Posted on 09/07/2011 3:34:54 PM PDT by nickcarraway
In an ever-growing number of states, if you crave a taco or fried chicken from a fast-food restaurant, you can pay for it with food stamps.
Food stamps - known more formally as the USDAs Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program - have been in use for grocery staples, such as bread and milk, since 1934, but now, for the first time, they can be used for fast food in four states across the country.
The number of businesses including convenience and discount stores, gas stations and pharmacies that have been approved to accept food stamps has increased by a third over the course of three years from 2005 to 2010, USA Today reports, and fast-food chains are working hard to get a cut of the federal dollars in Florida, California, Arizona and Michigan.
The funds allocated to the food stamp program have increased exponentially, from $28.5 billion to $64.7 billion in that same time frame, according to USA Today, and at a time when people have less money to spend, the bump in federal dollars can mean a lot to the fast-industry.
(Excerpt) Read more at abcnews.go.com ...
Buying Big Macs and fries with food stamps? This must be a clever Republican plot to turn liberal food nazis against government hand-outs.
That's what I'd be afraid of. The current management of the Federal food stamp program is fairly lenient in philosophy, not ruling out things like soft drinks and salted snacks (they actually cite studies that point out that food stamp recipients don't spend significantly more of their food budget on those items than the average grocery shopper). But get McDonald's into the act and that might be too much of a temptation.
The food stamp system is so taxed beyond proper oversight now that some food stamp recipients (in Illinois, which I know about) are getting put on express lists that don’t require a review for an entire year. If an honest person who was on the stamps gets a job he or she will tell the food stamp office to stop the benefits. Not-so-honest people will gladly accept the benefits for a year regardless.
I see this all the time at the grocery store - an elderly widower digs out some coins to pay exact change for $15.32 or something buying staples. Her clothes are old but serviceable, the car 30 years old, etc.
Next in line is somebody driving a 35k SUV with a shopping cart literally full of steaks and poultry paying with a welfare card.
That’s OK, BaraqqiCare’s death panels will quickly rid the country of those “burdens”.
Oh and BTW you’ve been out of the SUV market too long.
More like 60k these days for the ones you’re describing.
I thought it was bad enough when they approved the Papa Murphy’s take and bake pizzas for EBT!
“Spend” your WIC welfare $$ on the cheese and make your own damned dough!
Heck -- at the rate we're going, it's only a matter of time before the Federal government will allow people to use food stamps to make the monthly payments on a new GM car.
“Heres a quick list of fast food restaurants in states that already accept food stamps for restaurant meals”:
***Michigan:
Churchs Chicken
Kentucky Fried Chicken
McDonalds
Subway
Grandmas Famous Chicken
Eight Mile Pancake House
Mr. Ts BBQ
Vitos Pizza
***California:
Jack in the Box
Subway
El Pollo Loco
Papa Murphys Pizza
Florida
KFC
Taco Bell
Pizza Hut
Papa Murphys Pizza
***Arizona
Dominos Pizza
Golden Corral
Southern Cuisine
Rallys Hamburger
***BTTT
I was just in Sherman Oaks, California recently and saw a carwash that accepted EBT cards.
Does anyone think that maybe they are now trying out “eugenics”? What better way to kill off the population than to feed them pink goo chicken nuggets and non deteriorating white fried “potatoes”?
ABC News exists to advance the agenda of the marxist state, without questioning, without dissent.
Staples only is right. I agree!
Over the Labor Day weekend it happened YET AGAIN that my husband was in line at the checkout behind someone who bought live lobsters with food stamps,while he,who works very hard,was buying cheap hamburger.
It’s sickening and a complete ripoff of the working people of this country. Why is it that people who don’t work can afford to eat better than people who do? Because the people who work are forced to pay for others to live better than they do themselves.
They probably have other sources of “cash only” income.
Taxpayer funded corporate subsidies,all cleaned up as compassion for the needy.
The problem with your tirade is that there aren’t any jobs in the obama economy. Or did you lose sight of that fact? Even fast food isn’t hiring too much right now.
“Next in line is somebody driving a 35k SUV with a shopping cart literally full of steaks and poultry paying with a welfare card.”
This fraud on the taxpayer has been ongoing for multiple decades. I observed the same in the early seventies...but they had the recognizable coupons, then. She had two buggies full. One was meats only, lots of steaks and pork. Then she drove away in her new Cadillac.
The wife and I both worked. We had bills to pay. Mortgage, and a clunker used car payment. No way could we afford a buggy full of meats. Much less a new Cadillac. So I wrote a letter to my congressman who passed it (they always do) to the Dept in charge of these things. The response from them was that it was probably a friend’s car who drove them to the store. But if I had evidence of fraud, please feel free to contact them, and they would look into it. That was 1973.
Prepared food used to be denying under food stamps.
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