The government should expand the food stamp program, not
shrink it.
I never paid much
attention to the food stamp debate in Congress before. But I’m on food stamps
myself these days, so I’m tuning in this time around.
Officially called SNAP
— the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program — food stamps are one of those
things that deficit-conscious lawmakers always want to cut and hunger advocates
always want to increase.
The House wants to
slash food-stamp spending by $20 billion. The Senate’s angling for a $4 billion
cut, with a twist: David Vitter (the Louisiana Republican who was caught patronizing
prostitutes, but somehow hung
onto his Senate seat) wants to prohibit “convicted murderers, rapists, and
pedophiles” from receiving food stamps for life.
Talk about family
values! If this measure becomes law, I can’t wait till it backfires, and
somebody robs a grocery store at gunpoint for a box of Cheerios and a carton of
milk.
How did I get on food
stamps? By being poor. A magazine I wrote for went bankrupt, a book deal fell
through, and the next thing I knew, I was broke.
In government-speak,
you must earn under 130 percent of the federal poverty line and have less than
$100 in liquid assets to qualify. This means most of my income goes to pay my
rent, and with the few dollars left over, I struggle to pay for prescription
drugs, gas, food, utility bills, and anything else I might need.
Enter food stamps.
After providing Uncle Sam with a heap of documentation, I was awarded a
whopping $70 per month in assistance. It’s not unheard of for Americans to spend
that much at a restaurant for just one meal, but that’s what I get for an
entire month. When you’re that poor, it makes a big difference.
SNAP does work as
advertised — the program does help hungry people. Yet, I feel its impact as an
economic stimulus is even more important.
Every five dollars
spent in food stamps generates about nine dollars in economic activity. The
money I receive doesn’t only benefit me — it helps the store where I buy
staples like oatmeal and beans, and it helps every business that brought those
products from the farm to that store: food manufacturers, truckers, warehouses,
and more. Those companies make purchases and pay wages. Their employees use
their wages to buy what they need, and so on. Economists call this a multiplier
effect.
Food stamps are just
about the best way to stimulate
the economy.
Keeping our population
well-fed also makes us more productive. Hungry people can’t work as hard, and
hungry children learn less. After the Great Depression, Uncle Sam realized this
was even a national security problem when young men who grew up malnourished
were unfit to fight in World War II.
Fortunately, I’m back
on my feet. I’ll be back to buying my own food all by myself in short order.
Some who receive food
stamps are, like me, going through brief tough times. Others are chronically
poor. There are 50
million Americans who still don’t
get enough to eat with the SNAP budget where it is. That means the government
should expand the food-stamp program, not shrink it.
These benefits average
$1.46 per meal — hardly enough to purchase healthy food. For my money, I’d
rather help people buy healthy food while stimulating economic growth instead
of letting them suffer hunger or subsist on junk food. The costs of
diet-related illnesses, like diabetes, are many times greater than the cost of
healthy food.
But here’s another
thought to help understand the larger issue: As long as our economic slump
persists, tax revenue will be down while demand for food stamps will be up.
We need to stimulate
the economy in ways that put Americans back to work so fewer of us need food
stamps. That’s the best way to balance the budget.
OtherWords columnist Jill
Richardson is the author of Recipe
for America: Why Our Food System Is Broken and What We Can Do to Fix It. OtherWords.org