[Munson]

Are EBT cards the same as food stamps? I saw my local Taco Bell say they accept them now. And I was dismayed.

[Wally_Kalbacken]

Further evidence of the Everybody Get Some (Federal Dollars)!^(tm) philosophy of the Obama Administration. Sigh.

While the article mentions superficially some demographics on food stamp recipients, did they mention race, or did I overlook that?

[Sister_T]

Nudged along by New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, who threatened legal action, Costco began accepting food stamps at a few New York stores in May.

"Nudged along"?! More like gestapo-ed along!

[CTOCS]

Read the article twice. Didn’t read anywhere in there that Seenyor Zambrano had a job. So I guess he’s also munching at the govermnent trough.

[denydenydeny]

As food stamps become an increasingly common currency in a struggling U.S. economy government campaign toward permanent dependence

Fixed it.

[yefragetuwrabrumuy]

A company like Wal-Mart could make a lot of friends right now by fully embracing, and enhancing, the food stamp culture. A lot of it would be very low cost to Wal-Mart as well.

To start with, they already have a huge database of customer purchases, and could quickly figure out about how many of their customers are using food stamps at particular stores. From there, they could make a courtesy “long term food plan” for their customers, so that they can optimize their food purchases. It could also include a small recipe book.

Because produce arrives seasonally, Wal-mart gets inundated with, say, potatoes, at a particular time. So the long term food plan is balanced with these arrivals, and food stamp recipients get an extra “heads up” about big produce sales.

So they would advise them to buy a 10 pound sack of potatoes, even though they don’t need that many right now. Then make mashed potatoes to freeze. This overlaps into the next month or two, so they don’t have to buy potatoes then as well, they can buy other things.

Because Wal-Mart has the brain power and the purchasing power, they could have a multiplicative effect on their food stamp users rations. This would benefit both Wal-Mart and its customers, big time.

And make a lot of friends.

[ATOMIC_PUNK]

A smoking chicken in every pot and some pot for every smoking chicken !

[Swiss]

When I was a cashier at Wal-Mart I broke down those using food stamps like this. 1/4 was persons who really needed them such as the handicapped. I don’t think even the most misery would of had a problem with them using it and of all the users it seemed to me they was the most embarrassed in using food stamps.

About half the people was situational. They either had unemployment or big expenses happen or else they made some poor decisions. Many of those would be on food stamps only as long as they was having problems. It is my belief that professional counseling in money management could reduce many of these people from the rolls.

1/4 was obvious moochers, their kids would buy candy bars and pop like they was free on the card. Best choices of meat and luxury foods and most times their carts was filled with expensive non-food items which they had money to buy. They was also the rudest and most entitled group of food stamp users.

It would break my heart to see someone with obvious problems such as blindness count every penny economizing their purchases while the moochers was buying caviar (no fooling I had a guy buy caviar on food stamps)

[smokingfrog]

I think it is outrageous that these grocery stores and retail chains are making such obscene profits from selling food! Food is a human right. We need government run stores where people can get free food to compete with the private sector. Plus, if these publicly owned stores are making so much money off the government, the government should require them to only sell healthy food.