I think about buying an extra package or two of socks, t-shirts, towels or whatever, at CostCo specifically to donate to homeless shelters, but never seem to follow through. Someday, maybe.

It's much easier, for both you and the shelter, to just call them up and ask where you can mail a check. The people who run the shelter and interact with the homeless on the daily are going to know much better what they need. Same goes for food banks.

Wife worked for an organization that helps homeless veterans. I know for a fact that no homeless shelter will turn down free socks.

Also, perhaps in part due to my wife's former job, I resist donating money directly to some organizations. Waste is a thing. I prefer (in my dreams) to help more directly.

Why would they ever turn down free socks?

It certainly is. Entire books have been written about the environmental disaster of secondhand clothing, coming mainly from the US, flooding the entire world and ending up accumulating on beaches and landfills in 3rd world countries. Of course most of it is polyester that takes forever to biodegrade. There's essentially no one left on earth who doesn't have access to free or dirt cheap clothing. Organizations that take clothing donations can't get rid of clothes fast enough and most of it ends up being thrown away.

If directness is your goal, it's probably best to ask a homeless person what their most immediate needs are and get it for them.

A homeless person most needs a home.

If only our society would truly focus on that.

It's hard to help people where I live, if you buy and give them even small packs of food, clothes, hygiene items... they trade it for cash or drugs.

My employer started offering a free virtual pet vet program called Airvet, starting this year. When we enrolled in November, we couldn't sign up yet because the start date was Jan 1.

I downloaded the app and forgot about it until today, when I noticed a bill from Air vet. I signed up and then made sure to let my cowowrkers know the service is active and available for use. Many of them have pets and I figured this might be helpful for them.

About half of the time I go to my local grocery store there will be someone out front begging for money. Sometimes I recognize them, sometimes not. I rarely carry cash on me so I try to grab something for them to eat. I'm usually buying fruit of some sort so I'll get an extra few bananas or apples, for instance.

It's such a minor effort on my part, literally an extra $0.50-$1.00 worth of stuff that I'm already buying, but sometimes their reaction makes it clear that it means a lot to them. I'm as jaded as the next guy, probably more so than most, but I get pretty mad thinking about how 500 people might walk by these folks who are clearly suffering and 99% of them can't be bothered to do jack ****.

I'm glad you can do that, I've done that here and seen people immediately trade a close package of food or anything for money, then money for booze, and if you open the food package (so that they can't sell it) they reject it.

Unfortunately it’s more complicated than that. If we gave every homeless person a home, a significant portion would lose them because of other demons they’re grappling with.

In general I prefer to ask what they want from the grocery store - it's not that I'm against drugs so much as that if I'm giving money, I want it to be for food, so I'll ask them what they want and just buy it for them. If you don't want to stop and chat to them on top, this is a great way to remind the homeless that they're human - having money thrown at you by someone not even looking you in the eye and then walking on might help survival but, can make you feel less than human.

If a bum can turn a banana or two into some booze, more power to him. He'd make a great business man.

For sure I know that my gesture is tiny (which is why it's in this thread) and I don't delude myself into thinking I'm saving anyone or making a great sacrifice. Maybe they'd rather I give them $1 than a few bananas, I dunno.

All you need is banana, sugar, some kitchen equipment & space & time and you can make apparently delicious banana wine. I'd bet some enterprising unhoused have turned that into a business somewhere

I think the key word in that sentence is "apparently."

In my 20s I hated pennies as I spent my teens collecting them and had one of those giant popcorn tins full of them so I would take my pennies and toss them on the ground hoping to make some 8 year old's day when he found his new lucky penny.