The Food Nazi Says NO SHRIMP FOR YOU: How One State Plans to Feed the Poor.

[Jimmy Higgins]

Has anyone here said the SNAP and WIC are the same thing?

What in the world is with the needless snippy replies?

 

[AthenaAwakened]

Has anyone here said the SNAP and WIC are the same thing?

What in the world is with the needless snippy replies?

How is that snippy? It is a question. The statement that WIC and SNAP are not the same thing has been made before in the thread so I was wondering was there some confusion so I asked the question. So, how is that snippy?

 

[Toni]

As far as I can tell, regarding the bulk bag of beans, it seems as if it may be more about spoilage. A lot of products are limited in size (e.g. 16 oz box of rice).

Do you know why beans are dried and stored in bulk? To reduce spoilage. Which is why they are purchased in bulk: spoilage is reduced and therefore the beans are cheaper and can be stored for longer periods of time without danger of spoilage.

But I guess that it is better to let some lawmakers who likely have never cooked and never had to live on a razor thin budget while feeding a family (you know who the main recipients of SNAP are, right? Children.) make all the decisions for an entire group of people they see as some monolithic irresponsible adult who is lazy and wasteful.

I like the idea.

As for 20# of lobster--I haven't seen that. I have seen an awful lot of expensive meat being bought by people paying with food stamps, though. We do most of our produce shopping at Hispanic markets and a substantial percentage of the customers are using EBT cards.

Well there you have it. Nothing can replace solid evidence like good ole fashioned anecdotal evidence.

Back in my days living on a razor thin budget, eating on whatever happened to be left after all my other bills were paid, a group of friends and neighbors and my own family used to get together for large group meals occasionally when there was something like seafood on sale somewhere. We didn't eat meat but on these occasions, we'd join in, chip in or share and eat some high quality protein in the form of fresh seafood with about 20 of our friends and neighbors.

Simply put, it isn't their money.

It is as much 'their' money as it is yours or mine. More, since it is something THEY were awarded.

Awarded is a bit off. Supplemented would be more accurate.

The SNAP funds do supplement their income. They are AWARDED SNAP funds. Not like a prize. We don't think they are smart enough or responsible enough to manage any money outright so we dispense funds and dictate what their funds may go for and determine that this portion must be spent on food only. Not cleaning supplies or laundry detergent or birthday candles (because if you are a poor kid, you do not deserve a birthday cake with candles) or anything else that WE think isn't a good idea. Like inexpensive sources of protein such as bulk beans and rice.

It isn't unreasonable to set limits especially when the money has a very specific purpose.

Why is your judgment or mine better than that of the recipient's judgment?

Since EVERYBODY will not agree on what is fair, why not let the people who are eating the stuff make the decisions? Or maybe we should just round up all the poor people and put them in some kind of prison--except, let's not call it 'prison' but WE who have been smart enough to never need help will make all their decisions for them. What better possible way to help people regain control over their lives and plan ahead and make good decisions for their future and that of their children?

Yes Toni, what I suggested would exactly be like that.

Yeah. It would be. We don't agree with their judgment because if they had good judgment, they would never be poor in the first place. Therefore, we should substitute OUR judgment for theirs. Because we've got lots of judgment to spare, it seems.

That's the thing, the choices would still be up to the adults. Almost everything would be up for grabs in a grocery store. Including shell fish.

Sure. As long as they followed some guidelines you admitted were arbitrary.

I don't know if you actually know any poor people or how they got that way.

I have known a lot of poor people myself, including plenty of people who did not know where their next meal would be coming from. I've been there myself, although I was lucky that when I was actually food insecure (and housing insecure. Healthcare? nope), I had no children. But yeah, there was a period of time when I simply did not eat a couple of days a week because I ran out of money. I mean: I didn't eat. During that period of time, I got fairly sick (go figure) and couldn't go to work for a week, which meant I didn't get paid for a week and came very,very close to becoming homeless. Would have done if I had not had access to a $100 interest free loan that it took me 5 months to pay back. Probably would not have been able to get back to work in a week (and actually should not have) if a family member had not come by with a bag full of stuff they pulled from their chest freezer: game hunted, summer vegetables frozen. I ate every day until that was gone.

But I was really lucky: I had a family member who knew I was ill and knew how thin I was (and would have died of shame if they had known I was actually not eating because I didn't have any money) and had the resources to dip into their own meager extra and supplement my (empty) cupboards, despite having their own family to feed.

I was luckier still that that period of time of being that poor lasted under a year and a half. And I had family who could help if I asked for it. Being young and stupid and without children but plenty of pride, I never asked but wasn't above taking what I knew came from someone's freezer because I genuinely was hungry. Not as in: I skipped lunch. As in I skipped breakfast, lunch and dinner too many days a week for too long.

Oh, I wasn't on any kind of assistance. That would have been for poor people. Also see: young, stupid, plenty of pride.

As a financially stable adult, I have lived in a community which is mostly working class, with plenty of people who are genuinely poor. For a time, I worked in an antipoverty program which targeted young families with children. Yes, there were those in the program who were poor because of bad choices they made, often involving substance abuse, generally alcohol. Meth had not become an epidemic yet. One family was one of those classic generations on welfare families, but only one of the 60-70 families I worked with. There were some mental health problems. Some other chronic health problems that limited the ability of the adults to work. Some immigrant families. Some bad luck. One person I worked with--yes, she worked! had 4 children and was poor because her husband had been killed a couple of years earlier, in a car accident. Like most working class people who are the majority of the population where I live, they didn't have adequate insurance to make up for the loss of income when he died unexpectedly. They were lucky to have the funeral and other expenses covered by the meager insurance.

Actually, I think all of the parents had jobs. But ours is a very low wage town and local employers are happy to have the government they rail against supplement the income of their employees through various aid programs. Except at election time when they rail against such excessive wasteful spendi

Like many of the parents I knew, she was ashamed of needing assistance. When we gave out certificates for a free turkey to members of the program, she hid that she received one herself. Another single mom I worked with told me she was ashamed that she needed the same help as the program members.

That shame at needing help, and pride that motivates people to avoid applying for help and hiding what they receive permeated my town. I was lucky: I worked to supplement my family's income to pay for the upcoming college expenses of my kids. The widowed mom I was talking about worked 3 jobs to make ends meet. She couldn't find full time work. There were no benefits. She still needed some assistance.

I spent a number of years volunteering in my kids' schools. One of the things I learned is that only a fraction of the families who qualified for some form of assistance actually applied for it. This was an issue at the school who wished they would because part of the aid the school district received was based upon the numbers of kids who qualified for free or reduced cost lunches. The parents did not want to apply for benefits because of their own pride, but mostly because being on a program came with lots of intrusive rules and regulations meant to ensure that recipients never ever forgot that they were poor. As if that were possible in the US.

I was lucky. My husband had a good stable job that landed us squarely in the middle class. I could not even hazard a guess at the number of kids who came to my house to play whose families should have been on assistance, sometimes lost phones (land lines! and luxuries) or, in the summer, electric might be cut for a couple of days if things got really tight at their house. Nice, polite, well mannered children whose parents worked jobs that paid low wages and had low/no benefits. Often juggling several jobs because that was what was available and daycare was expensive and it was/still is really hard to find a good daycare program. Especially if you do not work a 9-5 job. Who invited my kids to their house, where I was happy to let them play because they were good people.

To make ends meet, parents work opposite shifts and/or patch together informal daycare for their kids, with family and friends filling in. Lots of times, the oldest kid gets pressed into duty babysitting siblings. Grandparents paid for back to school wardrobes: jeans, t shirts, sweatshirts. Sneakers.

I am sure some of those parents made bad decisions. Stupid decisions. So did I. The difference was that I had enough of a money cushion to ride out those mistakes.

No. I don't think I am smart enough to decide what food is sufficiently cheap enough to purchase with a SNAP card.

Neither are you.

 

[Tristan Scott]

The same could be said for others here who think that the Government should regulate banks and airlines and automobile standards, yet don't want the government regulating how people use government funds for nutrition.

It is already regulated. It can be used for food. Not alcohol. Not cigarettes. Not diapers. For food.

Regulating banks and airlines and automobiles is for the protection of the general public. How is forbidding a poor person some basil protecting the general public?

Oh please, the right wingers you're accusing of hypocrisy could make the same argument. But, again regulating the food that people can buy with these resources is, as I stated earlier, not new. WIC purchases have always been targeted for only certain foods.

 

[laughing dog]

It is already regulated. It can be used for food. Not alcohol. Not cigarettes. Not diapers. For food.

Regulating banks and airlines and automobiles is for the protection of the general public. How is forbidding a poor person some basil protecting the general public?

Oh please, the right wingers you're accusing of hypocrisy could make the same argument. But, again regulating the food that people can buy with these resources is, as I stated earlier, not new. WIC purchases have always been targeted for only certain foods.

Whether this practice is new or not is irrelevant to the discussion of its efficacy as social policy.

 

[KeepTalking]

Has anyone here said the SNAP and WIC are the same thing?

The OP seems to confuse the two by talking about proposed restrictions on SNAP, and then offering a link to items that are allowed by WIC. Some people in the thread then began to comment on the items allowed under the WIC program as if they are restricted by the SNAP program.

 

[AthenaAwakened]

Has anyone here said the SNAP and WIC are the same thing?

The OP seems to confuse the two by talking about proposed restrictions on SNAP, and then offering a link to items that are allowed by WIC. Some people in the thread then began to comment on the items allowed under the WIC program as if they are restricted by the SNAP program.

Thank you.

I did not mean to confuse the two, I thought listing them both would give a fuller picture as to how WI is addressing food insecurity and how state lawmakers thought they could or should treat poor people.

 

[KeepTalking]

The OP seems to confuse the two by talking about proposed restrictions on SNAP, and then offering a link to items that are allowed by WIC. Some people in the thread then began to comment on the items allowed under the WIC program as if they are restricted by the SNAP program.

Thank you.

I did not mean to confuse the two, I thought listing them both would give a fuller picture as to how WI is addressing food insecurity and how state lawmakers thought they could or should treat poor people.

It does seem as though the lawmaker in question cribbed off of the WIC program's allowed foods list. In that case, it just shows his ignorance in the difference between the programs. The reason bulk beans would not be allowed on WIC is because the WIC program issues coupons for specific items to be used in a specific time frame. A coupon for a 1 lb bag of dried beans would not be appropriate to use for however many bulk beans you happen to scoop out. It makes no sense to have a similar restriction on SNAP, which provides a dollar amount to be used mostly at the discretion of the recipient. In that case, buying the beans in bulk would likely cost less than a bag of the same weght, and save the program money.

 

[Tristan Scott]

Oh please, the right wingers you're accusing of hypocrisy could make the same argument. But, again regulating the food that people can buy with these resources is, as I stated earlier, not new. WIC purchases have always been targeted for only certain foods.

Whether this practice is new or not is irrelevant to the discussion of its efficacy as social policy.

Yes, thanks for pointing that out. All I know is that I'm glad we have programs that can insure that people in this country can put food on the table. I know when I needed it I was very grateful for it. Maybe I was wrong for being grateful, I don't know. My attitude might have been all screwed up. I certainly wasn't ashamed about it. I felt I had been helping others through my taxes for many years, and that now I needed help until I could back on track.

Of course, I realize that now we are going through a period where more and more people are being forced to be on these programs permanently so maybe I should re-think the whole paradigm of what these systems are and what they mean for the people who have been forced to take part in them. It is possible, maybe even probable that we are just starting down a steep slope in which more and more people will be forced on these programs, and with that will come proportional opposition.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

But I guess that it is better to let some lawmakers who likely have never cooked and never had to live on a razor thin budget while feeding a family (you know who the main recipients of SNAP are, right? Children.) make all the decisions for an entire group of people they see as some monolithic irresponsible adult who is lazy and wasteful.

You can go on a hike with your attitude here. You are hypocritically judging me for shit I haven't said. I'm not wasting any more time with your inability to read my post within the clear context it was presented in.

 

[Toni]

But I guess that it is better to let some lawmakers who likely have never cooked and never had to live on a razor thin budget while feeding a family (you know who the main recipients of SNAP are, right? Children.) make all the decisions for an entire group of people they see as some monolithic irresponsible adult who is lazy and wasteful.

You can go on a hike with your attitude here. You are hypocritically judging me for shit I haven't said. I'm not wasting any more time with your inability to read my post within the clear context it was presented in.

So I guess that means you will have more time to devise a point system that poor people will be compelled to use when making decisions about how they feed their family.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I don't think anybody was doubting that at the stores where you shop--which have home delivery (something not available from any of the grocery stores in the small city where I live and available only at the most expensive grocery stores in large cities), the prices might be different.

But Loren, surely you have realized by now that you are not the world and the entire world does not have the same price for every single good available in the many, many markets.

I stand by my claim: they're the same price where I shop.

And where did I say I shopped there? I picked that store because I could look up the prices online rather than going there. I would never buy something there unless it was on sale. (They sometimes have pretty good sales.)

How many times do I have to repeat--the prohibition was against beans from the bulk bins. Since almost everything on the list had sizes either highly restricted or exactly specified this makes sense and doesn't represent evil.

Needless stupidity is evil. Where I live, the cheapest way to purchase dried beans is in bulk from one particular market. They also sell 1 lb packages of dried beans but bulk is cheaper.

Rice can be purchased in 10 lb bags and higher weight. I don't need that much so I don't buy that way.

What part of "almost everything had sizes" did you miss? The prohibition against bulk beans is simply part of the specified sizes, it has nothing to do with beans.

A bag of dried beans was on the list.

Why is it acceptable to discern between dried beans that have been pre-packaged and those which are not pre-packaged but purchased by weight? Or necessary?

If you're going to provide a pound of beans the way to do that is a one-pound bag of beans, not an attempt to weigh out a pound of beans from the bulk bin.

When you see them paying with an EBT card--which is run through a separate machine here--there's no question they're on welfare.

And HERE, it's all the same machine whether you use credit or debit or EBT card, which is a kind of debit card. It doesn't matter to the machine.

Why on earth would I think it is any of my business what kind of card anybody uses?

But come on, Loren. We're all friends here. You don't even need to see what their card looks like or which machine they use, right? You can just...tell by looking if they are on assistance and therefore require your personal judgment and approval to do anything, including buy food.

When you're standing in line at checkout you tend to see what the person in front of you is doing. Again and again I see EBT cards, expensive food and smartphones together.

 

[Tristan Scott]

You can go on a hike with your attitude here. You are hypocritically judging me for shit I haven't said. I'm not wasting any more time with your inability to read my post within the clear context it was presented in.

So I guess that means you will have more time to devise a point system that poor people will be compelled to use when making decisions about how they feed their family.

Don't mean to jump into your quarrel but if you mean a food budget, I have always had to maintain a food budget and I'm not exactly "poor".

 

[laughing dog]

If you're going to provide a pound of beans the way to do that is a one-pound bag of beans, not an attempt to weigh out a pound of beans from the bulk bin.

Wherever I have lived, you would only do that if you wished to pay MORE for the pound of beans.

 

[Bronzeage]

It is kind of strange to see people who complain about taxes and government intrusion into their private lives, want the government to spend tax dollars to intrude into the private lives of other people.

It's stranger still that people don't understand what happens when people are hungry. Bad things happen and when people's children are hungry, worse things happen. There maybe a shortage of jobs, there maybe a shortage of food, but we'll never have a shortage of guns and bullets. When things get bad, the desperate always out number the content. We provide stuff like food assistance, cash benefits, healthcare, and all those other things which make life bearable, just to keep a lid on it. The figure of speech, "Gypsies in the palace," has never been commonly used in this country, but it could happen.

If the lid ever does come off, all our rugged individualists, who thought they accumulated all they have, all by themselves, will wish they had more friends.

 

[bilby]

It is kind of strange to see people who complain about taxes and government intrusion into their private lives, want the government to spend tax dollars to intrude into the private lives of other people.

It's stranger still that people don't understand what happens when people are hungry. Bad things happen and when people's children are hungry, worse things happen. There maybe a shortage of jobs, there maybe a shortage of food, but we'll never have a shortage of guns and bullets. When things get bad, the desperate always out number the content. We provide stuff like food assistance, cash benefits, healthcare, and all those other things which make life bearable, just to keep a lid on it. The figure of speech, "Gypsies in the palace," has never been commonly used in this country, but it could happen.

If the lid ever does come off, all our rugged individualists, who thought they accumulated all they have, all by themselves, will wish they had more friends.

^This.

Think of welfare not as a handout, but as a very very cheap, and far more effective, alternative to paying for far more police, courts and prisons.

If you really want tax money to be spent on improving the law and order situation, giving the money directly to the needy is often a much more efficient way to achieve that goal than paying it in police salaries.

 

[Toni]

So I guess that means you will have more time to devise a point system that poor people will be compelled to use when making decisions about how they feed their family.

Don't mean to jump into your quarrel but if you mean a food budget, I have always had to maintain a food budget and I'm not exactly "poor".

No. I mean that under Jimmy Higgen's plan, they will now need to take into consideration an arbitrary point system in addition to budgetary constraints, time constraints, food preferences and possibly food allergies and other requirements if someone has a specific dietary restriction or requirement: i.e. diabetes or gluten sensitivity or allergies to nuts, or milk, and so on.

 

[RavenSky]

It is already regulated. It can be used for food. Not alcohol. Not cigarettes. Not diapers. For food.

Regulating banks and airlines and automobiles is for the protection of the general public. How is forbidding a poor person some basil protecting the general public?

Oh please, the right wingers you're accusing of hypocrisy could make the same argument. But, again regulating the food that people can buy with these resources is, as I stated earlier, not new. WIC purchases have always been targeted for only certain foods.

Good thing we are not discussing WIC then isn't it?

Athena, you wanted to know who was throwing WIC in interchangeably with SNAP?

 

[RavenSky]

Again and again I see EBT cards, expensive food and smartphones together.

Of course you do. Just like you "see" people's financial information that you have no business snooping into.

 

[bilby]

Again and again I see EBT cards, expensive food and smartphones together.

Of course you do. Just like you "see" people's financial information that you have no business snooping into.

If you bought a smartphone, and then a year or so later, lost your job and ended up on welfare, then you are obviously a bad person. The same applies if you received a smartphone as a gift. You should probably expect to be justifiably shot by the cops at any moment.