Wow, that food stamp graph is a nearly perfect “logistic function” curve. One thing this indicates is that the economic environment changed abruptly, and has stayed changed. If we were in some sort of cycle, with a recovery, the curve would look like a “sine function” curve.
You are right. It looks like what happened at the beginning of 2007 was really a tipping point - something the environmentalists are so fond of talking about - and the underlying state of the economy has not (yet?) reverted to its original state.
Too difficult to disect all the proabable and possible factors in a short post, but suffice to say that the Obama admnistration has not succeeded. (Though, he has certainly not been helped by the inept Eurozone bunglers.)