The Germans have figured out a great way to get the homeless off the street for a few hours and put them to work at the same time. Pay them with beer and smokes to clean up the streets. Genius!!!!
German officials say that alcoholics often wind up on the streets as a result of their addiction and they wanted to figure out a way to put them to work and help them earn a few bucks while doing it. Of course, you usually don't want to pay a drunk with more booze but chances are if they know they're getting some free liquor they'll work their ass off. A similar idea was enacted in Holland recently and residents complained that they were exploiting the homeless for cheap labor while contributing to their addiction. As you can imagine none of the bums were complaining.
The chairman of "Homeless Support" Ruhr and Lower Rhine, Sabine Zschaler claim
"It would be nice if we could give the homeless a bit of their dignity back, when they're already at rock bottom... But that's not going to happen if we pay them with beer."
However project managers Suchthilfe Direkt said the idea behind the scheme was to stop drinkers turning to harder stuff or drugs and would also help them remain in contact with health teams and social workers. Co-ordinator Baerbel Marrziniak said, "We want to use these incentives to bring back a routine for these people and provide additional care at our facilities."
The homeless would be cleaning up the train station in the industrial city of Essen.
International Business Times has the story
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