700,000 Americans Citizens May Lose Food Stamp Benefits

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This kind of thing has been on my mind recently.

Sometimes people have no choice but to be dependent on others for short term things or permanent things and in those cases there's absolutely nothing wrong with being dependent. Examples of dependency range from asking someone to hold a door open for you when you have your hands full and can't open the door for yourself to needing 24/7 custodial care and many things in between. It's needing assistance with something.

Assistance ---> Dependence ---> Loss of a freedom.

I argue that taking assistance for something that you don't actually need assistance for does create dependence and in turn results in a loss of freedom. Never willingly relinquish a freedom.

You incorrectly see aid to the poor as a zero-sum game. In fact, aid to the poor is an economic stabilizer, helping to maintain the economy for everyone in ways that (up to a point, at least) more than offset the higher taxes.

People spending their food stamps help create jobs at local food stores in poor neighborhoods. The people who work at those food stores also spend their money at local stores, also helping to create and maintain jobs there. The store owners also pay rent, giving their landlords money to spend (or invest, and/or pay taxes). And so on.

Last edited by Mona Pereth on 06 Dec 2019, 10:30 am, edited 2 times in total.

These are good points about stabilization. I thought of an analogy years ago when I was pondering whether or not government job creation (ie jobs funded by taxpayer contributions) was a boost to the economy or a detriment to the economy that seemed like a boost:

Picture the owners of homes on a suburban street. Say, six homes. Those homeowners hire a landscaping company, a housecleaning company, a painter, a roofer, an accountant, a babysitter and a plumber. Those hired by the homeowners spend the money that they're paid in the local economy keeping that economy healthy. All the revenue made by each party hired by the homeowners comes from the homeowners and no other source.

The amounts charged by the various workers rise sharply and continue to rise to the point that three of the six homeowners have no more money to pay the workers. The workers therefore charge even more to the remaining homeowners. Two more homeowners can't pay for services as a result leaving one homeowner at which point that one homeowner sells her home. Now there are no homeowners.

The homeowners in my analogy are the taxpayers. This analogy fits the thread topic because it always comes back to the taxpayers, the source of funding, the source of the money that is spent in the community. Without acknowledging that taxpayer funding is finite it seems that the ripple effect of the money spent in the economy from government assistance is a good thing. It is, but government assistance money is generated from the taxpayer. It's not a limitless source of funding at all.

Of course it's not limitless, but I should point out that, historically, the U.S. economy was much better in the 1950's and 1960's than it is now. And, guess what? Taxes on the rich were much higher back then than they are now. That's why we need progressive income tax (taxing the rich at higher rates than the middle class).

I agree with you, Magna. There are many people who do need help.

But...like you say....if one doesn't really NEED to help, and would only FEEL GOOD by receiving help, it's not worth it to enter the Whirlpool. One should really think mighty long and hard before conceding that "freedom" you mentioned.

The freedom not to be more scrutinized by the Government---the freedom not to have your privacy sacrificed by dependence upon the Government.

Dependence on the Government does tend to become a Whirlpool. It is very difficult to get out once you're in.

I wonder if the tax rates for the middle class were also higher in the 50's & 60's than they are for the middle class today. Since there are far more middle class families and people than the rich, my concern in regard to increased taxation on middle class taxpayers is the possibility of more middle class being forced onto government assistance. A snowball effect which then reduces the number of taxpayers available to fund the government assistance making for a downward spiral. I recall years ago reading that if we taxed every billionaire and every multimillionaire 100%, if we took all of their money, it would hardly make a dent in government spending.

The tax rates were higher, in general, back in the 50s and 60s, than they are now.

Trump isn't cutting anyone.

He's requiring abled-bodied to get part time jobs.

In today's world the longterm trend has been for the middle class shrink at both ends -- there are more rich people as well as more poor people than there were, say, back in the late 1960's. So, these days, higher taxes on the rich (and the upper middle class) would raise more money than it did "years ago," assuming that what you read "years ago" was accurate at the time. But I think there's plenty of room to raise taxes safely for people above the median and especially for people high above the median.

In my opinion the government should avoid, if at all possible, raising taxes on anyone with income below the median.

But what if they just CAN'T get jobs, for whatever reason?

Like, they take lots of vacations, and a job would intrude on that?

That's not an example of "can't," obviously. Do you mean to deny the existence of "can't"? Here are some examples of "can't":

1) There just aren't any jobs available that they are qualified for near where they live.

2) Prospective employers just don't like them, for whatever reason (possibly due to things beyond the individual's control, e.g. speech impairments, physical ugliness, ASD-related body language oddities).

3) Not having clothes suitable for a job interview, and not being able to afford them.

4) Not being able to drive (either in general or because one's car has broken down and one can't afford to get it fixed), and not living in an area with decent public transportation.

EDIT: I would have no issue with a food stamps work requirement if the government were automatically assigning aid recipients to nearby part-time "public works project" jobs, as under Reagan-style "workfare" (and also providing transportation to said jobs if necessary). I do have a big issue with relying on the private sector to provide the required part-time jobs.

Last edited by Mona Pereth on 06 Dec 2019, 4:26 pm, edited 3 times in total.

Or, at least, make it easier for people (including and especially working poor people) to get an education and acquire new job skills.

The current financial aid system is screwed up, insofar as only people who are attending college fulltime can get Pell grants. As far as I am aware, there is little or no financial aid other than student loans for people attending part-time, which is a great hardship for poor people with full-time jobs.

There should be grants for people attending school part-time who are also working full-time jobs and have income below some threshold.

Under the current system, there are a lot of people who are both working full time AND attending school fulltime, because that's the only way they can get a Pell grant and thus afford to go to college. Only problem is, they end up failing a lot of their classes because they just don't have enough time to study. And it's kinda pointless to go to college only to end up failing because you don't have enough time to study.

If this is like "workfare" in NYC, people would be assigned to the "public works" sort of projects mentioned by Mona.

Unfortunately, it's NOT "workfare." As the article linked at the beginning of this thread points out:

Then it's ridiculous, in my opinion, to take away these peoples' food stamps.

It's not a slam dunk that these people will get jobs. This online job search process is an arduous one.

I had a hard time getting my second job. It took me months.

I wish this was "workfare."