cardboard technician
n.— «The first thing you should know about David is that he is not a panhandler. He was quick to explain the difference to me. “Panhandlers are those guys you see milling around the 7-Eleven shaking their cups at you.” David calls himself and his comrades “sign flyers,” because “the sign does the talking and [his] feet does the walking.”…For example, sign flyers are also known as cardboard technicians.» —“Beggars can be choosers” by Dina Chaiffetz Denver Post (Colorado) Aug. 5, 2007. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
Samantha Harvey’s novel Orbital is a sensuous, exhilarating meditation about the strangeness of life on a space station, with its mix of tedious tasks and jaw-dropping views. And: a musician who rode the rails in his youth shares the slang he...
Steve, a singer-songwriter from Rock Springs, Wyoming, shares some slang he picked up while months riding the rails and busking. Spanging refers to panhandling, from asking for “spare change.” The term bull refers to a type of security...