No food stamps for you
The Trump administration Wednesday formalized work requirements for recipients of food stamps, a move that will cause hundreds of thousands of people to lose access to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or SNAP.
Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue and Brandon Lipps, the deputy undersecretary for the USDA’s Food Nutrition and Consumer Services, spent about 18 minutes on a call with reporters outlining the changes to the rule that will take effect April 1.
“We’re taking action to reform our SNAP program in order to restore the dignity of work to a sizable segment of our population and be respectful of the taxpayers who fund the program,” Perdue said. “Americans are generous people who believe it is their responsibility to help their fellow citizens when they encounter a difficult stretch. That’s the commitment behind SNAP, but, like other welfare programs, it was never intended to be a way of life.”
And yet low wages very much are intended to be a way of life, so Perdue and the rest of the greedy sadistic pigs should not be pretending that poverty is some kind of rare and temporary glitch in the normal working of things.
The USDA rule change affects people between the ages of 18 and 49 who are childless and not disabled. Under current rules, this group is required to work at least 20 hours a week for more than three months over a 36-month period to qualify for food stamps, but states have been able to create waivers for areas that face high unemployment.
The new rule would limit states from waiving those standards, instead restricting their use to those areas that have a 6 percent unemployment rate or higher. The national unemployment rate in October was 3.6 percent.
Meanwhile, wouldn’t Prezeedent Trump like to play some more golf at our expense?
During the call Wednesday, the USDA said that about 688,000 people would lose access to food stamps. That’s down from its earlier estimate that 750,000 people would be affected.
The USDA said that this was an extension of President Donald Trump’s April 2018 executive order, called “Reducing Poverty in America by Promoting Opportunity and Economic Mobility,” that aimed to create more work programs and limit public assistance.
You don’t reduce poverty by taking away food stamps, you increase it. They don’t want to reduce poverty, either, because if poverty were reduced who would work for them for bad pay in crap conditions?
Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., the ranking member of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry, said this rule would do little to help anyone find work. All the rule change does is strip people from accessing the benefit, she said.
“This Administration is out of touch with families who are struggling to make ends meet by working seasonal jobs or part time jobs with unreliable hours,” Stabenow said. “Seasonal holiday workers, workers in Northern Michigan’s tourism industry, and workers with unreliable hours like waiters and waitresses are the kinds of workers hurt by this proposal.”
That’s what Trump and his loathsome partners in crime want.
It also isn’t great for farmers. Food stamps have always been a good thing for those who produce the food, because it is a payment for a good they provide. Sometimes the farmers know that; other times they seem to forget. So a lot of Trump supporters may find themselves with a reduced profit.
That sounds similar to one of the South’s justifications for the continuation of slavery; it gave the otherwise unemployable blacks the dignity of working for their food and shelter.
Dignity, now there’s a loaded word that has very different meanings depending on who uses it and how.
I’ve read historical accounts referring to the dignity of slaves, as if by quietly accepting their status they were somehow dignified. I can well imagine that some slaves did behave with dignity, preserving what sense of self they could in the circumstances. It still doesn’t make the state of slavery dignified or capable of conferring dignity.
I believe there is dignity in work. Even doing dirty, obnoxious and dangerous work. I’ve been there and done that and taken pride in doing such work to the best of my ability. I don’t for a second believe that taking minimum social support away from people to force them into taking dirty or dangerous work, often for pay rates we would criticise third world countries for, confers dignity. Quite the reverse.
People talk about the dignity of suffering (Mother Teresa) and the dignity of dying (pretty much anyone opposed to euthanasia). Fucking bullshit. Having watched loved ones die (including last week), there is no such dignity.
Rob, I agree in general about the dignity of work, but I also think that there are a lot of indignities. Right now I can take pride in the fact that I am working at a college teaching science to college students, but the indignity of the way the administration treats us (I got more respect when I worked the grill at McDonald’s) at times cancels out the dignity of working.
When you are treated like children, and not very bright children at that, the indignity outweighs the dignity. Unfortunately, from what I’m seeing, that’s the direction most jobs seem to be heading (at least in the U.S.), where employees are treated like not too bright 3 year olds.
Sorry to hear that, Rob.
Iknklast, that’s a couple of points very well made.Abusive working conditions, culture or practices certainly erode that inherent dignity of working for the purpose of supporting oneself and having independence. Just as my point about overly coercive policies designed to force you to work in the sort of environment you describe (or worse) does so. Workers seem to be under attack from both sides of that equation at present, which is one reason we’re seeing the middle class being hollowed out. A few claw their way to better wealth and security, but most are drifting down into insecurity.
Ophelia, thanks. It turns out even when you’re prepared, you’re not.
Rob, my condolences. When I lost my grandmother in a sudden death (literally, got sick that morning and dead that afternoon), I thought it must be better to have time to prepare. My granddad was dying for three years, so I thought I would be prepared. Nope.