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The author answers that question with this:

  In 2010, Jim Rankin, a reporter for The Toronto Star, asked
  himself the same question. So he handed out five $50 prepaid
  Visa and MasterCard gift cards to panhandlers. What did they
  buy? Mostly food. Some phone minutes and clothes. A couple
  bought liquor as well.

By and large, people know what's best for themselves. Some will waste it, but most will put the cash to good use.

Waste can't be completely eliminated, and giving the cash to an organization also doesn't eliminate waste.

Well...of course. Heroin dealers don't take Visa cards, so you wouldn't see a line item for drugs on a Visa bill. You also wouldn't see that the prepaid card had been exchanged for cash at a discount to someone that actually wanted food.

Heroin dealers don't take Visa cards, but liquor stores do.

Have you heard of this great app called Square Register?

I have no opinion on the matter at hand, however I do have an opinion making ANY conclusions on a sample size of n=5...

Even a sample size of 5 allows us to reject some claims. Consider claim - "this die is fair". If it comes up a six 5 times out of 5, we're justified in being suspicious.

Thirteen bits suspicious.

... scratch that. Closer to ten bits, since the first throw isn't suspicious, assuming we had no reason to privilege 6 coming in.

Well sure, your example here is objective based on pure numbers. Statistically there is much less than a fraction of a percent of that occurring by chance alone, so being suspicious is absolutely justified.

But a dice is the antithesis of human behavior. The example I was talking about was almost completely subjective in nature and with 5 samples from an (assumingly) untrained observer (given he/she was a reporter, not a clinical researcher) leads to a whole lot of observation/experimenter bias.

So while my original if n=5, reject may not have been 100% accurate, in the case of human behavioral analyses, I stand by it.

There have actually been a few experiments of various kinds, and they've all (to my knowledge) showed somewhere between little positive effect and significant positive effect.

i think the fact that the people are homeless and in need of help means they probably don't know whats best for themselves

> I would not be surprised if, due to the disparity in the overall wealth of the two places, homeless people in New York skewed much more into the latter group than homeless people in Liberia.

I would. Mainly because Liberia, from 1989 to 1996, was in the middle of a civil war that claimed the lives of 200,000 and displaced millions more into refugee camps. Liberia has been the center of coup and counter-coup and counter-counter-coup since 1980. I would be extraordinarily surprised if the incidence of PTSD and disabilities from trauma were lower there than they are here.

And given that neither USA nor Liberia have significant mental health facilities for those without the means to obtain it (we just dump them in jail), I doubt the incidence of other mental illness, as a percentage of population, are any different.

But one would expect the opportunity available in a worn-torn country to be lower as well.

Didn't you read the latest news on war? Apparently, they claim that a lack of it makes the economy stagnate. </no_kidding_they_really_said_that>

Not that I'm inclined to agree with the war-as-a-business-model approach to economics, but there are a number of very significant differences between paying for a war against an opponent who can scarcely afford to retaliate and having your own country turned into a war zone. Even people who benefit from the former are unlikely to be in favor of the latter. Having a lot of the national currency of a pile of rubble is not a very good place to be in the grand scheme of things

You understood his point backwards.

He's not saying there are more people with mental health issues in NY, but rather than there are more homeless people for other reasons (i.e. economic) in Liberia.

Most homeless, even here in NY, aren't homeless because they are mentally ill. Most of the chronically (decade+) homeless are.

Most homeless here in the states are transitionally homeless - usually for less than a month. Usually they're families, homeless for economic reasons. I'd be willing to wager that the ratio of mentally ill (I consider alcoholism and drug addiction to be mental illnesses) homeless to economically homeless are similar in both countries.

Came here to say this -- thought, I wonder how much our view of the homeless in America is skewed by the "visible homeless" we see, day to day, living on the streets.

Anecdotally, an overwhelming number of the "visible homeless" in America have mental illness or at least behave in a unemployable manner.

I imagine there is another (larger?) slice of homeless that live in shelters/elsewhere and are less obvious and could function "normally" in society given the means.

Yes, the larger slice of homeless is usually invisible. It typically includes families. And they're typically homeless for less than a year.

The 'visible' homeless are typically chronically homeless, and have been for decades.

I think the important bit the article was trying to press is really, more [citation needed] less stereotype. "I would not be surprised" is your assumption of the situation, either way it's worth exploring and researching.

You also touch on another important topic, which is mental health is also sorely needed for many people. It is very expensive, not widely available and essential to those who are suffering with those type of illnesses. Especially if they do not realize it.

Right. Many Americans that have never been poor or spent any time with poor people have strong moralistic assumptions about poor people due to decades of anti-welfare political propaganda.

The rich and poor in Liberia are the same race. The rich and poor in the USA have a strong racial component, and its politically correct to act racist as long as you don't speak racist. So saying the (insert color) man cannot participate in our white man's economy isn't going to fly, but applying that same attitude toward poor people who just coincidentally happen to be people of color is perfectly OK.

Its the same deal with disinterest in the prison industrial complex. 1/4 of all black men in or have been in prison, well... lots of people not seeing a problem with that. If the demographics inside and outside prison were (at least racially) identical, lots of people would have a problem with "the system" as it is. But as long as its a Black problem... no problemo (if you're not Black, anyway)

Race can correlate strongly to culture. Culture can get you put in prison. Its more complicated than 'black and white'

That is very true, yes. And if you think the middle class like the lower class, talk to someone of the opposite political persuasion for awhile. The opposite party view will clear the mind of preconceptions and rationalizations which prevent seeing the same attitude in members of your own party.

(edited to add, and needless to say the example of middle vs lower doesn't mean any of the other classes like any other class very much)

http://www.cnn.com/2014/02/05/us/texas-affluenza-teen/

What kind of culture are you talking about? The culture of being friends and neighbors with the police officers and politicians who can shield you and your children from the consequences of their actions?

Sure among other things. The race card is often played erroneously in argument when economic status, language, dialect or social connection are more correct.

AFAIK the black homeless population is barely larger than the white homeless population. Black people are disproportionately represented, but I don't think that homelessness is widely considered a "black problem." The homeless people that one is likely to meet are not significantly more likely to be black than white.

That might actually be caused among other things by a higher representation of African-Americans in the US military. Turns out, being a US soldier can have all sorts of health consequences...

I doubt it. I'd say having cities and large neighbourhoods that are effectively no-go zones for well-adjusted families has more to do with it. These are literal and figurative breeding grounds for anti-social behaviour.

I'd bet there is a stronger correlation between homelessness and incarceration rates. Incarceration in this country is very racially biased and it can be very difficult for ex-cons to find decent jobs that keep them off the streets. A lot of them end up with the choice to either be homeless or reoffend.

It's always a shock to me to see how many visibly homeless black people there are in SF, when I visit. The homeless I see in my daily life in Toronto are almost all white-ish or First Nations.

So, while I'm not arguing about the absolute number, it's the proportion that affects my perceptions. Frankly, it's demoralizing.

There are different ethnicities within Africa and Liberia is hardly devoid of ethnic differences that correspond to economic prosperity, like everywhere else.