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Food Stamps Restriction
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jhildebrandt73 wrote: »Have you actually ever used WIC?
I have, and what it does, for those who use it as an exclusive source for food income, is forces you to use the items it endorses. I am not particularly fond of peanut butter, but I sure ate it when WIC said it was something I was allowed to get. While that opens up a potential nightmare for government to try and satisfy the food related lobbyists and invites corruption, it at least does something to make people think about what is suitable nutrition.
Can you imagine the fights on what should be covered if the SNAP program was run that way, though?
It does seem to be creating much more of a burden for the stores, too, so fewer might end up participating, and to go against the idea of it being a simple, streamless program that works without having everyone around know someone is buying with food stamps or being annoyed that it's holding up the line or the like.
I admit I have not used SNAP or WIC ever, so don't know how WIC works in practice. The list of foods is pretty limited and definitely not one I see being agreed upon if it were open to debate, but who knows.
I'm not in favor of changing SNAP in this way, for the record, but just thinking about the proposal from a practical perspective. I think those pushing the change should explain how the details would work/change.3 -
Chef_Barbell wrote: »Chef_Barbell wrote: »Chef_Barbell wrote: »Realizing that this may derail the thread, but I think this is a great conversation.
As part of any temporary benefits application process what would be your opinion on mandatory education of the following (as applicable):
Nutrition/Weight Management
Cooking
Budgeting
Home Economics
Thinking back to my military service, where if one applied for financial assistance they had to first attend a basic finance course and have their budgets reviewed by a counselor. This was a very effective program with an extremely low rate of repeat applications.
Where does one find time for mandatory classes? Usually someone on assistance is already working a huge amount of hours a week and still can't get by. Then the time it takes to put food on the table, spend time with family, etc etc.Alatariel75 wrote: »JeromeBarry1 wrote: »VintageFeline wrote: »Bring back the poor house! The state should have full control over those pesky people daring to live in poverty and need state assistance.
I really despair of our attitude to those at the bottom of the pile.
I have a large number of First Cousins. One of them, who was one year older than I, was added to the welfare rolls at age 12 when her father died and she received U.S. Social Security benefits for being an orphan. Those expired when she turned 18, but college was free to her because of her orphan status. Preparing for that, she started producing children at age 16 so that she had government benefits for unmarried mothers and their children to replace her government benefits to orphans when she turned 18. At 19 she agreed to marry a man who was quite unable to produce an earned income and she kept receiving generous government assistance for her needy children, her low-income household, and oh-by-the-way her medical care was free, too. It was to her benefit that her older brother was a prosperous schmuck who provided her rent and grocery money unknown to the government. That's the cousin. I have a sister whose decidedly different course of life has been showered with great wealth. One day my sister was speaking with my cousin and asked her directly, "Why don't you get a job?" My cousin replied, "I make more money on welfare than I could at minimum wage."
It is that one person's story, my cousin, that more influences all my thoughts on government assistance to the needy than any other. She died of cancer 14 years ago because the free government medical care was a bit less than timely at delivering care.
We, as a society, don't need to be cruel as you parody, but we don't need to be schmucks, either.
I know this wasn't your point, but it does make me wonder at a society that pays so little in minimum wage that people in some circumstances are better off receiving aid instead of working . . . .
There was a documentary a couple of years ago, and I can't remember what it's called, but one of the people who was in it was a young single mother. Over the course of the documentary, all she wanted to do was find a job and get off of 'welfare'. She did end up finding a full time job, but realized that it put her over the cap pf being able to qualify for assistance but below what she actually needed to feed her kids. Obviously it's slanted (because it's a documentary), but I wonder how many people we have in the US in similar situations?
This causes me to ask the next level of "Why?"
Wage is based on market forces, primarily skill set, so why do we have a population lacking the skills to earn a minimum livable wage?
But the problem here is - those minimum, unlivable wage jobs will continue to exist, and need to be filled, even if the people currently in them manage to skill themselves out of them. So there will always be that group of people in those jobs (some with the skills to not be in them but without the available positions) who are stuck in this cycle.
Most of these jobs are temporary and transitional and intended for kids young adults entering the workplace. The intent is to gain additional skills, training and experience to work towards positions with greater responsibility and increased pay.
BLS stats:
https://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/minimum-wage/2016/home.htm
Seems very similar to dieting in a yo-yo cycle. Change will not come without changing behavior.
And? They aren't anymore and people have to do them.
There are ~330 M people living in the US, with ~255 M in the workforce. Only 700 k are at the minimum wage per BLS report cited.
https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t01.htm
These jobs certainly are temporary and transitional. The root cause is lack of job skills. Without addressing the root cause you are only addressing a symptom and dooming a population to a life of poverty.
And how do you suggest the root is addressed?
It has to be multifaceted - supplementation via SNAP, WIC is a correction, but not a corrective action.
For skills the entire college loan system needs to be overhauled and we need to stop subsidizing training to fields with no hope of employment. There are tremendous opportunities in the trades which are all on the verge of collapsing over the next two decades due to the baby boomer retirement. Per BLS we are going to lose ~65% of electricians, plumbers, carpenters, welders, etc. in the next decade. Public education either needs to re-incorporate tradeskills into the curriculum, or a private option needs to be created and incorporated into state curriculum. Forward thinking states are already doing this.
Government and industry need to look to long term solutions as opposed to the horrible shortsightedness we're grown accustomed to. It is in the best interests of everyone.
4 -
VintageFeline wrote: »I don't know if it's the same in the US but in the UK, 1% of the entire welfare spending budget is spent solely on unemployment benefits (though this excludes those also claiming housing benefit to pay rent). The rest is on pensions, in work support and disability benefits. So clearly there's a problem with corporate welfare if so little of the budget goes to unemployment and such a high amount is supporting those who should be able to afford to support themselves and family if they have one. Profits continue to rise, wages continue to stagnate.
Minimum wage is not a living wage. They actually work out the living wage every year, it's over £8ph, minimum wage for over 21s is £7.20 and this is before you take into account the vast differences in cost of living in different areas.
And at the end of the day, there will always be a need for cleaners, baristas, retail staff etc. Just because it's low skilled doesn't mean it should leave people in poverty and reliant on state support. Pretty ridiculous really. And here we are debating whether they should buy soda instead of why they are in need of support in the first place.
And the base problem with this (that no one wants to address) is that creating/mandating a 'living wage' is a self-defeating proposal.
How about a minimum basic income? Then no need for SNAP: https://www.libertarianism.org/columns/libertarian-case-basic-income4 -
Chef_Barbell wrote: »Chef_Barbell wrote: »Chef_Barbell wrote: »Realizing that this may derail the thread, but I think this is a great conversation.
As part of any temporary benefits application process what would be your opinion on mandatory education of the following (as applicable):
Nutrition/Weight Management
Cooking
Budgeting
Home Economics
Thinking back to my military service, where if one applied for financial assistance they had to first attend a basic finance course and have their budgets reviewed by a counselor. This was a very effective program with an extremely low rate of repeat applications.
Where does one find time for mandatory classes? Usually someone on assistance is already working a huge amount of hours a week and still can't get by. Then the time it takes to put food on the table, spend time with family, etc etc.Alatariel75 wrote: »JeromeBarry1 wrote: »VintageFeline wrote: »Bring back the poor house! The state should have full control over those pesky people daring to live in poverty and need state assistance.
I really despair of our attitude to those at the bottom of the pile.
I have a large number of First Cousins. One of them, who was one year older than I, was added to the welfare rolls at age 12 when her father died and she received U.S. Social Security benefits for being an orphan. Those expired when she turned 18, but college was free to her because of her orphan status. Preparing for that, she started producing children at age 16 so that she had government benefits for unmarried mothers and their children to replace her government benefits to orphans when she turned 18. At 19 she agreed to marry a man who was quite unable to produce an earned income and she kept receiving generous government assistance for her needy children, her low-income household, and oh-by-the-way her medical care was free, too. It was to her benefit that her older brother was a prosperous schmuck who provided her rent and grocery money unknown to the government. That's the cousin. I have a sister whose decidedly different course of life has been showered with great wealth. One day my sister was speaking with my cousin and asked her directly, "Why don't you get a job?" My cousin replied, "I make more money on welfare than I could at minimum wage."
It is that one person's story, my cousin, that more influences all my thoughts on government assistance to the needy than any other. She died of cancer 14 years ago because the free government medical care was a bit less than timely at delivering care.
We, as a society, don't need to be cruel as you parody, but we don't need to be schmucks, either.
I know this wasn't your point, but it does make me wonder at a society that pays so little in minimum wage that people in some circumstances are better off receiving aid instead of working . . . .
There was a documentary a couple of years ago, and I can't remember what it's called, but one of the people who was in it was a young single mother. Over the course of the documentary, all she wanted to do was find a job and get off of 'welfare'. She did end up finding a full time job, but realized that it put her over the cap pf being able to qualify for assistance but below what she actually needed to feed her kids. Obviously it's slanted (because it's a documentary), but I wonder how many people we have in the US in similar situations?
This causes me to ask the next level of "Why?"
Wage is based on market forces, primarily skill set, so why do we have a population lacking the skills to earn a minimum livable wage?
But the problem here is - those minimum, unlivable wage jobs will continue to exist, and need to be filled, even if the people currently in them manage to skill themselves out of them. So there will always be that group of people in those jobs (some with the skills to not be in them but without the available positions) who are stuck in this cycle.
Most of these jobs are temporary and transitional and intended for kids young adults entering the workplace. The intent is to gain additional skills, training and experience to work towards positions with greater responsibility and increased pay.
BLS stats:
https://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/minimum-wage/2016/home.htm
Seems very similar to dieting in a yo-yo cycle. Change will not come without changing behavior.
And? They aren't anymore and people have to do them.
There are ~330 M people living in the US, with ~255 M in the workforce. Only 700 k are at the minimum wage per BLS report cited.
https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t01.htm
These jobs certainly are temporary and transitional. The root cause is lack of job skills. Without addressing the root cause you are only addressing a symptom and dooming a population to a life of poverty.
And how do you suggest the root is addressed?
It has to be multifaceted - supplementation via SNAP, WIC is a correction, but not a corrective action.
For skills the entire college loan system needs to be overhauled and we need to stop subsidizing training to fields with no hope of employment. There are tremendous opportunities in the trades which are all on the verge of collapsing over the next two decades due to the baby boomer retirement. Per BLS we are going to lose ~65% of electricians, plumbers, carpenters, welders, etc. in the next decade. Public education either needs to re-incorporate tradeskills into the curriculum, or a private option needs to be created and incorporated into state curriculum. Forward thinking states are already doing this.
Government and industry need to look to long term solutions as opposed to the horrible shortsightedness we're grown accustomed to. It is in the best interests of everyone.
That all sounds good in a perfect world.2 -
Chef_Barbell wrote: »Chef_Barbell wrote: »Chef_Barbell wrote: »Chef_Barbell wrote: »Realizing that this may derail the thread, but I think this is a great conversation.
As part of any temporary benefits application process what would be your opinion on mandatory education of the following (as applicable):
Nutrition/Weight Management
Cooking
Budgeting
Home Economics
Thinking back to my military service, where if one applied for financial assistance they had to first attend a basic finance course and have their budgets reviewed by a counselor. This was a very effective program with an extremely low rate of repeat applications.
Where does one find time for mandatory classes? Usually someone on assistance is already working a huge amount of hours a week and still can't get by. Then the time it takes to put food on the table, spend time with family, etc etc.Alatariel75 wrote: »JeromeBarry1 wrote: »VintageFeline wrote: »Bring back the poor house! The state should have full control over those pesky people daring to live in poverty and need state assistance.
I really despair of our attitude to those at the bottom of the pile.
I have a large number of First Cousins. One of them, who was one year older than I, was added to the welfare rolls at age 12 when her father died and she received U.S. Social Security benefits for being an orphan. Those expired when she turned 18, but college was free to her because of her orphan status. Preparing for that, she started producing children at age 16 so that she had government benefits for unmarried mothers and their children to replace her government benefits to orphans when she turned 18. At 19 she agreed to marry a man who was quite unable to produce an earned income and she kept receiving generous government assistance for her needy children, her low-income household, and oh-by-the-way her medical care was free, too. It was to her benefit that her older brother was a prosperous schmuck who provided her rent and grocery money unknown to the government. That's the cousin. I have a sister whose decidedly different course of life has been showered with great wealth. One day my sister was speaking with my cousin and asked her directly, "Why don't you get a job?" My cousin replied, "I make more money on welfare than I could at minimum wage."
It is that one person's story, my cousin, that more influences all my thoughts on government assistance to the needy than any other. She died of cancer 14 years ago because the free government medical care was a bit less than timely at delivering care.
We, as a society, don't need to be cruel as you parody, but we don't need to be schmucks, either.
I know this wasn't your point, but it does make me wonder at a society that pays so little in minimum wage that people in some circumstances are better off receiving aid instead of working . . . .
There was a documentary a couple of years ago, and I can't remember what it's called, but one of the people who was in it was a young single mother. Over the course of the documentary, all she wanted to do was find a job and get off of 'welfare'. She did end up finding a full time job, but realized that it put her over the cap pf being able to qualify for assistance but below what she actually needed to feed her kids. Obviously it's slanted (because it's a documentary), but I wonder how many people we have in the US in similar situations?
This causes me to ask the next level of "Why?"
Wage is based on market forces, primarily skill set, so why do we have a population lacking the skills to earn a minimum livable wage?
But the problem here is - those minimum, unlivable wage jobs will continue to exist, and need to be filled, even if the people currently in them manage to skill themselves out of them. So there will always be that group of people in those jobs (some with the skills to not be in them but without the available positions) who are stuck in this cycle.
Most of these jobs are temporary and transitional and intended for kids young adults entering the workplace. The intent is to gain additional skills, training and experience to work towards positions with greater responsibility and increased pay.
BLS stats:
https://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/minimum-wage/2016/home.htm
Seems very similar to dieting in a yo-yo cycle. Change will not come without changing behavior.
And? They aren't anymore and people have to do them.
There are ~330 M people living in the US, with ~255 M in the workforce. Only 700 k are at the minimum wage per BLS report cited.
https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t01.htm
These jobs certainly are temporary and transitional. The root cause is lack of job skills. Without addressing the root cause you are only addressing a symptom and dooming a population to a life of poverty.
And how do you suggest the root is addressed?
It has to be multifaceted - supplementation via SNAP, WIC is a correction, but not a corrective action.
For skills the entire college loan system needs to be overhauled and we need to stop subsidizing training to fields with no hope of employment. There are tremendous opportunities in the trades which are all on the verge of collapsing over the next two decades due to the baby boomer retirement. Per BLS we are going to lose ~65% of electricians, plumbers, carpenters, welders, etc. in the next decade. Public education either needs to re-incorporate tradeskills into the curriculum, or a private option needs to be created and incorporated into state curriculum. Forward thinking states are already doing this.
Government and industry need to look to long term solutions as opposed to the horrible shortsightedness we're grown accustomed to. It is in the best interests of everyone.
That all sounds good in a perfect world.
Personal responsibility > government intervention
Every time.
5 -
Strawblackcat wrote: »
The calories from the soda are entirely empty, though. Unless the manufacturer adds vitamins or something to it, then it's just sugar, or artificial sweeteners (if it's diet soda). Increased sugar consumption has been linked to increased incidences of obesity and diabetes (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4277009/), and it's much easier to guzzle a 20oz bottle of Coke (with all the 260 non-filling and non-nourishing calories that it has) than it is to eat 260 calories of fruit, veggies, whole grains, or some other kind of food that provides any kind of micronutrient value. There's no health-related reason (for example, the prevention of malnourishment, which SNAP is supposed to help do) for the government to subsidize the consumption of soda.janejellyroll wrote: »Strawblackcat wrote: »janejellyroll wrote: »Need2Exerc1se wrote: »janejellyroll wrote: »Need2Exerc1se wrote: »janejellyroll wrote: »Strawblackcat wrote: »I'm in favor of what someone else suggested a few pages ago by making SNAP work more like WIC. Nutritious items like fruits, vegetables, meats, while grains, and dairy items would be approved for purchase by the program, and items that didn't have approval (like cookies, crackers, soda, etc.) Would be paid for by the buyer's money. SNAP is meant to help people afford to buy enough food to eat. It's not meant to cover 100% of a person's food budget. If someone in SNAP wants to buy soda, that's fine, but they should use their own money to pay for that and use their SNAP benefits to buy actual food.
If my food budget is $20 and $10 of that is from SNAP, why does it matter I'm actually purchasing the soda with? If I use my SNAP to buy $2 worth of beans and then use my $2 that I didn't spend on beans to buy soda or vice versa, it's the exact same result.
It's one thing to need help feeding your family and another to ask for help feeding your family and then use that help for luxuries.
It's being used for "luxuries" (if soda can be considered such) anyway. Whether it is directly paying for them or people are using the money that is freed up to buy soda doesn't seem relevant to me.
It's one thing to use your own money for luxuries, another to use other people's tax dollars.
So you see a relevant difference between directly using the benefits to buy soda and using the money that has been freed up because SNAP covered pasta or beans or whatever to buy soda?
It's true that soda is still being bought, if that's the point you're trying to make.
The difference is that if someone is using SNAP dollars to buy soda, then the government is essentially using tax dollars to pay for a food that is a major contributor to obesity, which causes an increased for many chronic diseases, which would then necessitate medical care that would probably be paid for using Medicare/Medicaid, spending more tax money in the process.
What you use your own money for is your deal.
I suppose what I'm trying to say is that I don't believe that it's right for someone to use public money to buy things that contribute to health problems that would then have to be dealt with by using more public money.
An excess of calories can come from any food though. Soda is just one source of excess calories. If you look at the bulk of the calories in the American diet, soda is only the fourth highest source of calories.
I'm unclear why we would skip 1-3 and go right to 4.
At the end of the day, it's true that the cutting caloric intake is a multi-headed hydra for most Americans, but if consumption of one of the major contributors could be cut by any amount, then I would consider that to be a win from a public health perspective. At the very least, the government shouldn't be encouraging soda consumption by being willing to pay for it.
Well, calories from soda provide carbohydrates, a macronutrient. I disagree with it being empty calories (I understand this may not be a popular position). I can understand better the argument against diet soda (since it provides virtually zero calories and wouldn't play a role in preventing malnourishment).
It seems odd that a program designed to prevent hunger is actually getting suggestions on how to reduce the amount of calories that people consume. It's just another sign, I guess, of how broken our modern relationship with food is.
If the argument is that it's better to eat fruit, vegetables, or whole grains and that people will choose these if their benefits won't get soda, why not consider the number one source of calories in the US diet -- grain-based desserts? I understand the argument some people are making that we shouldn't provide money for major contributors to obesity or that we need to encourage people to make better choices. It's the focus on soda alone that I don't get.4 -
janejellyroll wrote: »VintageFeline wrote: »I don't know if it's the same in the US but in the UK, 1% of the entire welfare spending budget is spent solely on unemployment benefits (though this excludes those also claiming housing benefit to pay rent). The rest is on pensions, in work support and disability benefits. So clearly there's a problem with corporate welfare if so little of the budget goes to unemployment and such a high amount is supporting those who should be able to afford to support themselves and family if they have one. Profits continue to rise, wages continue to stagnate.
Minimum wage is not a living wage. They actually work out the living wage every year, it's over £8ph, minimum wage for over 21s is £7.20 and this is before you take into account the vast differences in cost of living in different areas.
And at the end of the day, there will always be a need for cleaners, baristas, retail staff etc. Just because it's low skilled doesn't mean it should leave people in poverty and reliant on state support. Pretty ridiculous really. And here we are debating whether they should buy soda instead of why they are in need of support in the first place.
When you have a service economy that is based on a large number of workers making less than a living wage, government benefits are (IMO) actually subsidizing businesses.
There are a lot of business plans that rely on low wage workers and if that doesn't change, I don't see an easy way to transition away from the government helping people meet their needs for food, healthcare, and housing.
Agreed. It's what I was referring to when I said corporate welfare.2 -
dfnewcombe wrote: »I wonder if the responses in favor of restricting soda are financially motivated- meaning they believe that money will be spent more wisely and efficiently if soda is no longer something that can be purchased by the SNAP funds or if there truly is concern for the well-being of individuals who need the assistance- since they cannot purchase soda, they will have an improved diet leading to improved overall health.
I wonder if research would truly support either conclusion or if the additional regulation would serve any useful purpose at all. And the unintended consequences.... I wonder what Dr. Pepper has to say about all this.....
I'd bet good money it's all symbolic and would make no difference.
On the other hand, eliminating soda really doesn't bother me (but nor am I particularly desirous that we do that).
I can see the argument that we shouldn't further subsidize soda companies by subsidizing their purchase if we as a society think soda is a net harm (I realize that many MFPers do not think that, likely the majority, but I think it's a common view), and there's an easy way to do it which is to say SNAP pays for only items that are taxed as food by the state. (Not all states distinguish, as some have no sales tax at all, but many, perhaps most do.) I also don't see it as especially different from saying that SNAP does not pay for non food, alcohol, or prepared foods, which we already do.
What I don't like about it, and why I think there's opposition in large part, is that the symbolic message being pushed by such a rule is that we are assuming there's a problem with lower income people having no clue how to feed their kids or themselves and wasting money on lots and lots of soda. Is this true for some? I'm sure, but same with people not on SNAP, and I do think there's a real (and rather nasty) desire in some of the rhetoric nationally to stigmatize and shame the poor.4 -
lemurcat12 wrote: »jhildebrandt73 wrote: »Have you actually ever used WIC?
I have, and what it does, for those who use it as an exclusive source for food income, is forces you to use the items it endorses. I am not particularly fond of peanut butter, but I sure ate it when WIC said it was something I was allowed to get. While that opens up a potential nightmare for government to try and satisfy the food related lobbyists and invites corruption, it at least does something to make people think about what is suitable nutrition.
Can you imagine the fights on what should be covered if the SNAP program was run that way, though?
It does seem to be creating much more of a burden for the stores, too, so fewer might end up participating, and to go against the idea of it being a simple, streamless program that works without having everyone around know someone is buying with food stamps or being annoyed that it's holding up the line or the like.
I admit I have not used SNAP or WIC ever, so don't know how WIC works in practice. The list of foods is pretty limited and definitely not one I see being agreed upon if it were open to debate, but who knows.
I'm not in favor of changing SNAP in this way, for the record, but just thinking about the proposal from a practical perspective. I think those pushing the change should explain how the details would work/change.
I've been a grocery store cashier and it took way longer to process WIC transactions (this was a few years ago, so the process may be easier now). There is also more inconvenience with customers getting the wrong item/wrong size and having to go back to get the right one.
4 -
VintageFeline wrote: »I don't know if it's the same in the US but in the UK, 1% of the entire welfare spending budget is spent solely on unemployment benefits (though this excludes those also claiming housing benefit to pay rent). The rest is on pensions, in work support and disability benefits. So clearly there's a problem with corporate welfare if so little of the budget goes to unemployment and such a high amount is supporting those who should be able to afford to support themselves and family if they have one. Profits continue to rise, wages continue to stagnate.
Minimum wage is not a living wage. They actually work out the living wage every year, it's over £8ph, minimum wage for over 21s is £7.20 and this is before you take into account the vast differences in cost of living in different areas.
And at the end of the day, there will always be a need for cleaners, baristas, retail staff etc. Just because it's low skilled doesn't mean it should leave people in poverty and reliant on state support. Pretty ridiculous really. And here we are debating whether they should buy soda instead of why they are in need of support in the first place.
And the base problem with this (that no one wants to address) is that creating/mandating a 'living wage' is a self-defeating proposal.
Shrug. Australia manages.6 -
Chef_Barbell wrote: »Chef_Barbell wrote: »Chef_Barbell wrote: »Chef_Barbell wrote: »Realizing that this may derail the thread, but I think this is a great conversation.
As part of any temporary benefits application process what would be your opinion on mandatory education of the following (as applicable):
Nutrition/Weight Management
Cooking
Budgeting
Home Economics
Thinking back to my military service, where if one applied for financial assistance they had to first attend a basic finance course and have their budgets reviewed by a counselor. This was a very effective program with an extremely low rate of repeat applications.
Where does one find time for mandatory classes? Usually someone on assistance is already working a huge amount of hours a week and still can't get by. Then the time it takes to put food on the table, spend time with family, etc etc.Alatariel75 wrote: »JeromeBarry1 wrote: »VintageFeline wrote: »Bring back the poor house! The state should have full control over those pesky people daring to live in poverty and need state assistance.
I really despair of our attitude to those at the bottom of the pile.
I have a large number of First Cousins. One of them, who was one year older than I, was added to the welfare rolls at age 12 when her father died and she received U.S. Social Security benefits for being an orphan. Those expired when she turned 18, but college was free to her because of her orphan status. Preparing for that, she started producing children at age 16 so that she had government benefits for unmarried mothers and their children to replace her government benefits to orphans when she turned 18. At 19 she agreed to marry a man who was quite unable to produce an earned income and she kept receiving generous government assistance for her needy children, her low-income household, and oh-by-the-way her medical care was free, too. It was to her benefit that her older brother was a prosperous schmuck who provided her rent and grocery money unknown to the government. That's the cousin. I have a sister whose decidedly different course of life has been showered with great wealth. One day my sister was speaking with my cousin and asked her directly, "Why don't you get a job?" My cousin replied, "I make more money on welfare than I could at minimum wage."
It is that one person's story, my cousin, that more influences all my thoughts on government assistance to the needy than any other. She died of cancer 14 years ago because the free government medical care was a bit less than timely at delivering care.
We, as a society, don't need to be cruel as you parody, but we don't need to be schmucks, either.
I know this wasn't your point, but it does make me wonder at a society that pays so little in minimum wage that people in some circumstances are better off receiving aid instead of working . . . .
There was a documentary a couple of years ago, and I can't remember what it's called, but one of the people who was in it was a young single mother. Over the course of the documentary, all she wanted to do was find a job and get off of 'welfare'. She did end up finding a full time job, but realized that it put her over the cap pf being able to qualify for assistance but below what she actually needed to feed her kids. Obviously it's slanted (because it's a documentary), but I wonder how many people we have in the US in similar situations?
This causes me to ask the next level of "Why?"
Wage is based on market forces, primarily skill set, so why do we have a population lacking the skills to earn a minimum livable wage?
But the problem here is - those minimum, unlivable wage jobs will continue to exist, and need to be filled, even if the people currently in them manage to skill themselves out of them. So there will always be that group of people in those jobs (some with the skills to not be in them but without the available positions) who are stuck in this cycle.
Most of these jobs are temporary and transitional and intended for kids young adults entering the workplace. The intent is to gain additional skills, training and experience to work towards positions with greater responsibility and increased pay.
BLS stats:
https://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/minimum-wage/2016/home.htm
Seems very similar to dieting in a yo-yo cycle. Change will not come without changing behavior.
And? They aren't anymore and people have to do them.
There are ~330 M people living in the US, with ~255 M in the workforce. Only 700 k are at the minimum wage per BLS report cited.
https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t01.htm
These jobs certainly are temporary and transitional. The root cause is lack of job skills. Without addressing the root cause you are only addressing a symptom and dooming a population to a life of poverty.
And how do you suggest the root is addressed?
It has to be multifaceted - supplementation via SNAP, WIC is a correction, but not a corrective action.
For skills the entire college loan system needs to be overhauled and we need to stop subsidizing training to fields with no hope of employment. There are tremendous opportunities in the trades which are all on the verge of collapsing over the next two decades due to the baby boomer retirement. Per BLS we are going to lose ~65% of electricians, plumbers, carpenters, welders, etc. in the next decade. Public education either needs to re-incorporate tradeskills into the curriculum, or a private option needs to be created and incorporated into state curriculum. Forward thinking states are already doing this.
Government and industry need to look to long term solutions as opposed to the horrible shortsightedness we're grown accustomed to. It is in the best interests of everyone.
That all sounds good in a perfect world.
Personal responsibility > government intervention
Every time.
How does personal responsibility come into play for this?
Are we talking about people who lost their jobs and need temporary help or are we talking about chronic unemployment or underemployment?
Is this just a pull themselves up by their bootstraps and just make it happen?3 -
lemurcat12 wrote: »VintageFeline wrote: »I don't know if it's the same in the US but in the UK, 1% of the entire welfare spending budget is spent solely on unemployment benefits (though this excludes those also claiming housing benefit to pay rent). The rest is on pensions, in work support and disability benefits. So clearly there's a problem with corporate welfare if so little of the budget goes to unemployment and such a high amount is supporting those who should be able to afford to support themselves and family if they have one. Profits continue to rise, wages continue to stagnate.
Minimum wage is not a living wage. They actually work out the living wage every year, it's over £8ph, minimum wage for over 21s is £7.20 and this is before you take into account the vast differences in cost of living in different areas.
And at the end of the day, there will always be a need for cleaners, baristas, retail staff etc. Just because it's low skilled doesn't mean it should leave people in poverty and reliant on state support. Pretty ridiculous really. And here we are debating whether they should buy soda instead of why they are in need of support in the first place.
And the base problem with this (that no one wants to address) is that creating/mandating a 'living wage' is a self-defeating proposal.
How about a minimum basic income? Then no need for SNAP: https://www.libertarianism.org/columns/libertarian-case-basic-income
I think it makes perfect sense (in theory who knows what the unintended consequences would be) but it would be an incredibly hard sell in the US I think. Even something as straight forward as single-payer health care - that's proven the world over to be cheaper and more effective than what we have in the US - is rejected out of hand.6 -
richardgavel wrote: »Don't we tell people in these same MFP forums that there aren't good foods and bad foods when it comes to weight loss and that what is generally considered "junk food" is OK as long as it's in moderation and fits within your calorie budget?
Yeah but that approach doesn't allow you to shame poor people and for some, that's the most important thing.17 -
lemurcat12 wrote: »VintageFeline wrote: »I don't know if it's the same in the US but in the UK, 1% of the entire welfare spending budget is spent solely on unemployment benefits (though this excludes those also claiming housing benefit to pay rent). The rest is on pensions, in work support and disability benefits. So clearly there's a problem with corporate welfare if so little of the budget goes to unemployment and such a high amount is supporting those who should be able to afford to support themselves and family if they have one. Profits continue to rise, wages continue to stagnate.
Minimum wage is not a living wage. They actually work out the living wage every year, it's over £8ph, minimum wage for over 21s is £7.20 and this is before you take into account the vast differences in cost of living in different areas.
And at the end of the day, there will always be a need for cleaners, baristas, retail staff etc. Just because it's low skilled doesn't mean it should leave people in poverty and reliant on state support. Pretty ridiculous really. And here we are debating whether they should buy soda instead of why they are in need of support in the first place.
And the base problem with this (that no one wants to address) is that creating/mandating a 'living wage' is a self-defeating proposal.
How about a minimum basic income? Then no need for SNAP: https://www.libertarianism.org/columns/libertarian-case-basic-income
The problem that I have with that proposal (and the author rather glosses over it in the article that you linked) is I believe the disincentive to work would be MUCH greater than the author thinks and would in effect create a much larger 'welfare state' than what we have today.2 -
AlabasterVerve wrote: »lemurcat12 wrote: »VintageFeline wrote: »I don't know if it's the same in the US but in the UK, 1% of the entire welfare spending budget is spent solely on unemployment benefits (though this excludes those also claiming housing benefit to pay rent). The rest is on pensions, in work support and disability benefits. So clearly there's a problem with corporate welfare if so little of the budget goes to unemployment and such a high amount is supporting those who should be able to afford to support themselves and family if they have one. Profits continue to rise, wages continue to stagnate.
Minimum wage is not a living wage. They actually work out the living wage every year, it's over £8ph, minimum wage for over 21s is £7.20 and this is before you take into account the vast differences in cost of living in different areas.
And at the end of the day, there will always be a need for cleaners, baristas, retail staff etc. Just because it's low skilled doesn't mean it should leave people in poverty and reliant on state support. Pretty ridiculous really. And here we are debating whether they should buy soda instead of why they are in need of support in the first place.
And the base problem with this (that no one wants to address) is that creating/mandating a 'living wage' is a self-defeating proposal.
How about a minimum basic income? Then no need for SNAP: https://www.libertarianism.org/columns/libertarian-case-basic-income
I think it makes perfect sense (in theory who knows what the unintended consequences would be) but it would be an incredibly hard sell in the US I think. Even something as straight forward as single-payer health care - that's proven the world over to be cheaper and more effective than what we have in the US - is rejected out of hand.
Yep, I agree with you on both counts.0 -
lemurcat12 wrote: »French_Peasant wrote: »OliveGirl128 wrote: »janejellyroll wrote: »LJGettinSexy wrote: »Need2Exerc1se wrote: »LJGettinSexy wrote: »OliveGirl128 wrote: »LJGettinSexy wrote: »OliveGirl128 wrote: »LJGettinSexy wrote: »GlassAngyl wrote: »Totally for it. And they should add all junk food items as well. Leave baking items and they can make junk from scratch...
Then you'd complain they were spending the money on steaks and shrimp, I here it all the time. Food is expensive for the working poor ( not making a living wage and not poor enough for aid) and soda is cheap. Natural and healthier choices are twice as much as junk food, or haven't you noticed
This is thrown out all the time, but many times it's just not true. I eat a very 'healthy' diet and I fit it in, along with the rest of my family's groceries, on a pretty small grocery budget. Beans, whole grains, frozen veggies, frozen chicken etc are all pretty inexpensive.
1. Have you ever been on food stamps?
2. Have you ever been poor in your life?
3. Are you still poor?
Answer those and maybe we can have a deeper discussion
I actually grew up dumpster diving sometimes, alongside my parents and sisters, so if you'd like to have a deeper discussion about poverty I'd be more than willing to have one with you. You probably won't like what I have to say though
And I stand by what I said-I feed a family of 5 on a very tight grocery budget, and I eat a very 'healthy' diet (I follow the DASH protocol), and my family eats a fairly balanced diet as well. Nutrient dense foods are not automatically more expensive, and I've found that they're actually cheaper than convenience foods. This idea that that 'healthy' is more expensive is just not true many times.
eta: actually, no I'm not going to go there, because my past is a pretty dark place and I have no interest in revisiting it, especially on a public forum. Needless to say, yes I know what it's like to be truly poor, probably more than most posters in this thread. But that has absolutely nothing to do with my pp, which is that I feed myself and my family a well balanced, 'healthy' diet and do so on a very tight grocery budget, ($100 a week for 5 people/2 cats, and it also includes non-food items). Beans, whole grains, frozen veggies, bagged frozen chicken etc are usually inexpensive options and are staples in my house. The idea that 'healthy' automatically means more expensive is false.
We all have dark places that we don't want to visit and that's why it's absurd to try to think for someone else. You don't know another person's circumstance so they shouldn't be judged simply by what they buy in a grocery store. We all have to learn that, you of all people since you were a dumpster diver. When I go to buy groceries, I've noticed that food is expensive and getting higher by the day. Organic food is outrageously priced and that's supposed to be the healthiest. Fresh fruit is ridiculously high and fresh squeezed juice, no way. You can't buy a single piece of fruit for less than a dollar unless it's a banana. Now imagine feeding a family of 4. Yeah you can buy only grains and wheat, but what do you do with that? You need a balanced diet to eat healthy and trying to buy all four food groups for a growing family is expensive. BTW, chicken is not inexpensive, who eats beans and what is whole grains and how do you just eat them?
This is where nutrition counseling could be helpful. Organic or fresh foods are necessarily the healthiest. Frozen or canned vegetables provide plenty of nutrients. Dried beans and grains are very healthy. A ribeye at $15 per lb is not more nutrition than round steak at $4 per lb. Thinking that a balanced diet only comes from expensive foods shows a lack of nutrition knowledge.
I didn't say a balanced diet only comes from expensive foods, I said the healthier foods are more expensive. You can get family size bags of potato chips 2/$4 or bogo but 2lbs of grapes $7.98. I shop every week for groceries and I am not making this up for the sake of argument, I've been shopping for decades and have seen the rising prices of food. Parkay Butter spray is $3 for 8oz bottle but you can get Blue Bonnet margarine 4 stick pkg at 2/$1, and these are staples, so there is no nutritional counseling for me, maybe you need counseling for the real world.
You don't need to choose between grapes and potato chips. Things like beans, rice, frozen vegetables, onions, carrots, cabbage, oats, potatoes . . . . all very affordable (at least where I live). Yeah, anyone wanting a lot of fresh fruit is going to pay more, but that's not required for a healthy diet.
But people don't actually eat beans and whole grains like oats, according to pp.
It's regrettable, because beans + rice + lard + chicken gizzards, hearts, pieces and parts = magic.
Or at least one of the foundation dishes of Cajun and Creole cookery, admired around the world.
http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/baked-louisiana-dirty-rice-beans
ETA: the first recipe is overly gentrified and not dirty enough. Here is one using a lard-based roux, gizzards and livers. I would also increase the amount of the "Trinity and the Pope" (vegetables and garlic) and add in black beans for a more complete dish nutrition-wise.
https://dricksramblingcafe.blogspot.com/2009/11/cajun-dirty-rice.html
Yeah, lots of low cost, filling foods are available, and they don't require fresh fruit out of season, expensive fresh veg out of season, and certainly not Parkay spray, which I would never buy or call especially healthy (vs. generic store brand butter without the mark up for pretend health and being able to spray it or just cooking with the fat from a slightly lower cost cut of meat). I am so much in favor of these dishes being cooked, preserved, taught, celebrated.
One of the problems with these kinds of dishes is, of course, that they are more time consuming, and that's a real issue, and of course knowledge -- which community classes can help with if people have the time to take them.
Also, if you don't know what you are doing and have to shift there's often a higher cost to changing -- someone relying on convenience foods who loses a job or decides to change her eating won't necessarily know how to switch to relying on beans and grains and greens and the like, or even potatoes and chicken thighs and frozen veg or in season fresh veg (although the veg are easier).
There was a good article I linked a while back about one issue for poorer families with eating veg is fear of waste. This isn't that tough a problem to figure out, but the barriers in the short term can be high.
This should be paid more attention to. Having the best plan in the world is useless if you can't get people to buy into it and people who face too many short term barriers are unlikely to sacrifice in order to make the change.3 -
lemurcat12 wrote: »VintageFeline wrote: »I don't know if it's the same in the US but in the UK, 1% of the entire welfare spending budget is spent solely on unemployment benefits (though this excludes those also claiming housing benefit to pay rent). The rest is on pensions, in work support and disability benefits. So clearly there's a problem with corporate welfare if so little of the budget goes to unemployment and such a high amount is supporting those who should be able to afford to support themselves and family if they have one. Profits continue to rise, wages continue to stagnate.
Minimum wage is not a living wage. They actually work out the living wage every year, it's over £8ph, minimum wage for over 21s is £7.20 and this is before you take into account the vast differences in cost of living in different areas.
And at the end of the day, there will always be a need for cleaners, baristas, retail staff etc. Just because it's low skilled doesn't mean it should leave people in poverty and reliant on state support. Pretty ridiculous really. And here we are debating whether they should buy soda instead of why they are in need of support in the first place.
And the base problem with this (that no one wants to address) is that creating/mandating a 'living wage' is a self-defeating proposal.
How about a minimum basic income? Then no need for SNAP: https://www.libertarianism.org/columns/libertarian-case-basic-income
The problem that I have with that proposal (and the author rather glosses over it in the article that you linked) is I believe the disincentive to work would be MUCH greater than the author thinks and would in effect create a much larger 'welfare state' than what we have today.
I think the research has been done and it actually leads to greater employment and creativity etc.
And realistically, the more automation we have, the fewer jobs there are going to be. I think something like a basic income is going to become essential at some point.3 -
richardgavel wrote: »Don't we tell people in these same MFP forums that there aren't good foods and bad foods when it comes to weight loss and that what is generally considered "junk food" is OK as long as it's in moderation and fits within your calorie budget?
Yeah but that approach doesn't allow you to shame poor people and for some, that's the most important thing.
I'm totally feeling the shaming because apparently because I live in poverty I am uneducated, overweight, don't know how to budget and make tons of bad decisions5 -
lemurcat12 wrote: »VintageFeline wrote: »I don't know if it's the same in the US but in the UK, 1% of the entire welfare spending budget is spent solely on unemployment benefits (though this excludes those also claiming housing benefit to pay rent). The rest is on pensions, in work support and disability benefits. So clearly there's a problem with corporate welfare if so little of the budget goes to unemployment and such a high amount is supporting those who should be able to afford to support themselves and family if they have one. Profits continue to rise, wages continue to stagnate.
Minimum wage is not a living wage. They actually work out the living wage every year, it's over £8ph, minimum wage for over 21s is £7.20 and this is before you take into account the vast differences in cost of living in different areas.
And at the end of the day, there will always be a need for cleaners, baristas, retail staff etc. Just because it's low skilled doesn't mean it should leave people in poverty and reliant on state support. Pretty ridiculous really. And here we are debating whether they should buy soda instead of why they are in need of support in the first place.
And the base problem with this (that no one wants to address) is that creating/mandating a 'living wage' is a self-defeating proposal.
How about a minimum basic income? Then no need for SNAP: https://www.libertarianism.org/columns/libertarian-case-basic-income
Thank you for this link - an excellent idea I have been a strong proponent of for some time now.1 -
VintageFeline wrote: »VintageFeline wrote: »I don't know if it's the same in the US but in the UK, 1% of the entire welfare spending budget is spent solely on unemployment benefits (though this excludes those also claiming housing benefit to pay rent). The rest is on pensions, in work support and disability benefits. So clearly there's a problem with corporate welfare if so little of the budget goes to unemployment and such a high amount is supporting those who should be able to afford to support themselves and family if they have one. Profits continue to rise, wages continue to stagnate.
Minimum wage is not a living wage. They actually work out the living wage every year, it's over £8ph, minimum wage for over 21s is £7.20 and this is before you take into account the vast differences in cost of living in different areas.
And at the end of the day, there will always be a need for cleaners, baristas, retail staff etc. Just because it's low skilled doesn't mean it should leave people in poverty and reliant on state support. Pretty ridiculous really. And here we are debating whether they should buy soda instead of why they are in need of support in the first place.
And the base problem with this (that no one wants to address) is that creating/mandating a 'living wage' is a self-defeating proposal.
Shrug. Australia manages.
Australia manages, but costs are much higher (at least from what I have seen posted on these boards) and they also do not have near the population pressure that the US has. Also, there is the need to address the effect that increasing the minimum wage has on automation and replacement of the wage-earner with machines (thereby increasing the problem with lack of wages). Current proposals for minimum wage hikes in the US already has a large segment of the fast-food industry (by far one of the largest payers of the minimum wages) experimenting with robots that can do everything from cooking the burgers to taking/delivering your order. I expect that within a year (if not less) we will have fully automatic (or nearly so) Mikey-D's as a commonplace sight here in the US.1
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