Posted on 08/18/2021 4:38:51 AM PDT by Kaslin
In keeping with its penchant for increasing government dependence, the Biden administration recently announced it has greenlit the largest-ever increase for Americans on the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP), also known as food stamps.
Under the revised SNAP guidelines, the 42 million Americans on SNAP will receive a 25 percent monthly increase. This means the average SNAP recipient will now receive $157 per month in benefits.
According toTom Vilsack, secretary of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, “I think the pandemic sort of shocked people out of the belief that this is a program that was for some others, somebody else, I would never be involved in the SNAP program. All the sudden we found families either in need of SNAP or in need of the food bank pantry system that never in a million years thought that they would be faced with that situation.”
Stacy Dean, deputy undersecretary for Food, Nutrition, and Consumer Services, added, “Too many of our fellow Americans struggle to afford healthy meals. The revised plan is one step toward getting them the support they need to feed their families.”
Interestingly, the Biden administration implemented the monthly increase without Congress, under an arcane provision of the 2018 Farm Bill called the Thrifty Food Plan. As Dean describes it, “To set SNAP families up for success, we need a Thrifty Food Plan that supports current dietary guidance on a budget.”
Put another way, the Biden administration has circumvented Congress again (like it did with the extension of the federal eviction moratorium), in order to placate the Democratic Party’s increasingly powerful far-left constituency.
In 2019, when then-President Trump announced he supported states’ seeking to implement work requirements for able-bodied SNAP beneficiaries without dependents, many on the left went apoplectic.
Shortly after the announcement, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) tweeted, “My family relied on food stamps (EBT) when my dad died at 48. I was a student. If this happened then, we might’ve just starved. Now, many people will.”
Of course, after the 2019 reform, AOC’s prediction of Americans starving in the streets never came to pass.
In fact, after the 2019 SNAP reforms, hundreds of thousands of previously unemployed Americans entered the workforce, thereby reducing the total number of Americans on SNAP.
The same thing also occurred in 1996, when then-President Bill Clinton signed the "Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act."
What’s more, according to several studies, Americans on SNAP tend to have higher obesity rates than those not on the program. Per a 2015 Health and Human Services report, “Participation in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) has been associated with obesity. SNAP is a means-tested entitlement program that provides financial assistance for food purchases to low-income households; it is the largest food assistance program in the United States, serving ~14% of all Americans. Given the high costs associated with obesity and the large reach of SNAP, it is important to understand the role that SNAP may play in obesity development among the poor.”
So, even as many on the left call for more money for those on SNAP, or else they will starve, the data show that those on SNAP (before the increase in benefits) already had higher obesity rates than those not on the program.
Moreover, despite calls from Biden administration officials that the increase in benefits is needed due to the economic fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic, that is simply not true.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there are 10.1 million job openings in the United States.
As of now, the worst of the pandemic is behind us. Vaccines are widely available. Americans are returning to work, the economy is reopening, and jobs are aplenty.
Given all this, there is no justification for the Biden administration’s move to increase benefits for those on SNAP.
Yet, facts be damned, the Biden administration, with pressure from its far-left flank, has decided to increase SNAP benefits anyways.
This is par for the course when it comes to the Biden White House. From policies such as “free” college to “free” pre-K, the Biden team is all-in on substantially increasing the welfare state.
Ronald Reagan once said, “We should measure welfare’s success by how many people leave welfare, not by how many are added.”
Unfortunately, it seems as if that mentality, which was embraced by President Clinton just 25 years ago, is the antithesis of the modern-day Democratic Party.
Good. We will all be on them soon.
Given the increase in food prices, including the ridiculous price of meat, food stamps are the only thing holding back food riots.
Yeah and they are letting us old people on SS die off from starvation. Since we are mostly Conservative they want us to die.
Democrats have to keep people dependent on handouts and corrupt the US election system for them to remain in power.
Have you seen the price of steak and lobster?
How am I supposed to feed my family?
Just in time for the influx of “migrants” through the southern border and direct flights from Kabul.
42 MILLION people receiving food stamps in the USA. That is more than 13% of the entire population. Truly staggering and it’s only going to grow much bigger.
When the country collapses (and it surely will soon) those democrat parasites will be dead within a month.
The collapse can’t come soon enough. Burn it all to the ground and the rest of the world along with it. /spit.
Bread and Circus.
Yeah, but some people need them.
My step daughter ran off with her druggie boy friend and left us with a 9 month old, a 15 month old, and 5 and 7 year old. Our retirement was fine for the two of us but not for 6 of us.
We needed the food stamps.
And we don’t buy steak and lobster, we need to stretch the value. We get stuff on sale and buy in bulk.
While it’s easy to stereotype, not everyone fits in easy categories.
Difficult situation, but thank God you are there for these kids.
Step daughter must be a real piece of work.
Good thing.
Got to cover the 1.1 million illegals that have been allowed to enter the country.
Now we have tens of thousands of Afghan refugees headed this way as well who could use that 25% increase in food stamp benefits.
What does the admin care?
Monday Printing press goes brrrrrrr.
He doesn’t want people to work.
Also this likely will lead to further inflation of food prices.
THIS is what people need for it. Lots take advantage of the system and makes it harder in us. You should buy some steak and lobster. You deserve it. Your good people.
My wife was a executive at Disney and made great money and she carried our heath insurance. She was the bread winner. Lol. But got into a car accident and has had several surgeries and will never work again. Had to search for health insurance and we had to go to the market place for insurance. Basically obama care. I tell you it’s a fine line where you get a good deal on descent insurance and then policy being more than you can afford. Making a extra 1000 dollars a year can changes your premiums by thousands. She got a $1200 dollar check from something and obama care is notified and premiums went from 350 a month to 560 a month. I know it goes by the package you choose but wow. That hit us hard at a really bad time.
Wow I really need to spell check. Hope you can understand that mess.
Basically, a crooked employer invented an excuse to terminate me in order to steal about $10K in unused vacation and sick time, most likely because they had caught wind of the fact that I was on to their crooked ways.
So, to rub it in, they challenged my unemployment claim, an action which immediately made me eligible for Food Stamps. My wife and I qualified for a bigger allowance than we actually spent on groceries when I was working.
So I win my hearing and qualify for unemployment benefits but, because I am honest and report some gig earnings, the unemployment benefits get suspended until I can prove the gig earnings did not result in a full time job.
So it is back on the food stamps. By the time I can prove the gig earnings did not result in a full-time job to the UC's satisfaction, I actually have a full-time job because Trump has been in office for a month and employers are actually scrambling to find employees. For some odd reason, the people who really want to work get hired first and I'm part of that statistic.
So I report this to the Food Stamp people figuring the benefits will be shut off now. Doesn't happen, so I call again, explain the situation and ask if they want the benefits back. No, they tell me, but they do want me to prove I have a full time job.
So, dutifully, I send in pay stub copies to satisfy them. A couple of weeks later, I get a letter telling me that food stamp benefits will be terminated the following month, not because I have a full time job, but because I declined to take them.
Just, wow! I really don't know how to play this game! Do I?
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