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Homeless, Unemployed, and Surviving On Bitcoins
An anonymous reader writes "Wired profiles a homeless man who's supporting himself primarily through Bitcoin. Jesse Angle, a former network engineer, earns small amounts throughout the day by visiting various websites that pay him to look at ads. He then converts it to gift certificates and uses the certificates to buy food. '"It's a lot less embarrassing," he says. "You don't have to put yourself out there." And unlike panhandling in Pensacola, using an app like Bitcoin Tapper won't put him on the wrong side of the law. This past May, Pensacola — where Angle has lived since April — passed an ordinance that bans not only panhandling but camping on city property.' Angle learned about Bitcoin from a charity organization called Sean's Outpost that wanted something better than PayPal for accepting donations over the internet. The organization has even opened an outreach center paid for solely with Bitcoins. Founder Jason King said, 'Bitcoin beats the s#!% out of regular money, We've resonated so well with people because it's direct action. There's no chaff between donation and helping people.'"
Have you compared the price of those energy drinks with a bag of apples or coffee?
I wouldn't call coffee nutritious in any way, but I know that I can get about 5 pounds of bananas, 1 pound of beans, or 2 pounds of rice for the price of one of those "energy drinks".
I don't respond to AC's.
With proper mental health care, a great deal of those people could be medicated, counseled and otherwise treated to the point where they could become contributing members of society, and the ones that are too far gone for that, could be off the streets and getting proper care somewhere.
We have free/public health care in Canada, as well as public drug plans like the Trillium plan here in Ontario, which can offer up to 100% drug coverage depending on your income level. We still have homeless people with mental illness. We probably have less than in the US, but you can only help people who want to be helped, and some people will always choose to live on the street. (some people will end up there because they don't realize they have a choice, but that is a different discussion entirely)