"A panhandler outside Grand Central Terminal says he rakes in up to $200 an hour from kind-hearted New Yorkers."

It might be the dog and it might be the location (Grand Central):

“People are more generous because I have a dog, 100 percent. They throw me a dollar and say, ‘That’s for the dog,’ ’’ Andersen said...

Another beggar, working the northeast corner of West 35th Street and Seventh Avenue near Penn Station, said that just like everything else in the city, it’s all about location for vagrants. “There are other spots where people get hundred-dollar bills. I could go over to Fifth Avenue and make $150 before lunch.... But I don’t want to deal with the hassle,’’ he said. “There’s people that bully you to get out of the good spots.’’

By the way, the headline uses the word "bum"...



... which we were just talking about in connection with Halloween costumes. I'd said that circa 1960 the go-to costumes were "bum and gypsy." I used the word "bum" (and "gypsy") because those were the words back then, not that I hadn't moved on to more respectful terminology. I got some (comic) pushback in the comments: "Hey, hey, hey, I'm gonna need a trigger warning if you're gonna use words like bum and gypsy."

The Post is using the word "bum" to rile readers, but I think "bum" is the wrong would for a person who is engaged in remunerative labor. You may disapprove of his money-making scheme, but he's not a bum. He's a beggar. But if you think "beggar" is too mean, I would call him a Provider of Charity Opportunities.

Or is "bum" the best word? The verb "to bum" can mean to beg, as in "He looked so immaculately frightful/As he bummed a cigarette/Then he went off sniffing drainpipes/And reciting the alphabet...."

"Pedestrian Fast Lanes. Why the Heck Not?"

Because it wouldn't work, but still...

... a New Yorker’s heart leaps at the possibilities. Imagine using these to give locals a way around and through Times Square. You could bypass the tourist sidewalk hoggers, the smartphone starers, the matinee meanderers, the leafletters and hawkers, the desnudas with their oglers, the Elmos and Minions and all the other human and humanoid boulders that make the crossings choppy and all but impassable at the Crossroads of the World.

Hey, "New Yorker." The New York fast lane is stay the fuck out of Times Square. And what's up with "heart leaps"?! If you have a heart that leaps, don't try to palm yourself off as a New Yorker.

And I'm speaking as someone who lived in NYC for more than 10 years and who has been literally punched for stopping to look at a map on Park Avenue.