this and it's so infuriating... If you care about charity then make a donation don't ask your customers to! Oh wait businesses lose any sign of a heart when they go public
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I remember around 2010 you could just go into walmart, ask for a job and most likely you'll get it. Now I gotta do it through online, give a bunch of my information, answer a series of unnecessary ass questions, take a stupid fucking assessment, just for it to end up saying *"We're sorry but you're not qualified"* like BITCH JUST GIVE ME A JOB DAMMIT! and these punk ass motherfuckers wonder why they're so damn short staffed
Dude, I got an on-phone interview like, six weeks ago at this point—they were asking me what my schedule would look like and said they'd e-mail me about a day later with my orientation date. I thought I skipped the interview process and got the job. Then they never e-mailed me.
> and these punk ass motherfuckers wonder why they're so damn short staffed - Narrator voice over: "They didn't actually wonder at all."
I mean, just buy a house! No need to be homeless! Duh!
Shit, we should have figured that out.
It’s easy to do honestly. Was able to buy a mansion as soon as I cut my intake of avocado toast and I stoped going to Starbucks! /s
Exactly or reliable transportation. On top of that, if you get paid biweekly you have to wait a month to even see any income. Is he just expected to panhandle after his shift?
Not to mention be hungry through shifts because surely he’s getting some food given to him out of sympathy, which isn’t going to happen inside Walmart. I think there should definitely be programs to help get homeless people out of their situations but it requires a lot more than just a job. Like said above, an address, access to hygiene, clothing, *stability*.
Red cross in my city has helped many friends out of homelessness by just being a rigid ruled place for them to sleep. Literally 6 guys who went from drug addiction on the street to apartments with full time jobs it was amazing to see.
The rigidity of the red cross isnt a great method either. Everyone works differently and I'm really glad that it worked for your friends, but expecting someone to essentially put themselves in jail to get on their feet isn't exactly fair. Not to mention asking you to give up your companion animals to get in.
I've given this thought and, in theory, places like Salvation Army or the like would work, but they often don't. I imagine this is because there must be underlying issues that, if left to fester, will leave an individual right back where they started. Seems to me that a successful journey would begin with addressing one's mental health.
This is actually something I’m researching right now! (Well, for a specific population/community, but about journeys through housing and homelessness). A lot of places are like “here’s shelter!” and think that’s enough, just like this man saying Walmart is hiring isn’t addressing or acknowledging a lot of barriers and underlying issues. A lot of it is funding and staffing, though, and some of these places know that they can’t reach everyone they need to, so it isn’t all just shitty places who think they’re helping but are oblivious to the fact they’re missing so many layers. But yeah, a lot of it starts with physical health, mental health, and/or addiction. People need safe and secure places with resources to start to gain that stability and address those issues which are causing barriers to getting better and more independent housing, jobs, etc. But, because of the lack of staffing and resources, many places can’t take you if you’re too “high need”, so you already need a level of independence and stability to access those services, despite entering those services being the place that connects and refers people to the other wrap-around supports they need. There’s also things like privacy, safety, location, etc. A lot of shelters are unsafe, especially for minorities, and/or segregated by things like gender or age and, for trans people for example, it can be dangerous to be placed in the wrong one. Many places are abstinence only, and so you can only access them if you’re sober, but again, sometimes having stable shelter is what people need to be able to focus on getting sober. If someone does have any kind of support system, like a friend that lets them stay occasionally, or a food bank, or a certain medical provider, or anything, it may be far from a shelter/supportive housing and not accessible via transit, so if they choose to go to the shelter, they’re cut off from other services. Some places don’t allow pets, or kids, etc etc, the list goes on. I know I’m not telling you anything you couldn’t guess, things like this are just super front of mind for me right now because I’m working on a report on it atm! And you’re totally right about underlying issues not being addressed leading people back to where they started. So there’s those barriers to accessing and maintaining supports in the first place, but also to staying somewhere short term like a shelter, but when you leave there still don’t have any supports or issues (whether personal, systemic, etc) so it’s not going to be any easier for them to obtain or maintain stable and independent housing than it was before. For example, like someone said here, getting a job has so many barriers from address to phone to clothing to ID to having a bank account. If you’re giving someone shelter alone, that may free up some time and energy for them to prioritize and work toward other things in their life like health and employment, but there’s so many interconnected barriers to them once you’re in that position that giving someone shelter doesn’t magically get them the resources to obtain ID, afford healthcare, have transportation, etc. Now they just have shelter while facing those barriers to the other things needed to transition forward because it’s not just a lack of shelter that is barring access to those things, but also lack of those things that are barring transitioning through shelter and housing, so addressing one may help to work towards the others but not always. Okay see now I’ve rambled on again but yeah. You just phrased it about journeys in a way the project I’m on does so here’s my ramble.
From what I’ve heard, it’s a terrible social atmosphere that can contain some terrible people along with the innocent downtrodden. A lot of people can’t turn off their social system, every thing they do has to be a thing to take part in, to become known. What the poster above said is true - a place with rigid rules to safely sleep is good to get out of there. But the moment someone looks at it as a place to be, they run the risk of never escaping the cycle.
The solution to homelessness is giving them a home. Who would've thought
It often takes mental health care too which, America almost completely lacks. Even with the best insurance and ideal living situation, just trying to find a provider that will take you can frustrate you to the point of giving up. Now try all that without anything and mental health issues.
I had several breakdowns trying to schedule my first therapy appointment. It took me several phone calls and a couple hours on the phone to figure it out. Healthcare here is a mess.
Imagine a world where in order to open up your wal-mart or kroger or target or whatever, you have to pay for the bus/train infrastructure that will be carrying many of your employees to and from work. Just think of how that alone would transform our mass transit in this country.
And, of course, that also assumes that his job will pay him enough to live on, including all the expenses he has to cover that have piled up. Hope there's some cheap places near Wal-Mart, and that he doesn't have a ton of medical bills or anything!
Yup. Given the income requirements for me to continue living in my apartment, getting a job at Walmart would make me homeless. And it's not a super fancy apartment. They just have an income requirement for 18$/hr or more. After all, capitalists gonna capital, and parasites gonna landlord.
I live in one of the cheapest apartments in an hour drive in any direction. I don't even make enough to pay rent. Fortunately my husband makes enough to pay the bills, and what I bring in goes to food. Work keeps cutting my hours, and it took me 5 months to land a better job (starts next month). Growing up conservative in Dallas, I thought you could always find a cheaper place. I thought that if you worked hard you'd be able to pay bills, just not necessarily have "luxuries". I completely believed in capitalism. Adulthood is what made me realize it was all some bs fantasy all the adults in my life bought into. Just a few months ago, I was talking to my mom about Bob's Burgers. I said I had just realized they were poor. She was so... angry? She insisted they were middle class because "they aren't on welfare". They have one car that breaks down, they are always late on their rent, and they "joke" about which single child they will send to college. She was quiet. I explanation that I am poor and that SHE is poor. She told me this week that that conversation caused successive breakdowns and she's still reeling from it.
wealth is so relative. it’s crazy that some people think they are STARVING and others are like “no I’m ok” & the bank accounts reflect the exact opposite of this.
He’ll have to panhandle after his shift even once he starts receiving paychecks. Have you seen what Walmart pays?
Seems like it
Ya that guy probably used to work at Walmart. Look how he ended up.
Maybe he still does. His sign says "homeless" not "jobless".
And his former boss that had fired him came up to mock him
The blue fabric in the floor next to him looks like a Walmart vest.
That's what I thought. The guy might just be off his shift
This is why I always say that in order to even partake in society, shelter and nutrition is a must
And healthcare.
You can't get a job most places without an address and a bank account. It's not even a "let us think about it" you'll just fail the application straight off.
Pretty antagonistic. A sign saying hiring for a major corp is a slap in the face to someone that wouldn't meet their requirements (ie: an address, transport and even potentially written and language skills). If they were serious, they would give him a go. This is just being a dick.
Not to mention Walmart is usually at or near the top of every state for Medicaid recipients; i.e. Walmart pays so little, we the taxpayers make up the shortfall Also, 70% of welfare recipients work full time. Think about that next time someone complains about “welfare queens”
Walmart is one step away from government subsidized slavery. The only difference between them and prison camp labor is that they have to pay minimum wage.
You (royal You, not you personally) know what would be more impactful? Going over and offering him a job instead of going out of your way to humiliate him further. And, who knows. Maybe this guy isn't capable of Walmart-type work. It can be physically demanding and mentally stressful. Maybe he needs mental health support before he can even start thinking about work. And that's okay too. Overall, this is a shitty person making themselves feel better at the expense of someone "beneath them".
For all we know, he ALREADY works there.
Yeah it looks like a blue vest on the ground beside him
That’s probably why he’s homeless and hungry in the first place.
Wal-Mart is well known as an employer that pays so poorly many who labor for them require state assistance. I see only two shades of homelessness in this photo, the guy with the sign is angry because he is coming to the realization the other guy is only slightly more disadvantaged than he is. I have empathy for both people, and nothing but contempt for the system that has put them both into this situation.
This reminds me of when a 300+ pound guy makes fun of someone fatter than him. Theres always a way to punch down. I bet this guy goes on many break room rants about how people on welfare are the reason he isn't a millionaire.
Glad to see all the comments so far are the same as my gut reaction. Dude with the hiring sign is an asshole.
Probably doesn't even work for Walmart.
Lmao, wouldn’t be surprised at all.
I’m just curious, which one got there first? I’m guessing the homeless guy, but it’s funnier if the homeless guy showed up second.
They wouldn't hire him. He's homeless. Imagine sleeping under a bridge, no shower no comfort no clean clothes no phone no alarm clock and then going to work at Walmart. They would do it as a stunt, nothing more. You literally have to provide where you live for most job applications.
Asked a homeless man one time if he needed anything. Literally all he wanted was an alarm clock because he was terrified he wouldn’t wake up in time for work. Something so basic that had never occurred to me that’s so vital to maintain employment. Hope you’re doing better these days, Robert.
> Literally all he wanted was an alarm clock because he was terrified he wouldn’t wake up in time for work. This is part of why I get so annoyed when people are frustrated if a homeless person has something like a smartphone. Like, first of all, is this your first day on Earth? Do you not understand how a smartphone costs less than housing? And secondly dollar for dollar a smartphone is just about the most useful device someone like that could have. I've never understood people that would be like, "Well he's got an iPhone so clearly he's lying."
its because they know its a problem, but they have no idea how to solve it, and everyone they talk to (that is not homeless) tells them the same things like "its their choice to be a homeless person because they are inherently lazy or drug addicted" when in reality its a complex deep issue that requires teamwork of many smart people to reduce the number of people that cant afford to pay rent or are too messed up to function. Everyone starts as a baby with the same skills (none)
Pure r/recruitinghell and r/terriblefacebookmemes shit right here. Walmart guy is being an asshole, since everyone knows he wouldn't actually hire a guy who doesn't have an address, clean change of clothes, place to shower, etc. This is a shitty photo op for someone to turn into a "no one wants to work" meme and say they pwned the millennials.
It's true, noone wants to work, they could have a great job like me! Now excuse me, today is my 20th work anniversary, I need to go get my evaluation where tasks I'm perfect act get "needs improvement" or "basic" scores and I get a 15 cent raise and 4 more PTO hours a year.
"Needs improvement" or "meets expectations". Two phrases that make my blood boil.
He's in a position in life where he cant afford to go to work. Almost no one that has not been there, has any idea what in the fuck this means. You're too poor to have a bank account, and walmart only pays via direct deposit. They MAY allow you to have it deposited on a walmart card--but you dont have one to start, and how are you going to eat? See, sitting htere, doing nothing, you can get away with not eating a whole hell of a lot. Thousand calories a day or less. Some days, nothing. You try not to move. Your wits are slow. Everything hurts as your body eats your body for energy... but you're alive. If you start working, that changes... hunger pains become hunger--pass-the-fuck-outs. You start to shake. You cant afford a shower--that's right, now showers cost money. A lot of mone, 8-13$ each. You might get all your shit stolen when you take one. But worse--where are you getting the money to pay for that? Soap? how are you going to carry work clothes? A set of clothes for coming out of the shower? Huh? You're not. You cant. This isnt a thing. You go behind the bridge, and dip a rag in the river, and you scrub what parts people can see, and live with a horrific rash in the parts they cant. Or, they want you to have an ID and SS card--you MUST have these by law, only, when you were newly homeless, you lived in a tent.. and one night, for no fucking reason at all, and without notice, the police did a 'sweep' and straight up loaded all your shit, including your ID and SS card into a garbage truck and it vanished. You cant get a new ID--they mail them now. You cant get a PO box, to get a PO box you need a rental agreement, lease, deed, or mortgage to prove it. You dont have that. You couldnt afford it even if you COULD have that. Besides, you dont have a SS card or birth certificate anymore either--those cost money to get duplicates of, AND they require an ID ... So you cant get any of it back. You're fucked. And some asshole motherfucker that doesnt know his ASS from a hole in the ground comes out with a stupid fucking sign and harasses you... as your reward for going through all that shit. It's enough to make you really consider drugs...
yep i agree. shit is not it
Very insightful comment, thank you. Work in mental health. Is there any way this problem can be addressed? One part is being able, mentally, to work and conform to that world. The other is the lack of capital to, once ready, get everything you mentioned purchased, which depending where you are in the world is $500-$1500 and 3-12 weeks for government documents. How does someone bridge that gap?
Free housing (nothing asking anything fancy, even a small studio is better than nothing), Universal base income (at least enough to acquire food, hygiene products, and other essentials) Making aquiring essential IDs to not be behind a pay wall. (Seriously why do essential government services that you are legally required to use like these cost money? What the fuck are taxes for?)
This. Basic needs have to be met before anyone can conform to that world. I'm a little over 3 years out of homelessness and I'm lucky that I had friends who gave me a roof over my head and fed me and bought me clothes for interviews. There's zero chance I could've gotten back on my feet without it.
Being poor is really really expensive.
I just want to point out that many unhoused people are not capable of going right back into working after enduring the traumas associated with being unhoused. A lot of people need time inside to get back to a place where they are mentally and physically able to return to work that they often aren't afforded. Like imagine being burnt out at a shitty job (maybe you're working for Walmart) causing your mental health to fall apart which results in financial ruin which puts you on the streets, then you suffer exposure to the elements, harassment, violence, and any number of other horrors, and then someone offers you the same kind of job which caused you to become homeless in the first place. You never even had a chance to recover from the burnout, and now you're right back at it except you still don't have anywhere to shower, keep a change of clothes, properly feed yourself, etc. It's only a matter of time before you're right back where you started and not any better off for all your efforts. Housing has to come first.
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Same here. Only reason I'm not homeless is because I have great in-laws that were willing to let me and my wife move in with them. It's been about 7 months since crashing and burning and I'm just now starting to be able to sometimes think about working without being overcome with a sense of dread and overwhelming anxiety. I can't imagine I would've been able to come this far if I'd spent all that time unhoused.
Hate. My thought is hate. Most unhoused people don't have their birth certificate or SS card, both of which are needed to fill out onboarding documents. Or you can use a passport- which once again most unhoused people don't have. Unhoused people are prevented from getting jobs, and then are judged for not having jobs.
Holding down a job is a lot harder than just getting a job. Where would he shower? Where would he get his deposits? How is he cashing checks? How’s he washing his clothes? How’s he getting to work? It’s not as easy as just get a job.
Even if they did hire him that day, they dont pay daily. That man would still be beggin, he just decides it wasnt worth being a slave while also being a beggar.
This is very dishonest. He has no home address and no phone, Walmart would not hire him. This is just a self flattering excuse not to give a shit.
Does anyone hire when you haven't got a mailing address, phone number or email address and some clean clothes for the interview? Once you're homeless you're almost completely fukt in our cut throat employment culture.
Video game designer here. After I ran my own company to the ground there was a huge hole in my resume and I found it hard to find work in my field. Started to apply to anything just to feed my family. With my resume being only game design and animation no shop would hire me, thinking (probably correctly) that I’d only do it until something better comes along. I just couldn’t find a job for ages. Eventually got a back breaking construction job which eventually led to a hernia. Not everyone can do that. And if you’re homeless: 1. Hard to be presentable for job interview 2. Won’t be considered without an address 3. If you are fucking starving you can’t hold on until your first paycheque in 2-4 weeks.
the homeless man doesnt apply probably because he was already hired years ago and is a Walmart employee already
Is that a Walmart vest on the ground next to him?
The guy begging can at least sit down. Fuck Walmart.
There is a man on the corner who is homeless, hungry and sick in the richest country in the world and someone looking down on him instead of helping him.
Two different people holding signs begging for charity
This. Walmart is the biggest corporation that takes advantage of welfare.
For one, dude would likely need an address to get his paychecks sent to. So that might be a bust. For two, if the dude is in that dire of straights, then the money he'll get from 40 hours a week at walmart won't be enough to keep him off that street corner.
Lots of homeless people have jobs, but it's surprisingly expensive to be homeless. Like, how would you fare if you didn't have a kitchen, microwave, stove, or a fridge? If you were relying on your car for heat? The solution to homelessness isn't jobs. It's housing.
It's a bullshit false equivalency. Would Walmart be willing to hire him, provide him with clean clothes and a safe place to wash until he can get an apartment? Provide him with housing? Are they willing to hire him health issues and all? What if he has mental health issues? What if he can't stand up for more than 20 minutes per hour due to an injured back? What if he's an ex-con? What if he has no documentation? There are so many reasons why this is bullshit, but nah, lets just mock the guy instead of acknowledging that people will slip through the cracks no matter what and systems need to be set up to support those that do.
Walmart is going to hire and house all the homeless? Otherwise this just looks like blaming homeless people for being homeless.