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Professional beggars earn more than some white-collar workers: report

By Yin Xiaohong (People's Daily Online)    14:57, October 21, 2016

So-called professional beggars in Taian, Shandong province can earn around 7,000 RMB in a month, enough that they can afford to live in small hotels near the railway station. This revelation is only one that has come from investigations and interviews done by local journalists.

Employees from local relief stations said that most of the beggars in Taian's streets are “professionals,” refusing help from the relief stations for fear of losing their real daily income. The methods used by these beggars are various. Some pretend to wash cars in traffic for tips; some display physical maladies; some dress up as indigent students or unlucky backpackers.

These cases are not limited to Shandong province. Many big cities in China face a similar issue. Traffic police in Shanghai have dealt with 5,158 cases of people begging in the subway since the beginning of 2016. A formal system has been established in Shanghai to regulate professional beggars, including constant patrolling and registering homeless people. These efforts are an attempt to separate those beggars really in need of help from the ones who exploit people’s sympathy.

Professional beggars not only harm the image of a city, they also disrupt social order. Harbin's local government established a campaign in October to regulate the behavior, dispatching patrollers to ask professional beggars to vacate public spaces. 

(For the latest China news, Please follow People's Daily on Twitter and Facebook)(Web editor: Hongyu, Bianji)

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