Food stamp foods

[Landshark]

I didn't want to hijack the Dependency Class thread, but badger did bring up an interesting point, and the picture of that supermarket receipt he posted was disturbing on many levels.  As it stands right now, you can buy almost any kind of food with food stamps.  I think the only things you can't buy are hot foods that are ready to eat.  The debate is, should we regulate the food stamp program so that it only pays for basic foods and people don't abuse the system?  I think it sounds reasonable.  I'd love to hear everyone's thoughts on what should and shouldn't be allowed to be bought with food stamps. 

Here is my proposed list of foods that should be bought with food stamps.

Meats- Ground beef, chicken (drumsticks, thighs, or whole chickens only), turkey (same as chicken), and inexpensive fish (cod, flounder, catfish, or canned tuna).  No expensive fish, steaks, lamb, veal, pork, or seafood.

Fruits and Vegetables- Pretty much anything here, including seeds that can produce more fruits and vegetables.  All fruits and vegetables may be fresh, frozen, or canned.

Bread/Starches- Rice (long grain white or brown), pasta, potatoes (white or sweet), and bread (packaged pre sliced).   No jasmine rice, bakery rolls, donuts, cake, or cookies.

Dairy- Milk and cheese (whole block cheese only, no pre-sliced, shredded or string cheese).  No ice cream or butter.

Peanut Butter- Must be all natural.  No Jif or Peter Pan spreads that are loaded with sugar.

Drinks- Juices that are 100% fruit juice.  No sugar sweetened juice drinks/mixes, bottled water, and especially no alcoholic beverages. 

[SportsChick]

Dealing with WIC at a checkout with their list of approved and non approved foods is a bitch enough. Let people decide what they want to eat, food stamps or no.

By your list, a family is on FS and little sally is having a birthday she can't have a cake? Seriously?

[Buddhagirl]

Dealing with WIC at a checkout with their list of approved and non approved foods is a bitch enough. Let people decide what they want to eat, food stamps or no.

By your list, a family is on FS and little sally is having a birthday she can't have a cake? Seriously?

Those dirty poor people don't deserve cake.

[Brian Fein]

Just because you get food stamps doesn't mean you can't buy other stuff with regular money.  You can have all the cake you want.  He just says "pay for it yourself"

However, is this an agenda to keep people healthy?  Or are you trying to be cheap?  It seems like its not the government's job to keep people healthy.  That's a personal lifestyle choice.

[el diablo]

However, is this an agenda to keep people healthy?  Or are you trying to be cheap?  It seems like its not the government's job to keep people healthy.  That's a personal lifestyle choice.

Exactly. Its a personal lifestyle choice to keep one healthy. The problem is expensive healthy food. And they're expensive because they are healthy.

[dolphins4life]

So should people with food stamps never be allowed to enjoy any kind of high quality food EVER?

[Brian Fein]

^^ I think his point is that he wants people to not be on it for a long time, and not be comfy on it, and wants them to want to get off it.  Also, again, you can buy other food and pay for it with money (instead of food stamps).

[Landshark]

Exactly. Its a personal lifestyle choice to keep one healthy. The problem is expensive healthy food. And they're expensive because they are healthy.

My physician mentioned this to me last time I saw him.  He said only in America can you find junk food cheaper than healthy food.  That might explain the correlations between obesity and food stamp usage.

[Fins4ever]

My physician mentioned this to me last time I saw him.  He said only in America can you find junk food cheaper than healthy food.  That might explain the correlations between obesity and food stamp usage.

Exactly! It is a 3 way correlation of education, obesity and income.

The lower the education, in general the lower the income. The lower the income the more likely to be on food stamps. Now you have an uneducated, low income person on the dole making poor health choices. Simple. lol 

[Brian Fein]

That's exactly right.  Cheap food is unhealthy.  But to suggest that people are fat because they're on food stamps is moronic.

[Fins4ever]

I didn't want to hijack the Dependency Class thread, but badger did bring up an interesting point, and the picture of that supermarket receipt he posted was disturbing on many levels.  As it stands right now, you can buy almost any kind of food with food stamps.  I think the only things you can't buy are hot foods that are ready to eat.  The debate is, should we regulate the food stamp program so that it only pays for basic foods and people don't abuse the system?  I think it sounds reasonable.  I'd love to hear everyone's thoughts on what should and shouldn't be allowed to be bought with food stamps. 

Here is my proposed list of foods that should be bought with food stamps.

Meats- Ground beef, chicken (drumsticks, thighs, or whole chickens only), turkey (same as chicken), and inexpensive fish (cod, flounder, catfish, or canned tuna).  No expensive fish, steaks, lamb, veal, pork, or seafood.

Fruits and Vegetables- Pretty much anything here, including seeds that can produce more fruits and vegetables.  All fruits and vegetables may be fresh, frozen, or canned.

Bread/Starches- Rice (long grain white or brown), pasta, potatoes (white or sweet), and bread (packaged pre sliced).   No jasmine rice, bakery rolls, donuts, cake, or cookies.

Dairy- Milk and cheese (whole block cheese only, no pre-sliced, shredded or string cheese).  No ice cream or butter.

Peanut Butter- Must be all natural.  No Jif or Peter Pan spreads that are loaded with sugar.

Drinks- Juices that are 100% fruit juice.  No sugar sweetened juice drinks/mixes, bottled water, and especially no alcoholic beverages. 

Love the post and the time and effort. The problem is regulating all those criterion. It would only be a matter of time before fights would break out between the cashier and the food stamp recipient. Do you expect the cashier to read all the labels and make sure the peanut butter is all natural? Just to hard to control.

How about this? Have a government distribution center as THE ONLY PLACE food stamps are accepted. It would be easy to control what was offered (the very things you suggest) and they could even promote "healthy living" through educational material and teachings.    

[Brian Fein]

It could be controlled by SKU/UPC at the computer level.  I believe it already is now.  And people already bitch when cashiers do their job.  I've seen it myself. 

[Landshark]

It could be controlled by SKU/UPC at the computer level.  I believe it already is now.  And people already bitch when cashiers do their job.  I've seen it myself. 

It is controlled at that level.  I was in Publix last week and witnessed an argument between the cashier and a food stamp customer because she couldn't buy a deli-rotisserie chicken with food stamps.  And your previous posts are exactly correct about my points of people not getting comfy on food stamps and not be on them for a long time.  The entire point is to provide people with basic food nutrition until they can get back on their feet. 

That's exactly right.  Cheap food is unhealthy.  But to suggest that people are fat because they're on food stamps is moronic.

Not that people are overweight because they are on food stamps, but a lot of low income people are overweight because if you are low income, chances are you can only afford cheap, unhealthy, fattening food.

[MyGodWearsAHoodie]

I have NO problem with taking certain items such as junk food, sugar cereals, kool aid, etc off the approved list items to be purchased with food stamps.  

Also keeping in mind that for signficant number of poor people 2/3 of their meal, 5 times a week occur in public schools, along with many other impressionable middle class young people who are in the process of devloping eating habits, I support strenghening the standards for public school meals and banning candy and soda machines from k-12 schools.  I wonder which of the canidates for President shares my views on that and which opposed it.  

I would NOT ban expensive pieces of meat etc.  Because quite frankly the abuse is pretty rare so we are solving a problem that doesn't exist and it would not in fact save the gov't any money.  Folks are given $XXX per month, for most it doesn't go far enough and they aren't buying the expensive stuff anyway.  The very few are abusing it will shift their spending but will spend the entire amount.  

I would also remove from the approved list all imported food stuffs.  This has nothing to do with improving the foodstamp program healthwise and everything to do with helping american farmers, already the biggest benificary of the program.  Getting rid of foodstamps would hurt american agribusiness as much it would hurt the poor.

The political challenge with getting rules passed that would take Lucky Charms off the list of items to be purchased with food stamps forcing kids to eat Cherrios, does not come from liberal dems and advocates for the poor, but from repubs and the lobbiest of the megafood giants.  

If I had unfetted access to revise the food stamp program I would even discount fresh fruits and vegitables and other very health stuff (dried beans, whole wheat etc) by 25%.  Let say a person is given $200 per month in food stamps.  They could spend the $200 on anything approved.  But for every dollar they spend on fresh fruits and vegitable it only cost them 75 cents.  So they could by $100 worth of regular food and $133 worth of fresh produce.   

[Dave Gray]

I certainly understand the sentiment here and respect this debate, but I think that trying to legislate the foods is probably not very effective to solving the problem.  I think it may end up causing you more trouble, more red tape, etc.

What do you do with vegetarians, kosher people, vegans, those that only believe in free range chicken, medical diets that only allow for gluten free, kids that are picky eaters.  Do you allow for only certain brand names?  If so, how does the government justify supporting one company over the other?  It's a tangled web of 1000 issues.

It just opens so many doors of problems to solve a problem that I'm not completely convinced exists, at least to the level that it's being reported.

I think if you're really truly interested in stopping the so-called "dependency culture", you'd be better off to monitor it at the human level.  Have the equivalent of parole officers, like a social worker you have to check in with and report job-progress in order to be eligible.  Even that, while it might make us feel better about not getting scammed, will probably be more expensive for the taxpayer.