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GOP view of food stamps far too black and white [UPDATED]
Published 10:03am Monday, January 23, 2012 Updated 12:04pm Monday, January 23, 2012When politicians talk about issues, they tend to speak in a lot of black-and-white terms and simple solutions.
The issue I would refer to most recently was the one in the Republican debates regarding food stamps.
According to the Republican philosophy, food stamps are hindering our economy. The reason, in addition to the fact that it contributes to higher taxes and deficit spending, is that, by giving out food stamps to people, we are making them complacent, and less likely to aggressively look for a job or work to obtain training for a higher-paying job. These food stamp recipients, Republicans say, are content to collect their government handout and sit on their rear ends. By taking away food stamps, recipients will be forced to get motivated, and they’ll find jobs and become productive members of society.
It’s a theory that is far too black and white for my taste.
I’m sure there are cases where someone is indeed “sitting on his rear end” collecting government checks. Certainly, the programs implemented in the 1990s that required many long-time welfare recipients to find work did some good in reducing institutional welfare.
I also question some of the unemployment insurance rules. One in particular, I believe, allows recipients to continue to collect paychecks while turning down jobs that aren’t up to the salary level of their previous job. To me, such a rule allows unemployed individuals to be “pickier” than they should be. It seems a more sensible policy would be, after, say, three months, an unemployed worker be required to take a job, even one that that pays less, and the government supplements their salary for a short time to help make up the gap.
But when it comes to food stamps, let’s get serious about this. The unemployment rate has been as much as 10 percent in the last couple years. A decade ago, it was as low as 4 percent. That means that, at one time, about 9 million Americans had a job at the beginning of the millennium, and since then lost it. Among those, there are certainly many that took jobs making significantly less than their previous ones.
A story I read explains that many food stamp recipients actually were working, but their wages were basically enough to cover rent, utilities, child care (many are single mothers) and car expenses. The food stamps are, as I suggested above, a gap filler.
If the point of the Republican presidential candidates is that the Obama administration could have done a better job of growing the economy over the last two years, there is some validity to it. My feeling is that the Great Recession was going to do its damage no matter who the president would have been, and if a Republican were in the Oval Office right now, the Democrats would be the ones able to throw verbal arrows about the economy. That said, I’m also not suggesting the Obama administration has done everything right in creating the ideal conditions for job growth.
On the issue of food stamps, however, if Republicans truly believe that our country would be a lot better off if we didn’t have them, I disagree.
The fact is, not every American adult has the skills – mental, emotional or motivational – it takes to obtain and keep a job. In the recent economy, there are many who have such skills and still can’t find a job.
And let’s face it, even if there are a percentage of food stamp recipients who are abusing the system or are unmotivated to find work, it isn’t as if they are living like kings.
Help the economy or hurt it, put a tax dent in my paycheck or not, I believe it is our duty as Americans to make sure that everyone in our country does not go hungry.
Joel Myhre is The Journal’s publisher. E-mail him at joel.myhre@fergusfallsjournal.com
I worked 36 years in the dairy industry. Let me offer some information from an entirely different perspective. When that food stamp is redeemed at the grocery store for a gallon of milk, a few pennies go to the cashier behind the counter, a few pennies to the store owner, a few to the grocery department manager,a few to the truck driver who hauled the milk to the store, a few to the warehouse person that loaded the truck, a few to the operator who ran the filling machine, a few to the dairy plant owner, a few to the bulk hauler who picked the milk up at the farm and even the farmer gets a few of those pennies. The point could be said people need to eat and they would find another way to buy the gallon of milk if they didn’t get food stamps. That’s likely true but I’ve seen how some people in Minneapolis, men as well as women, “earn” their milk money starting around the 20th of the month when their food stamps have run out. As those methods of earning milk money are illegal I have often hoped they get arrested and jailed, but that costs more than food stamps.
Maybe Joel should have to pay for all of the food stamps. That is alright with me!
However, I am willing to bet your food stamps He will become much more discriminating once he starts putting out the money for them.:)
“GOP candidates Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum … propose to convert the food stamp program to block grants for each state, with the states individually administering their own programs.”
http://www.buzzle.com/articles/gop-candidates-ramp-up-debate-over-food-stamps.html
Joel, Gingrich and Santorum are discussing how to make the program more efficient by removing a layer of bureaucracy.
It sounds good, doesn’t it. But if you stop and think about it a little you come to realize states would have to set up some sort of method (bureaucracy) to administer food stamps and there would have to be some sort of federal oversight to assure the job was being done as intended. So this is not a solution that is likely to save money unless somehow benefits are cut. Is that what the GOP is really suggesting, starvation? If we were near full employment maybe further restrictions on eligibility might have some merit. But remember, there are lots of working folks and corporate owners making money from the food stamp program.
Are you defending Joel’s straw-man argument, or did you not know that localities had food assistance programs in place prior to the food stamp program in the 1930′s?
Larry, do you think that reducing agricultural price supports would reduce the cost of food to the poor?
Mike and others-
Food assistance of the ’30′s–there is/was a big building on a hill south of Fergus Falls that my mother told me was what was left of the county poor farm of the ’30′s. Yes, some counties, some cities, some states and even the federal government offered some sort of food aid. Minnesota had a WIC program into the ’90′s, I believe. Maybe it is still in place. One problem was this assistance varied from location to location and was tied to a locality’s ability to afford it. (Think Detroit–deep recession, increased need, less ability to afford services. Now think Bismark–booming economy, little need, lots of ability to pay)
Price supports- this is important–check the US economy numbers from the 1870′s to the 1920′s. Huge economic swings! These are the effects of a freer economy. Price supports not only establish the bottom they work to control the top. This top control is not the intended effect but is real. So, wouldn’t things be cheaper if they were allowed to fall? Yes, sometimes but sometimes too expensive too. (The method of price supports for dairy makes little sense in today’s world but the powers that be [big dairy] can’t agree on a replacement.)
Money that doesn’t make it to the needy–paperwork, investigation, prosecution. There does need to be some accountability in this progam and that costs money.
Class warefare–when someone says “after taxes that person paying 15% has $16million to live on this year and after I pay my 15% I have $35,000 and as the federal deficit is so big, sort of seems unfair” yet there are those who point at the poor as part of the reason for the deficit–if one is class warfare isn’t the other?
As for the ability of someone born into the web of the multi-generational poor being able to free themselves by the bootstraps, that is a complex subject for another time. (Hint–think a web structure used for survival vs. the inverted tree model for success)
not every American adult has the skills – mental, emotional or motivational – it takes to obtain and keep a job.
Take the kids away and put them in a home whe people support themselves and stop helping the adults who joel says have no “motivational skills” to obtain and keep a job. Trust me, when it gets cold enough and they get hungry enough, they will become movitated to work if they know there is no other option. I know people who are on the 4th generation of living on government support. They are not physically or mentally unable ot work. They just know how to work the system. Just because you can make a baby does not mean you should be supported by tax payers. Taking kids and free money away will be motivation to work 1 or more jobs like everyone else. Welfare is there for those who can not physically or mentally support themselves and I know that is very important, but those who are not motivated to work, tough luck, work or starve and freeze. Lazy is no excuse.
Wish that I could remember where I read , in a newspaper about two years ago, an analysis that reported that for every dollar authorized by Congress to welfare, rental assistance, and food stamps, less than 31 cents actually gets into the hands of the beneficiaries in the form of a check, rent payment, food stamps. The remainder goes to the federal bureaucrats who run the programs to go to the state bureaucrats, who distribute it to county bureaucrats who allocate it to city bureaucrats. In other words, there are at least four government employees involved in getting that 31 cents to the welfare mom, and all four get a slice of that dollar. If you can eliminate even one step along the way, that reduces the cost of the program by , oh, fifteen cents per dollar. Multiply that fifteen cents by billions of times and you reduce the cost of the programs while keeping benefit levels unchanged. Of course, only the Republicans would think of doing this, as the Democrats are more interested in keeping all those bureaucrats dependent on the Democrats for creating and maintaining all those unnecessary jobs.
All illustrative of the divergent viewpoints of Democrats and Republicans: the Dems see the world as being divided between the haves and the have nots, while the Republicans see the world as comprised of haves and the soon to haves. Apparently the author of this article favors the have and have not paradigm, hence his seeeming willingness to let a few (maybe a few million?) welfare cheats get away with being deprived of living like kings, and have to exist only as minor royalty from the earnings of people who work for their keep.
There is an additional advantage to eliminating the federal level and just give block grants to the states to administer the program, that being that the states are closer to the problem, and more capable of spotting and remedying problems, such as inefficiencies of operation or cheating. Some states would even reform the distribution system, so they could use the dollars saved to fund other areas. I doubt that our Marky Dayton would allow that though, not in keeping with his GRE (Government Runs Everything) philosophy.
The Cato Institute did a study that revealed at least 65% of redistributed income is overhead cost at the federal level.
GOP candidates want to eliminate government waste, which is why they are discussing a block grant program.
Joel created a false premise to attack the Republican party.
Larry, now you admit to knowing about local food assistance programs prior to a federal program. Then you try to say local government would let people starve, then use that straw man to again attack the Republican party.
Larry, when you defend a lie, you take ownership of that lie.
I think they are many more ways to cut then cutting Food Stamps. Here are a few, Stop going into war, that would say billions. Cut miltary, they are tons of money going to waste. C
ut subsited to Oil Company, make people making over 1 million dollars pay 30% not like 13.7% they pay now. Everyone should go back and see what the bible say about taken care of our brothers and sisters in need.
Myth: If families are on welfare they have to work, if a welfare mom doesn’t want to work, all she has to do is leave welfare and she will retain her food stamp benefits! How does that encourage work? A mom getting food stamps doesn’t have to work until her kids are at least six years old!
Fact: No family can live on food stamps alone. The Food Stamp Program encourages work. The number of food stamp recipients with one working household member is rising. Food stamps do not undermine welfare work requirements. In fact, the number of food stamp households with children that neither work or receive welfare has declined by 90,000. In addition, any family on welfare that receives a sanction for not playing by the welfare rules (avoiding a job etc.) has their foodstamp benefits frozen or reduced.
Myth: Food stamps are just like welfare. How can food stamps be a work support if unemployed people can get them? Getting food stamps robs families of their dignity and self-respect. Food stamps should be changed just like welfare was changed in 1996.
Fact: Food stamps are a work support. Every day food stamps help working poor families put food on the table. Working food stamp households with children now outnumber unemployed food stamp households. Food stamps are crucial to helping low-wage working families make ends meet. A family of four supported by a full-time, year-round minimum wage worker will fall short of the poverty line by 25 percent if the family doesn’t get food stamps. Food stamps play a vital role in lifting families out of poverty, and are a critical support when parents have been laid off from work . Poor families should work if they are able to, but many parents lack the skills to get and keep high paying jobs.
Myth: The Food Stamp Program is rife with fraud. Between people committing fraud to get onto the Program and people selling food stamps once they get them, food stamps is not a good investment of public funds.
Fact: There is little fraud in the Food Stamp Program. USDA audits over 50,000 food stamp households every year searching for fraud and reports that 93 percent of all food stamp benefits are issued correctly. Most of the remaining cases consist of small overpayments to eligible households that still leave households well below the poverty line. According to USDA, only 2 percent of benefits go to households that are ineligible for food stamps, and some of these families receive food stamps as a result of mistakes or confusion over complex rules, rather than fraud.
A recent USDA study found that the extent of food stamp trafficking appears to be relatively small and declining since the early 1990′s. This reduction may result from the Program’s expanding use of a debit-like card to transfer benefits. The Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) is now being used by 40 states. Every state is required to do so by October 2002.
Myth: Food stamp recipients use their benefits to buy junk food. Obesity is the biggest nutrition problem among the poor.
Fact: USDA studies show that low-income people buy healthier food than any other segment of the population. Poor people live in the same society the rest of us do and see the same ads; some make the same questionable food choices the rest of us do. Indeed, obesity masks other serious nutrition problems that result from families having insufficient money for food: some high-fat, high-sugar foods that contribute to obesity and other health problems are among the cheapest sources of calories low-income parents can find to keep their children from experiencing hunger.
Limiting food stamp benefits to the purchase of “nutritious” foods would introduce a whole new level of bureaucracy and red tape to the Food Stamp program which would lead to new and varied confusions at cash registers across America. For this reason, the Food Marketing Institute, which represents grocers across the country, has strenuously opposed this suggestion.
Myth: The Food Stamp Program should be run by the states, not the feds. It is choking on bureaucracy. State administrative costs are climbing. Families document every little detail about their lives to get food stamps. The application forms make the Form 1040 look like a breeze. Low-income working people are required to take time off from work every three months to reapply for food stamps and gather all of the documentation the Program requires. Working poor families, the very ones that need the Program the most, are giving up in disgust.
Fact: The Food Stamp Program desperately needs an overhaul to remove bureaucratic hurdles but turning the program over to the states is not the answer. During the 1990′s many states, not USDA, implemented strenuous and onerous levels of red tape in response to pressure from USDA to prevent fraud. That is why we face our current “red tape divide”. Nevertheless, the program needs significant further improvement, which can be accomplished by building on these recent, positive efforts. In addition, states say repeatedly, the food stamp Quality Control system is badly in need of reform. The QC system should focus primarily on serious threats to the Program’s integrity and should not, for example, penalize states for doing a better job of serving working families.
I lived in St. Paul for a few years, near 35E and Maryland Avenue. In the evening, at the Rainbow Foods grocery store, young men would hang out by the checkout lanes and sell food stamps for half price, so they could acquire cash.
A couple of things that speak to the accuracy of the letter and its headline. In Minnesota, “food stamps” are now an EBT card. Much like a debit card they can be linked to one person and when benefits are claimed can be connected to that person’s a photo ID to minimize fraud. Skeptics will say fraud still exists and that is correct. However, in earlier comments it was verified that senior citizens and the working poor receive over 1/2 of all benefits and those benefits are deserved.(Aren’t most of the others children?) (Granted, there are a few heartless simpletons like Michelle Bachmann who don’t understand compassion but considering the support in evidence by the defense of the GOP they MUST be only a small minority.) And that brings me to my final point and again it speaks to the black and white over-simplified view of the GOP–there will always be scammers, people working the system for benefits they don’t deserve. But how big and expensive do you wish government to become? Catching, prosecuting and imprisoning crooks is expensive and labor intensive. That is not to say we should look the other way and let everyone get something for nothing. But we do need to have aconversation, intelligent, from multiple points of view and using facts, math and an accurate picture of history and come up with a course of action that is not so black and white but the best we can do with the resources we have available to us.
Compare whatever scams there are among those qualifying for food stamps with the likes of Bernie, Madoff, Bob McClean and the crooks on Wall Street. Take a gander at a program on television called “American Greed” and then make an argument for fewer regulations of the investment industry. The program never runs out of examples of people who don’t bother with the peanuts some people wrongfully on stamps may filch. Their scams run to the millions and billions and cause recessions and the Great Depression. Read some history about the very same kind of unregulated wildly unethical speculation on Wall Street with ordinary folks’ money leading up to the depression. The exact same thing happened as a catalyst to our recession, and please don’t yip about Freddie & Fannie because recent revelations have exposed both parties’ politicians as very culpable in that regard. Oh, I forgot, the program must surely be another example of “socialistic propaganda”, like one of the most respected newspapers in the word, the NYT. If I were a blind partisan, I could make just as specious a charge against the Wall Street Journal. LOL
Class warfare.