SNAP study is just gross

janeite1990

Caution, you may see this as a political rant. If you don't like those, hit the back button.

This link:

http://www.fns.usda.gov/ora/menu/Published/snap/FILES/ProgramOperations/FSPFoodRestrictions.pdf

Will take you to the federal government's justification for not restricting the type of food items bought with SNAP, or food stamps. For example, the SNAP website says
oft drinks, candy, cookies, snack crackers, and ice cream are food items and are therefore eligible items

Seafood, steak, and bakery cakes are also food items and are therefore eligible items

Since the current definition of food is a specific part of the Act, any change to this definition would require action by a member of Congress. Several times in the history of SNAP, Congress had considered placing limits on the types of food that could be purchased with program benefits. However, they concluded that designating foods as luxury or non-nutritious would be administratively costly and burdensome.

That last sentence is just dumb in the first place. Really? It is too costly to say sodas can't be bought with SNAP, so it costs less to pay for them?

Then, within the document, there are the most idiotic comparisons. An example:

"Some candy bars have a lower percentage of calories from fat and less saturated fat than a
serving of cheddar cheese."

Yeah, no ****. Except the cheese also has nutrients, and most candy bars are just sugar and fat. Bud don't look at that part, it is too administratively burdensome to think about that.

Ug, I had a feeling that program was a waste. Now I'm sure.

---

****STAFF NOTE: Post has been locked*****

I wanted to offer a brief explanation for the locking of this thread.

The forum guidelines include this item:

16. No Political Topics in the Main Forums

Political content is not allowed on the Main Forums. This includes images. Please form or join a Group if you would like to engage in political debate on MyFitnessPal. http://www.myfitnesspal.com/groups

If you would like to review the forum guidelines, please visit the following link:

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/welcome/guidelines

At our discretion, this locked thread may be deleted entirely in the near future.

With respect,
Scott
MyFitnessPal Staff

AZKristi

The costly part obviously isn't saying that something is bad and should not be purchased with SNAP benefits. The costly part is the huge government bureaucracy that would be required to enforce the changes once they were enacted.

That is not to say it can't be done. The WIC program is a great example of providing families with nutritious food.

SelfHelpJunky

I agree with what you're saying, but then if the mechanisms were put into place to regulate the nutritional quality of the food that is purchased, people would complain about the cost of that, too. Of course, the only real solution would be for people to make quality food choices, but we all know that's not going to happen.

jrwatson87

God forbid low-income families occasionally treat themselves to a candy bar. The program is not a waste. Let people make their own decisions.

oohmercyme

God forbid low-income families occasionally treat themselves to a candy bar.

This!

maremare312

Have you ever had to use the program? Your attitude is just gross.

Tweety1983

Well I feed my kids foo from the garden and I but mostly whole grain breads and lean meats. But on occasion I also need to buy them some sweats, or candy for easter, christmas etc, and do to my current finacial situation if I didnt have SNAP benefits I wouldnt eat. So I believe it is the one who is receiving the SNAP benefits to determine wheather they want to get clean and healthy, not for the goverment or you to regulate it!!! Thanks

PiggySweet

Might not be related, but i'm a cashier and someone bought i tiny $50 jar of caviar with their access card today... My week's worth of groceries only cost $35 (and that's WITH vegan icecream and chocolate covered cherries)

slenderizeme

Placing restrictions on what they can buy might be confusing. If they didn't have the right items, the cashier would have to tell them that they did not buy the eligible items for the SNAP program. That would be humiliating. Doesn't everyone deserve a treat once in a while anyway? I am glad that food stamps exist so people do not have to starve.

devo182

Right, but it's the taxpayers' money. Limiting their food choices to reasonable ones (like no candy, cookies, dessert, etc) seems perfectly reasonable. When you get a handout, how can you complain you can't waste it on non-nutritious items? That then adds to health care costs in the country, it just doesn't seem like something a rational society would allow when they're paying for it. Fwiw, you could treat yourself to a candy bar if you want, but it would be out of your own pocket. The point of a handout for people getting food is they eat food that will help them live, not kill them.

Pinkigloopyxie

God forbid low-income families occasionally treat themselves to a candy bar. The program is not a waste. Let people make their own decisions.

It is a waste when large numbers of people buy nothing BUT candy bars and soda and chips and corn dogs and frozen pizzas and they feed their children with this. Children already suffer severely from lack of rights in this country, it's even worse when they can't even be fed proper foods and are molded into people who make bad nutritional choices in adulthood and perpetuate that on their own children whether they get food stamps or not.

Although I hate not being able to chose where my tax money goes to in general.

drmerc

God forbid low-income families occasionally treat themselves to a candy bar. The program is not a waste. Let people make their own decisions.

I am for doing good to the poor, but I differ in opinion of the means. I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it. In my youth I travelled much, and I observed in different countries, that the more public provisions were made for the poor, the less they provided for themselves, and of course became poorer. And, on the contrary, the less was done for them, the more they did for themselves, and became richer.

-Benjamin Franklin

Yes2HealthyAriel

a lil insulted by this crap. My family is on foodstamps. My bf is the only one working. I have been struggling to find a job for the last year or so. I buy low calorie snack crackers, and I dont eat them all the time. I eat them when I am really low on cals or wanting a change of pace from my normal snack. I do not purchase anything from bakery as it is expensive not very healthy. Once in a blue moon I get the kids junk food but not very often. It is more like a treat for good behavior or good grades. You are labeling people and that is not ok. Not everyone fits into one freaking stereotype.

BAMFMeredith

The costly part obviously isn't saying that something is bad and should not be purchased with SNAP benefits. The costly part is the huge government bureaucracy that would be required to enforce the changes once they were enacted.

That is not to say it can't be done. The WIC program is a great example of providing families with nutritious food.

I've been on food stamps (Lonestar Card) before, and a good friend of mine was on WIC for a while. She hated WIC, because it was so limiting in terms of what food items you could and couldn't buy, but it was great because she could use it for diapers and formula for her daughter. Because it was just me and my son, who was 2 at the time, we usually had a couple hundred dollars extra on the Lonestar Card every month, so I often let her get groceries with it, just so she wouldn't be stuck with generic government cheese sandwiches every day. Yes- there needs to be some kind of reform on the program, because it would have been VERY easy for me to take advantage of it at the time, and I see it allll the time, but just because a family is lower-income or going through a tough time financially doesn't mean they shouldn't be allowed to indulge sometimes too.

tajmel

As a current recipient of SNAP benefits, I have similar concerns. Many items - cooked foods, all supplements including energy drinks and protein powders - are already restricted from purchase by SNAP. It seems incredibly wasteful to allow recipients to buy non-nutritious and convenience foods considering that stores already have a system in place to allow/disallow certain foods. Also, we never buy "luxury items" unless they're more economical, as doing so is a waste that we can't afford. As a side note, many types of seafood are a far cry from "luxury", and in some areas it's actually comparable to beef/chicken.

The amount I receive doesn't even come close to covering my food bill, for the record. Without food stamps, we (my husband and I, who both work AND go to school, and our two young children) would sometimes go hungry and always have poor nutrition. I'm thankful my children don't have to go hungry or be malnourished, as I want them to have the best chance possible of fulfilling their potential and growing up to be contributing members of society. My husband and I will graduate as engineers in about 18 months, and when we do we'll have a household income of at least 120K. SNAP benefits have made that possible for us, and we'll more than make it up over our lifetimes.

janeite1990

BTW, I did not label anyone in the program, nor am I saying we should not help people in need. Help should be healthy. If you don't want someone else regulating your food choices, pay for them yourself. That's all. God knows I make some unhealthy choices, but I pay for them out of pocket.

My critique is that for some reason no one in the government has the guts to say soda is bad for humans, and there we will not pay for it. I get the point of the study, which is that it is hard to draw a line between healthy and not healthy for some things. Sure. But gee, are we really going to say that soda is healthy? Their own report suggests that some candy bars are healthier than cheese. That is just plain dumb. Anybody who took 8th grade health class knows better. These are educated people making the call. Yuck.

beckajw

God forbid low-income families occasionally treat themselves to a candy bar. The program is not a waste. Let people make their own decisions.

^^ This.

cmcorn26

I think you need to mind your own business. I had to be on snap when I was going to school because my useless husband wouldntbwork, we are divorced now. I didn't buy junk food for my family unless it was a special occasion, birthday, etc. Not Halloween, I sent them out and shut off my light. I bought meat from the reduced bins, bought only good food that was on sale, no pop, coffee, etc. I am now making enough money and paying back in taxes what I used plus some.
I think you should walk a couple of months in someone else's shoes before you pass judgement on the snap group.
Are there some who abuse it? Yep there, there are also companies hiring 970 lawyers and accountants so they don't have to pay taxes. And politicians who are cheating on their taxes. Much bigger things to worry about than poor people actually getting to choose what they want to buy with tax dollars.

tajmel

BTW, I did not label anyone in the program, nor am I saying we should not help people in need. Help should be healthy. If you don't want someone else regulating your food choices, pay for them yourself. That's all. God knows I make some unhealthy choices, but I pay for them out of pocket.

My critique is that for some reason no one in the government has the guts to say soda is bad for humans, and there we will not pay for it. I get the point of the study, which is that it is hard to draw a line between healthy and not healthy for some things. Sure. But gee, are we really going to say that soda is healthy? Their own report suggests that some candy bars are healthier than cheese. That is just plain dumb. Anybody who took 8th grade health class knows better. These are educated people making the call. Yuck.

It's a difficult issue. Frankly candy bars and cheddar cheese ARE both incredibly high calorie, low nutrient density foods. Who gets to make the call?

DivineRED1

Honestly, I don't think it's ok to control what other people buy to that extent. On the WIC you can't buy pet food for even toiletries. It's a slippery slope when you start controlling everything and everyone. I'd rather live in a country where I'm still free to make individual choices. It's all about personal responsibility. It's not my job or my government's job to poke a nose into someone else's shopping cart or yours.

avir8

You're welcome. Just responding to the "thank you for your paycheck" since it's my money that pays for "welfare checks.