How much does a beggar in Bangalore makes in an year?
Question
This is one of the best guesstimate question I have ever heard of in an interview.
Guess the salary of a beggar.
Think a lot, take some time and come up with different cuts on which you will calculate the numbers
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Guesstimate
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Grand Master 0
Answers ( 11 )
1. The income of a beggar will depend largely upon what is his location of begging, as in if it a pilgrimage or traffic signal or in colonies.
2. If it is a traffic signal then how rushed is it, what is the stop time, what is an average income of people mostly crossing that signal everyday.
3. How many other beggars are there.
4. On an average what he gets more as in coins or big denomination notes, may be less people entertain him but they do give him more
1.Depends on which location that person is begging
2. Depends on how many people do come by.
3. how is the place is, if its very much posh then chances are less for money as guards do push aside those beggars.
The annual income of a beggar in Bangalore would be the average footfall in the location where he begs( like a traffic signal,religious place/transportation hub)*(avg percentage of people who give him money)*(avg money given)* No. of days that he begs in a year
Following factor will influence the amount that the beggar makes in Bangalore will be:
1) Locality at which the beggar used to sit like temples, traffic signals, stalls of cigarettes’ etc near the business complexes,
2) Attitude of people at the location of beggar
3) Attire of the beggar
4) Age of the beggar as old age or children are more likely to give the money
5) Convincing power of the beggar as if beggar who begs multiple times to is more likely to get a beg than those who just beg for once to the same person.
6) Number of people visiting at the location of beggar
7) Status of the locality
8) Number of other beggars at his place
Consider a beggar staying at Mumbai City
He begs all throughout the day.
So 6-11 am, where people travel to offices and other
Work places during this time say our working force is in age grp of 25-60 yrs which is around 50-60% of population 1.25 cr which is 60cr.
Weekends are compensated by considering the same amount of money which they get 6-11am at weekdays
Assuming that beggars are successfull in begging at 1% rate. Then it’s 60 lakhs.
There would be around 25k beggars in the city. So each beggar would get Rs 240. If some pay them more money it would reach to 300 per day
Consider a beggar staying at Mumbai City
He begs all throughout the day.
So 6-11 am, where people travel to offices and other
Work places during this time say our working force is in age grp of 25-60 yrs which is around 50-60% of population 1.25 cr which is 0.6cr.
Weekends are compensated by considering the same amount of money which they get 6-11am at weekdays
Assuming that beggars are successfull in begging at 10% rate. Then it’s 6 lakhs. Some would pay 10rs as well. On avg of we take 3rs considering all dimensions. It would be 18 lakhs.
In the evening 6pm – 11pm it would be again 18 lakhs
There would be around 25k beggars in the city. So each beggar would get Rs 180-200 per day
A few clarifying questions-
1. What is his/her location or area in Bangalore?
2. Does he/she beg only in that particular area, or does that change on a daily/monthly basis?
3. How many hours in a day is he/she at that location?
To probe deeper, let us first look at a typical day-
1. On weekdays, being office days, traffic would be more at traffic signals, hence more income (safe assumption).
2. On weekends, traffic would be more near marketplace areas.
3. Weather would also affect income. Hours outside will lessen in summers (not a problem in Bengaluru, hence safely discarding the assumption). Rains would affect the number of hours during monsoons.
Let us try to get at a number on a daily basis as per location and then scale it for different months, as per weather.
(Average number of hours the beggar is available for begging in a day) * (Average footfall at the location for the hours he is begging) * (average proportion of people who give him money) * (average amount of money given by a person) * (number of days the beggar begs in a month)
Following factor will influence the amount that the beggar makes in Bangalore will be:
1) Locality at which the beggar used to sit like temples, traffic signals, stalls of cigarettes’ etc near the business complexes,
2) Attitude of people at the location of beggar
3) Attire of the beggar
4) Age of the beggar as old age or children are more likely to give the money
5) Convincing power of the beggar as if beggar who begs multiple times to is more likely to get a beg than those who just beg for once to the same person.
6) Number of people visiting at the location of beggar
7) Status of the locality
8) Number of other beggars at his place
9) physical appearance
10) handicap
I don’t know why so many people are trying to use some formulas as if they’re gonna tell the exact amount. Firstly the interviewer will never be interested in that. And most importantly these are just guesstimate problems (also mentioned with problem)where you have try find a estimate by guessing some numbers. I can see an answer by sree harsha which is infact a very good approach for such a problem in an interview. But for sure deriving some formulas never going to help.
Well for this i would consider following parameters.
1) Population of Banglore
2) Emotional appeal of a beggar
3) Amount of money generally given to beggar
4) Area where beggar is begging
5) Footfall of that particular area
6) Timmings: like peak hours, also weekdays vs weekends, festivals, holidays etc.
7) Lastly, number of beggars in total in banglore.