Texas to outlaw the use of SNAP for purchasing junk food/energy drinks.

[Butler to Baby Sloths]

It's not within the gov't scope to say what you can and can't eay.

They aren't saying "you can't eat XYZ". They are saying "You can't buy XYZ with government food coupons". Big difference.

[drwelfare]

So much hatred and ignorance, but this is the internet. It's not within the gov't scope to say what you can and can't eay. How would you regulate this? Being directly involved in the field, I can honestly say there are more people who legitimately need benefits (my gf's mother, who is disabled and cannot work and SSI barely covers rent/bills, for one) than those who milk the system. For every dollar of entitlements that go out, it goes back into the pockets of taxpayers. Consumer buys food at WalMart, goes into pay for the workers, which gets taxed, then goes back into circulation, getting taxed again, and then the consumer rec's benefits again. People who don't understand are nothing but ignorant.

And if more of that money went to those who earned it in the first place what would they do with it. Either spend it themselves or maybe invest it into something. I think I could do something better with my money than giving it to Shanekia so she can buy her pitbull a TBone

[Deadvolcanoes]

Obesity and poverty are inextricably linked. So not only does this make sense, but if we deploy more government intervention programs to reduce obesity, I think we could see positive results.

I also think these SNAP cards should also reduce the price of healthy items, kind of like a government subsidy of health food for the poor.

[Lyese]

It is, in essence what they are doing. For households that can barely scrape by, buying high preservative food that lasts long and is high in carbs/cals for the lowest price, that is one of their few options.

[Rendia]

It would be fine with me were this to happen. I just wish drug testing to receive benefits was mandatory as well.

The problem then comes at what is determined to be healthy and what isn't. Can you buy canned corn? It has nearly no good nutritional value, but is commonly used as a healthy vegetable substitute. Does iceberg lettuce count? It has no nutritional value to speak of, but is the primary ingredient in cheap salads. There is plenty of things that people would have to be educated about concerning what is and is not acceptable. And all that is going to do is cost more tax money. Plus, we have to make sure that those that determine what is and is not allowed have no alternate agenda that they want to push on people.

Off-topic: BTW, people are being kinda racist in this thread w/o REALLY calling out race. Those comments should be discouraged.

[Twotonsteak]

It is, in essence what they are doing. For households that can barely scrape by, buying high preservative food that lasts long and is high in carbs/cals for the lowest price, that is one of their few options.

I amended my original post to address the concerns people, such as yourself, put forth. Below is one of the points I added.

"5. On $180/month in benefits I, as a single person, can have a bowl of cereal (generic Cheerio's, typically) for breakfast. Lunch is either soup (condensed) or lunch-meat on whole-wheat bread. Dinner is a protean (chicken, pork, or beef, all boneless), and two cans of veggies. (I prefer whole potatoes and carrots or a green.) For drinking I have coffee, tea, milk, and V-8. After all of that I still allow a little "nicety" now and then such as creamer, eggs instead of cereal, or the occasional frozen pizza. If that isn't enough, if you're still hungry, it might be time for a diet."

Now I understand that each state is different. I don't know, for sure, the total amounts provided by Texas. However as every state I've lived in has been pretty close to, if not exactly, the same then I am willing to bet that Texas isn't too far off. As such you can see by my outline that eating with-in the means provided by SNAP is fairly easy and you can still eat (mostly) healthy.

Now if you have alternate sources that contradict me, perhaps an exact figure of benefits provided as it relates to family size over one person, please feel free to provide it. Otherwise I think it's less an issue of amount of benefits and more an issue of portion size. We, as Americans, have become too use to bloated portion sizes that most Europeans would laugh at. Even the "small" McDonalds value-meal is too large.

[Seirith]

I have mixed feelings about this.

What about all those families that have children? We seriously dont want them to have even ONE box of little debbie Oatmeal Cream Pies for their kids? Just one box? Thats not cool guys. You cant tell me that consumption of one box over the course of a month is harmful, especially when split between a whole family. . .But at the same time, Id hate to see food stamps wasted on a cart full of chips and dip.

Its crazy, we wont drug test to allow people to get stamps, but we want to restrict the purchase of twinkies?

This whole situation is fd up.

If they want a box of cream pies, then they should buy them with their OWN earned money. My husband and I both work and sometimes we WANT something we cannot afford. We have never been on food stamps but we have had times where we really had to watch our money and be careful with what we bought. Sometimes we had do to without things we wanted to buy what we needed. Kids do not need those to live.

[Lyese]

I amended my original post to address the concerns people, such as yourself, put forth. Below is one of the points I added.

"5. On $180/month in benefits I, as a single person, can have a bowl of cereal (generic Cheerio's, typically) for breakfast. Lunch is either soup (condensed) or lunch-meat on whole-wheat bread. Dinner is a protean (chicken, pork, or beef, all boneless), and two cans of veggies. (I prefer whole potatoes and carrots or a green.) For drinking I have coffee, tea, milk, and V-8. After all of that I still allow a little "nicety" now and then such as creamer, eggs instead of cereal, or the occasional frozen pizza. If that isn't enough, if you're still hungry, it might be time for a diet."

Now I understand that each state is different. I don't know, for sure, the total amounts provided by Texas. However as every state I've lived in has been pretty close to, if not exactly, the same then I am willing to bet that Texas isn't too far off. As such you can see by my outline that eating with-in the means provided by SNAP is fairly easy and you can still eat (mostly) healthy.

Now if you have alternate sources that contradict me, perhaps an exact figure of benefits provided as it relates to family size over one person, please feel free to provide it. Otherwise I think it's less an issue of amount of benefits and more an issue of portion size. We, as Americans, have become too use to bloated portion sizes that most Europeans would laugh at. Even the "small" McDonalds value-meal is too large.

TX Works policy and the benefit allotment chart can both be found online. I'm on my phone atm, but either google or www.hhsc.state.tx.us would be good starting points. Depending on income, you would receive anywhere between $16-108 a month. What you've described to me is a high carb low nutrient diet, which while cheap and lasts longer, causing less trips to the grocery store and saving you gas. This isn't healthy, however, and causes obesity.

[Ofmanv]

Off-topic: BTW, people are being kinda racist in this thread w/o REALLY calling out race. Those comments should be discouraged.

I'm amazed you have conciosness to admit the "w/o really calling out race" part, yet fail to reaiize it's you inserting racial interpretation.

That's the problem with conversations about thing like food stamps, is you can't have a conversation without it devolving to "you're racist even though we're not talking about race".

[Rendia]

I'm amazed you have conciosness to admit the "w/o really calling out race" part, yet fail to reaiize it's you inserting racial interpretation.

That's the problem with conversations about thing like food stamps, is you can't have a conversation without it devolving to "you're racist even though we're not talking about race".

Ok, then when drwelfare said

Lots of ways they can make that $2 over a month. If they skip one 40oz or a pack of menthols they can get more than one box.

or

And if more of that money went to those who earned it in the first place what would they do with it. Either spend it themselves or maybe invest it into something. I think I could do something better with my money than giving it to Shanekia so she can buy her pitbull a TBone

CLEARLY it has nothing to do with race, for him at least, hmm?

Playing to racial stereotypes without specifically calling it out. It really wasn't needed to be put that way to make a point. That is all I was saying.

[DEATHETERNAL]

It's not within the gov't scope to say what you can and can't eat.

The states retain all powers not prohibited from them or given to the federal government. If you wish to say that it is within the government’s scope to redistribute income to you to buy food with, then it is absolutely within the scope of the government to say what you can and cannot buy with that money they are giving to you. You can't have it both ways.

[Deleted]

Even though food is quite a bit cheaper in the US, last time i checked both Europe and the US had something in common and that's the prices of healthy food versus unhealthy food. I can only imagine that people buy unhealthy food not only becuase of the potential taste but also the price.

[Underverse]

Sounds fine as long as people on food stamps can still eat. Cost might be something to worry about but if they can work it out, well thats great

[Creotor]

That's the thing, junk food is a hell of a lot cheaper than organic vegetables and any other healthy stuff. It's like the common saying goes, society wants people to lose weight and stay healthy but you can't exactly do that with healthy items being more expensive than the junk food itself.

No one ever said anything about organic produce. Genetically modified vegetables and fruit are still a lot healthier than fast food. As for any kind of meat (including poultry and fish), you really don't need a lot of it.

Most of those whose diet primarily consists of junk/fast food eat it because it's tasty and/or hassle-free. A minority does it because they literally don't have enough time to buy and cook due to working multiple jobs for chump change. That is a very small minority, though.

Trying to eat healthy with a constricted budget does take some time, money and effort. Many figure (or just do it without any thinking) they'd rather just invest those resources into something that provides instant gratification (junk food, drugs, over-indulging self in certain activities) even if the way they do it makes it shorter and significantly shittier closer to the end.

I have no statistics to back up any of that, it is my opinion.

[Svifnymr]

Even though food is quite a bit cheaper in the US, last time i checked both Europe and the US had something in common and that's the prices of healthy food versus unhealthy food. I can only imagine that people buy unhealthy food not only becuase of the potential taste but also the price.

I work in retail, so most of the EBT/SNAP purchases I see are of course weighted by location, but from my perspective it's not a matter of restricting them from buying a frozen pizza instead of buying a loaf of bread. They're not even buying the pizza, they're buying a bag of chips and some candy with their redbull. And again, I'm not seeing every honest person in my story, so it's skewed as a result, but I see people on vacation with $100's of dollars on EBT (highest I've seen is $500ish), buying junk (can't even use the word food...).

I'm sure a lot of them can't cook well, so buy cheap-prepared food, others just don't know any better, lots of reasons. Doesn't change the fact that you're throwing good money after bad. (And not like we're suggesting just sending them a case of MRE's at the start of each month.)

[Rucati]

I don't really see why this needs to exist. If you're giving them $200 a month to spend on food, why shouldn't they be allowed to buy whatever food they want? If they want to spend $200 on junk food and energy drinks then let them, they just won't have any money to spend on real food. Don't really see why it matters what they're spending the money on, since you're giving it to them either way.

[Svifnymr]

So much hatred and ignorance, but this is the internet.

I haven't really seen any hatred or ignorance, so I wouldn't jump to conclusions so easily.

It's not within the gov't scope to say what you can and can't eay. How would you regulate this? Being directly involved in the field, I can honestly say there are more people who legitimately need benefits (my gf's mother, who is disabled and cannot work and SSI barely covers rent/bills, for one) than those who milk the system. For every dollar of entitlements that go out, it goes back into the pockets of taxpayers. Consumer buys food at WalMart, goes into pay for the workers, which gets taxed, then goes back into circulation, getting taxed again, and then the consumer rec's benefits again. People who don't understand are nothing but ignorant.

There are plenty of people that need benefits, just as there are plenty of people that abuse the system, no real way to know the ratios. Some of it is a matter of "should society pay the bills rather than a family supporting their own" and such, but that's a different debate. Yeah, what they're buying feeds back into the system, but it STILL has a COST, it's not a zero-sum game. Just because a portion of the benefits feed back into the system doesn't mean all of it does. I'd avoid calling people ignorant for disagreeing.

[smelltheglove]

Playing to racial stereotypes without specifically calling it out. It really wasn't needed to be put that way to make a point. That is all I was saying.

he is special. if you've seen as much of his history as i have, you would know that really his solution to poverty is for poor people to fuck off and die quietly. and he is pretty much incapable of believing anything outside of a stereotype

[Hayro1]

get money out of ATM's at strip clubs, beer stores, and casinos.

The sad part is that people actually use that (General Assistance) money on these things.....I mean I guess I could kind of see the last one being semi-decent (IF you win,) but the other two - not so much.

[Defengar]

I agree with this. If you want to buy junk food. Use YOUR MONEY. Not mine.