-Submitted by David Drumm (Nal), Guest Blogger
The Food Stamp program, now called the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), is a target for Republicans who voted to cut $40 billion from the program. The reasons that Republicans have given are so divorced from reality that one can reasonably suspect their true motivations lie elsewhere. The primacy of fantasy in the GOP has been recently evidenced by Michele Bachmann who sees signs of the End Times, a wished-for global apocalypse.
First up on the list of fantasies is by Rep. Rick Crawford (R-Arkansas) who said “the food stamp program [grew] exponentially because the government continues to turn a blind eye to a system fraught with abuse.” In reality, SNAP participation closely tracks the long term unemployment rate, prolonged by Republicans. The sale of SNAP benefits for cash, called “trafficking,” has been cut to $1 in every $100 of SNAP benefits. The reality is a one percent abuse rate, the fantasy is SNAP is “fraught” with abuse.
The next fantasy is that able-bodied people are getting food stamps instead of working. The reality is that 83% of all SNAP benefits go to households that include a child, an elderly person, or a disabled person. The average individual gets $133 a month in SNAP benefits. It is ridiculous to imagine that a person is going to quit their job for $133 a month that can only be spent on food, but Republicans bear ridicule well.
The next fantasy is that SNAP recipients use their benefits to buy cigarettes and alcohol. The SNAP program uses Electronic Benefits Transfer (EBT) cards, similar to debit cards, that can be used in the supermarket checkout line only to purchase food. The Right likes to point to Jackie Whiton, a Peterborough, New Hampshire, store cashier who declined to accept an EBT card as payment for a pack of cigarettes. In reality, the EBT card contained state assistance money, not SNAP benefits, which can be used to purchase tobacco products. The store she worked for has a policy of accepting EBT cash benefits. In reality, Whiton was fired for violating the company’s policies.
The Republican war on programs that benefit Americans in need isn’t based on a philosophical commitment to small government. If it were, the $20 billion in farm subsidies, a welfare program for agribusiness, would be near the top of their hit list. According to a Greenberg report, the Republicans “are very conscious of being white in a country that is increasingly minority.” The report goes on to say that the “race issue [is] very much alive.” There you have it. Obama is taking their money and giving it to “Those People.”
H/T: Dave Johnson, Paul Krugman, Dottie Rosenbaum, Amanda Marcotte, Brian Tashman, WMUR.
The subsidy of the food industry and big ag has a lot of moving parts and food stamps are only one of them. If you saw ‘Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution season 2 you saw another. He was trying to get a school district in California to go back to cooking food for kids, healthy stuff instead of prepackaged meals.
At one point he was in a food warehouse with a member of the school board and a school official and they explained that they ordered their food warehouses just like that one. They had to order a school year in advance to take advantage of the government program that subsidized school food.
The warehouse was filled with frozen food- just like the stuff in regular stores. There were other kinds of foodstuffs in other warehouses. When he asked about the prices they turned out to be extremely cheap. It was explained that the federal government subsidized the the food at a discount from the manufactures and then the school system paid a small price to the manufacturer. It was literally too cheap to pass up. It did take a long lead time though so any change to the system by a district was very difficult, they were on the hook for what they ordered a school year in advance. They were bound to cheap, not particularly healthy food by the government subsidies but it fit the state school food budget. This is how it’s done all over the country.
This is a direct subsidy to the food industry and an indirect subsidy to agriculture.
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A couple of years ago I saw a documentary on corn, its production and uses. It was on my local PBS station. It tracked one of the documentary makers leasing an acre of corn farmland from a corn farmer and then buying the seeds and attendant support materials, planting, growing and harvesting the corn under the tutelage of the farm owner.
The takeaway was this: there were many different kinds of federal subsidies that came into play, at almost every step of the process and they were they were scaleable -one acre or 10 hectares didn’t matter and no one can grow corn at a profit without the subsidies. The big determining factor on how much corn to plant is the size of the subsidies and attendant costs like gasoline prices to run the farm implements etc. etc. The farmer didn’t know the government’s formula for the various subsidies. That corn is sold domestically and to foreign buyers, is turned into fuel, feeds our meat production, and is also turned into HFCS which is ubiquitous in food.
So, this was just a couple of windows into food production, manufacture and sale in the US. Agriculture, food production/manufacture, and distribution is subsidized out the yin-yang and keeps corn production at least from collapsing totally. I doubt corn is unique and I doubt that the US is alone in food subsidies. America has basically destroyed small farming of corn (and beans I also read) in Mexico with an export treaty, another subsidy that has heavy immigration implications.
To complain about food assistance programs for the poor in the US on the basis of some hidden assistance to big ag is ridiculous. We are all buying food that is heavily subsidized by the government, we probably couldn’t afford to eat if it wasn’t. I have a mental fit every time I go to the grocery store and get the bill but I’m always aware that without the web of subsidies which each of us contribute to when we pay our taxes and pay full price (?) at the checkout, we probably couldn’t eat as much or as well. SNAP isn’t even on the radar as a subsidy. That is a specious reason to be against SNAP.
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2011/02/01/107871/free-trade-us-corn-flows-south.html
Moving right along to the next link for SHANNON the know it all.
http://www.campaignforliberty.org/national-blog/foreign-aidcorproeate-welfare/
http://secular.org/blogs/herb-silverman/god%E2%80%99s-welfare-dilemma
Welfare battles in the U.S. usually focus on government social safety net programs like food stamps, unemployment insurance and Medicaid. Conservatives complain that the government transfers their hard-earned tax money to people allegedly unwilling to work, and many claim we should leave it to the church rather than the state to assist the truly needy. So it’s no coincidence that our poorest states are mainly in the Bible Belt. – See more at:
so tell me shannon who again is Moronic? i worked my axx off since the age of 16 and didnt have my first child until i was 22. i paid my taxes accordingly i was disabled in 2003 and i am today still fighting 10 years later to obtain the social security i paid my money into . my rent is 1600 a month for a 3bdrm apart what welfare program do you know is paying that much rent? and no i do not have section 8 nor do i live in nycha housing? i pay for electricity, gas and cable. so you’re damn right when i did finally qualify for food stamps i took them i earned that right with the sweat off of my back!!! can your daughter who by your own words is hanging out with the wrong crowd say the same thing? how do you feel about paying taxes for specialized military weaponry that is now being used to enslaved you? how about the fact that your taxes are used to give israel 4 billion dollars a year without fail yet we cant feed, house , or employ AMERICANS? and im not prejudice against all jewish people. or any non blacks.. BUT I AM DAMN SICK AND TIRED OF the lies told about us. we know the truth about our history even though a certain faction of people tried to destroy our history. and to this day continues to do it. because if the truth were to ever come out… ww3 wouldn’t be about a nwo.
Do i need to go on shannon? because its very easy to do!! its easy to pull up the articles of the rich who scammed the welfare program for medicaid, food stamps, and cash assistance. its also easy for me to prove the history of the moors/mu’urs and what the hatred and enslavement of blacks were truly about. sad to say but you’re of the faction of people who will continue to lie to yourself and anyone willing to listen to you so as to deny the truth. to deny who the real criminals are.
how about drug testing for all those people in the links i posted? especially the one below?:
Shall we continue this discussion of moronic? should we continue on the discussion of who commits the real fraud?
because we can shannon im more then willing to educate you and bring you up out of your state of ignorance…….
Then again the more i think about it, the more i realize people like you revel in your ignorance and bigotry it is how you define your existence on earth unfortunately for you.
you do realize @ michael that food pantries and soup kitches have been shut down and that was within the last few years. as for that arab store you’re talking about. i do know this much. if they are doing what you say. the inspectors will soon catch them and they will lose their ebt license.
as for the drugs. no need to go there those who know the truth know exactly who the real drug dealers are and their reasons for dumping them in the inner city. i live in nyc born and raised in brooklyn and now living in the bronx and i have to wonder if that much and kind of fraud was going on how so many supermarkets have managed to not only stay open but manage to employ so many to work for them??
RobinH, thanks for your input. It is apparent that you are a very angry hostile person. I have a right to my opinion as do you. Have a wonderful day.
RobinH,
Your comment above contained 4 links and so was caught in the WordPress spam filter. WordPress only allows 2 links per comment. I “rescued” your comment by deleting your last two links. They came after the two lines below. You can post those links in another comment.
“poorest states are mainly in the Bible Belt. – See more at:”
“how about drug testing for all those people in the links i posted? especially the one below?:”
Food stamps and drugs, hmmm. Just to be a contrarian I have to ask, so? People get drug money in high risk ways including theft and prostitution. If a nation has a drug problem and no effective way to deal with it except incarceration which is very expensive, is not the re-purposing of one program (say food stamps) to encompass one of the aspects of an effective drug control program (used in other countries) that amounts to providing drug users with the drugs, a bad thing? It lessens the need for high risk and socially disruptive behavior in securing the money for drugs. The more I think about it the less disturbed I am by the prospect of this conversion of assets.
1. i never said no one commits fraud. but shannon implies that everyone in a certain community does!!!!… she implies like the other bigots that a certain faction (blacks) dont work or pay their taxes.. WRONG ON BOTH POINTS. so to prove my point let me inform those who do no know. welfare was began for white women in the suburbs only. blacks paid their taxes like the rest but didnt qualify until the civil rights movement.
2. no one wants to be on welfare. they dont give you enough to survive but then you have those like shannon who love to believe that they do and that is all black people want is to live off of welfare. another lie told them thru their HISTORY to make them feel superior….
http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,156084,00.html
I am so tired of people like shannon who love to believe in the lies and attempt to blame everything on black and their crimes while ignoring and denying the crimes committed by non blacks. i’ve been reading and sporadically posting on this blog for quite a few years. some of you know why and i have made no secret but i dont remember seeing the name shannon but so many times and definitely not on the blogs concerning banking fraud, wall st fraud and other fraud, committed by non blacks..
WHY IS THAT?
http://www.breakpoint.org/commentaries/2045-middle-class-welfare
continued in next post as i dont want to overload this comment with to many links that prove shannon WRONG!!
I have not said everyone on SNAP abuses the benefit. I have not said abuse of this benefit was by any specific race or socio economic class. All I have pointed out is that their is room for improvement in order to decrease the misuse of the benefits that some people truly need and rely on. Maybe if it can be done by the person who overhauled New York, perhaps he is willing to work with other states. Calling people liars and bigots solves nothing whatsoever. There may not be an issue where you are from but as I read from these comments, there are issues in many states such as Florida, Ohio, Texas and possibly others. There are some truly mean spirited individuals on this blog, I shall pray for you as I leave for church. All I ask is that you open your eyes and look around you.
“Maybe if it can be done by the person who overhauled New York, perhaps he is willing to work with other states.”
Shannon,
If you are referring to me it was New York City, not NY State and I specifically said so. I also referenced the fact that my work on that was from 1997 to 1999. In the years that have passed since then the entire SNAP program has gone far beyond what I accomplished in tightening up the problem of Food Stamp Overpayment. Many people have supplied the more up to date statistics in their comments. My last comment referenced the fact that not only are the loss statistics low, but that they compare favorably with the efforts of private industry to prevent loss. However, you are basically ignoring the facts and dealing with some suppositions you have.
“I am the mother of 4 children and am raising my grand daughter (without help from the state or federal government) because her parents are drug addicts.”
As a Grandfather of three myself I commend the effort you are making with your granddaughter and understand what a hardship that must be, as well as a labor of love. However, the facts are that in the scheme of things anything you might have observed is not the general rule for the SNAP program and is really what one must expect from any venture where people are involved. People always find way to misuse things and steal. This has been true forever in the history of humanity.
Where you raise enmity here is in your maligning a program unfairly, that provides much needed assistance to people in distress. I say unfairly because you offer anecdotal evidence based on your observation of a very small sample. As for Michael Arm’s evidence I do believe it was errant conjecture and was tinged by certain words towards negative stereotypes. Your assertions, however, appeared more honest, but no less specious. As you o to church today it might be worthwhile for you to ponder on the moral meaning of “love thy neighbor as you would thyself” and the ill towards your neighbors that have come about by the attempts to destroy the SNAP program.
Mike,
I appreciate your comments. In no way do I want to eliminate this program however as someone else mentioned, stores requesting identification as they do when using credit cards may help. It is true that many Americans rely on this benefit…in fact, I am sure that people with addictions rely on this benefit as well. I just think that there should be a way to ensure it is used in a manner for which it is intended.
With that being said, there are many other areas of the government which have waste and abuse of our tax dollars. For instance, as a member of the military, my family and I were transferred every year to two years. Each move was across the country vice staying in the same region. Can you imagine how much it costs to transfer someone?
There are many many areas that could be tweaked which the average person who hasn’t lived it is woefully unaware of.
“There are many many areas that could be tweaked which the average person who hasn’t lived it is woefully unaware of.”
Shannon,
As someone in the military I’m sure that you have seen much waste. This past week on this blog there was reference to the U.S. buying cargo planes from Italy at the cost of many billion$. These planes were to be instantly put in storage since there was no use for them. At the same time you must be aware in the attempt to cut military health care and other benefits. Here’s the issue.
Our military budget is larger than the next 13 countries in the world’s combined. Yet our military personnel are neither well paid for their jobs, nor treated all that well after retirement. However, more than half of military spending goes to enrich the Defense Industry and or private contractors with political pull. A private contractor in Iraq sharing the same dangers as our troops was getting paid $100,000 per year. Our Defense budget is the major part of our government expense, yet no one seems to talk about “cutting the fat”, because both Party’s get campaign fund from defense contractors they are sending money to for hardware we don’t need. Instead when the issue of “bloated” government is raised the finger is always pointed to people least able to defend themselves.
I must admit to you that this makes me very angry. I worked for four decades dealing with poverty, old age issues, child abuse and drug addiction. I was on the “ground” in the “other America”, in the same way that only a soldier can appreciate being in a combat zone. I know the difference between the propaganda on TV and the reality of peoples lives. We Americans are truly being robbed, but the real crooks are not the little people, but the .01% who care only for their wealth and power.
Plus, in my town, they all drive around in new cars, with expensive stereo systems etc.
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how many lbs of hamburger does a nice pioneer with an LCD flip out screen run? do i have to get the good 93/7 or can i just get the 73/27?
“Plus, in my town, they all drive around in new cars, with expensive stereo systems etc.
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how many lbs of hamburger does a nice pioneer with an LCD flip out screen run? do i have to get the good 93/7 or can i just get the 73/27?”
Pete,
I’m sorry you’ll have to accept the 73/27. There is simply not enough dashboard space on the Porsche Carrera GT you exchanged for the broccoli.
@Mike Spindell, opinions are like a**holes, everybody has one.
Question, what do I gain for making up stuff?
I wonder just how honest you are being about what you do for a living if you can’t even relate to what I discussed.
This is common sense, well at least to me it is.
However, I grew up around it and even in my building, there are drug addicts on every single floor.
Trust me, i have better things to do then to make up things on a blog I never even been on before.
Sad there are people like you in the world that come off like a know it all but seem to lack common sense.
“Question, what do I gain for making up stuff?
I wonder just how honest you are being about what you do for a living if you can’t even relate to what I discussed.
This is common sense, well at least to me it is.”
Michael Arm,
For some people making stuff up makes them feel like they are smart. for others making stuff up is a way to justify their pre-judgments. People have all sorts of reasons for making stuff up on the internet. some even make up the names they use. I have no idea what you gain but your anecdotes sound suspicious to me especially in your use of adjectives like Arab stores. since I’ve also ran programs with drug addicts and have worked all my life in areas like yours, I’m well aware of what goes on. The idea that drug dealers became rich from food stamps or trading in them, seems absurd to me and absent anything more than just your guesses, I don’t believe them.
Actually, I can relate to what you discussed very well. I became disabled myself and almost died three years ago, so I know what it is like to be sick. As for whether you believe me or not this is my real name and I can be googled. Also since I’ve been around this blog for many years there are a lot of people who know my background. BTW, I rescues your comment from the spam file.
You spelled out “a**hole” and so WordPress automatically rejected it. I added the ** to make it acceptable so you would have your chance to attack me.
Michael Arm
Jeez. All that stuff at that drug bust and not a single pound of hamburger to be found.
I guess your drug dealer is a regular Rumplestilskin and turned all that ground beef into bikes and computers.
Somebody get Alan Greenspan on the line to tell him all about this new economy.
How does one blow smoke out the behind?
How come so many poor people in this world smoke tobacco?
I am studying suicide by tobacco to see if it can be exported to other planets so as to minimalize the populations there.
My comment to you Shannon has no reason at all to do with why are country is going to shit, maybe uncalled for, however, not so sure about that. Maybe up til now, I have lead a sheltered life, drugs and street names are from movies. And maybe I am just bitter, but it seems to me you could find someway to report it, and maybe I wouldn’t be so anxious too, considering those involved use street names… however I was just quite annoyed with your attitude that while “data” shows, the selling of food stamps isn’t so bad as an issue that expensive measures need be taken, that 98% of ppl receiving use them as intended, you claim they are wrong
Republicans feel very strongly that it is all right to punish the innocent, to get at the guilty.
I have no clue of the turn around they make selling heroin, but I am sure its huge profits if they can drive new cars and trading their drugs for food and hygiene products is actually saving them money, which further adds to their profits.
The last major drug house that was busted (a few years back) had hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of drugs in it as well as over 200k cash, a ton of foodstamp cards in a box and tons and tons of stolen goods, such as bikes, computers, etc.
Plus, not sure how true this is, but I have heard that the stolen hygiene products and such are sometimes sold to crooked Arab stores by the drug man.
They can then sell the items at reg price and there is no paper trail as they never even legally bought the stuff in the first place.
I was going to read all the comments first because I am sure someone has already (many ones I hope) come down in this Michael. Arabs? Only Arabs? Your prejudice and bigotry is showing. All drive big fancy cars? All? And Based on what you write you must be very intimately involved with the drug trade to have all this information. I’m working very hard to not make an ad hominem attack on you Michael. (and Shannon you are not far behnd, at all.)
Why is it that the observant citizens such as Michael and I are being called names and accused of being directly related to the fraud within the EBT system? I am the mother of 4 children and am raising my grand daughter (without help from the state or federal government) because her parents are drug addicts. I open my eyes and see what is going on. These very things that I would have never dreamed of a year ago. Being observant does not give anyone the right to call names or make assumptions regarding our lives. I love our country, I fought for this country. Please use discretion when you assume that you know what is going on in our lives. Your words solve nothing and only divide this country more.
@pdm, are you serious?
.Where do you think mr drug dealer gets his actual money to buy food in the first place?
From his profits of selling drugs, so him trading $10 worth of drugs for $20 worth of food, he will have to buy anyway, is further profit for him.
Think about it.
Plus, in my town, they all drive around in new cars, with expensive stereo systems etc.
“From his profits of selling drugs, so him trading $10 worth of drugs for $20 worth of food, he will have to buy anyway, is further profit for him.
Think about it.”
Michael Arm,
I’ve thought about it and I think you’re blowing smoke out of your behind.
I’ve no experience with drugs, drug dealers, or SNAP making me very unqualified to question Michael Am. But how the heck does the dealer pay HIS boss out of the $20 package of hamburger? I’m having a hard time imagining this barter system.
Also, too….
How many customers does this drug dealer have? Do they all trade him dope for hamburger? Anybody see “The Wire”? Those kids weren’t toting around bags full of groceries. And who the hell makes up the grocery list for the customers?
@Shannon, no clue why everyone is all over your case and making ignorant claims at you, i would just ignore them, i read your posts, I have no idea where they get off saying that stuff to you.
God bless 🙂
Hello to all. I unfortunately do receive food stamps, and no I didn’t sell my food stamps so I could have Wi-Fi and this little nook tablet, those were gifts from my sister, along with a cell phone so that she could keep in touch with her sister. I am on disability, Dr has given me four years. I would very much like to be in the working world. I have worked all my life. Miss the income of course, but also coworkers, and just the overall end of shift, work day over feeling, doing a job right, mattering! My disability amount is $962, a month, with $32o. a month coming out of that for Medial coverage. I receive $49. a month in food stamps. Shannon, I go along with the others in this conversation, not sure why you keep trying to put your two cents worth in! You started by saying you know many people do sell there stamps for cash, you know how it is done, your daughter who started to hang with the wrong crowd knows th?ese people, but only buy street names. Shannon, you said you are lucky enough not to need this program, which in your opinion is ran wrong. Shannon, are you taking advantage of young people with alcohol and drug problems, by buying their food stamps
For your information, I am a retired military veteran. I have not now nor ever bought, used, sold anyone’s benefits. That was absolutely uncalled for and the reason our country is turning to shit. Unbelievable.
Shannon: ‘Do you not think that I as a taxpayer would not report if I had the information to do so?’
No, I don’t.
I am disabled and receive assistance and my heart goes out to those who may loose assistance in the future due to Gov cut backs, its sad we can afford to take pictures on Mars, but cant feed our own people.
As for abusing foodstamps, its a very simple process, for those who think people cant sell their foodstamps, you’re ignorant.
Its a simple process, they sell them the card and let them use it or find an Arab store that will ring up a bogus food purchase and then give them 50 cents on the dollar for the charge on their card and/or let them buy beer/smokes with the card for the same 50 cents on the dollar purchase.
I live in one of the most drug infested areas in Ohio, and tons of druggies get a foodcard and its gone the day it is loaded with funds, then they rely on soup kitchens to feed their kids.
Some even take the food bags they get from churches, right to the drug man and exchange it for drugs.
I even know a guy whose case manager has authority over his money and she personally has to take him shopping, he then takes the actual food right to his drug dealer who will trade him it for drugs.
A $20 pack of hamburger will get him a $10 bag of heroin, and that includes the hamburger buns and what ever else he has to give.
Its a win win for the drug man because not only is he feeding his own family dirt cheap, he dont even have to spend gas money to go to the store himself.
This same guy will shoplift soap, deodorant, razors, toothpaste etc and trade it for his drug fix.
Once again, this is a win win for the drug man, he is getting his personal hygiene products dirt cheap and doesn’t even have to leave the house to get them.
Recap, if you think its a big deal to trade a food stamp card for drugs, your only kidding yourself and the only way to actually stop it from happening is to stop the actual drug man or the stores who will gladly give 50 cents on the dollar to swipe the card.
Its disturbing at the amount of Arab stores I know personally who are making a fortune giving 50 cents on the dollar and the only thing they actually sell is chips,candy,pop etc.
BTW, this one corner store actually will let you get gas with your foodcard.
welcome to America
bill mcwilliams
1, October 12, 2013 at 9:23 pm
The Food Stamp Program is little more than a giant corporate welfare scheme.
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no, farm subsidies are a giant corporate welfare scheme.
the max amount per person is about $133.00 a month. half that is what $66.50? don’t know where you buy your drugs and alcohol but 66.50 won’t buy much. maybe you get some sort of frequent flyer miles?
SNAP also buys cold food only. want to get a sub from the grocery deli, go ahead, just don’t ask them to toast it. (not a joke) also won’t buy toilet paper.
my mother is one of ten kids that grew up during the depression, they lived on a farm. she told me once that they never starved but during the winter you did get tired of the same thing day after day (grits and greens) and to this day she will not eat boiled meat.
i recall it takes about an acre and a half to feed one person per year. it’s not 1929 any more so most people don’t have the land to feed themselves in hard times.
besides most of every dollar spent on food stays here in the us.
unless you start outsourcing your chicken processing to china.
The Food Stamp Program is little more than a giant corporate welfare scheme.