Food Stamp Stimulus Felt Coast to Coast

Food Stamp Stimulus Felt Coast to Coast

www.cbsnews.com

I'm hiring people. I've never sold so many vegetables in my life," said Sweredoski, co-owner of Takahashi-Sweredoski Farms.

Sweredoski is reaping the early benefits of President Obama's economic stimulus program which gives poor families additional food stamp money to spend each month.

One Los Angeles market has had an 88 percent increase in food stamp purchases and that has given Sweredoski more money to spend on expansion.

"I recently bought a new John Deere tractor," he said, a purchase that hopefully added - or at least saved - American jobs in another part of the country.

(visit the link for the full news article)

So taxpayers pay for food stamps, and the families spend the food stamps, and the companies that produce the food prosper.

...

Sure, sounds great. Except that when 1 in 5 or more American families are on food stamps, I tend to see a little issue with this logic.

If Americans had jobs to pay for the food, the cycle would work without the government in the middle of it?

Big government is big and we should praise them for it?

I'm lost here guys, help me out.

www.cbsnews.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

A classic example of why US is in such a mess! Good Housekeeping eh!

Originally posted by sbctinfantry
I'm lost here guys, help me out.

You're not lost and your skepticism is valid.

This is an example of the broken window fallacy being conveyed as economical progress.

reply to post by sbctinfantry


i want you to take your time ...


and explain to me how this is breaking news?

What do you suppose happens when businesses reduce labour costs - ie: wages? The people working for these said wages can no longer afford to buy and consume, meaning they need assistance in order to survive. If not the whole system comes crashing to a halt.

The fact is the entire system is broken. It needs to be torn down, dismantled and rebuilt from the ground up.

So lets see the gov steals a dollar from me that I could have used to go buy food or whatever so I don't buy. They turn that dollar into 'food stamps' for someone less fortunate, how much of my dollar actually gets to that person? The gov needs some of course for 'operating costs', whatever company provides the 'services' like call centers in India and what not. So lets say 50cents actually gets to the needy person who then spends it on food ....
This helps the economy how?
Hey if I have an extra dollar how about I just give it to someone and we avoid the middle man?

More jobs, less food stamps, more taxes perceived, boost of local economy. MAYBE it would be better if food stamps were limited to U.S. products.

A chain is only as srong as its weakest link.

ABC News' Huma Khan reports: Congress is under pressure to cut the rapidly rising costs of the federal government’s food stamps program at a time when a record number of Americans are relying on it.

The House Appropriations Committee today will review the fiscal year 2012 appropriations bill for the Department of Agriculture that includes $71 billion for the agency’s “Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.” That’s $2 billion less than what President Obama requested but a 9 percent increase from 2011, which, critics say, is too large given the sizeable budget deficit.

I wonder how much actually gets to the "recipients" ?

and how much is for "administrative" costs ?

Food Stamps Costs

(March 2008 article)

The Food Stamp Program is one of the nation’s largest programs providing benefits directly to low-income families. In 2006, the program provided benefits to 26.7 million people in an average month, at a combined federal and state cost of $35.8 billion. While most of these funds were spent on food stamp benefits for families, administrative costs totaled $4.8 to $5.7 billion, depending on how such costs are defined.

The Costs of Benefit Delivery in the Food Stamp Program

I wonder if that includes favors and kickbacks ? .... !!!!

reply to post by sbctinfantry


Keynesian Economic Theory dictates that any growth is growth, regardless of the cost it took to get any measure of growth. So we spend money to make growth even if growth would exist if there was real growth to spur the growth. In absence of said growth it can be replicated through the artificial expansion of the monetary base to spur further growth which, according to the theory, would "jump start" the self perpetuating cycle of perpetual growth. Only the United States can turn feeding the poor into a profitable business.

Why don't they just give out bats to all the "Flash Mobs" and tell the kids to break windows? What better way to stimulate growth by ensuring window repairmen, glass makers and a whole slew of other businesses will have plenty of money?

Originally posted by Angry Danish
Why don't they just give out bats to all the "Flash Mobs" and tell the kids to break windows? What better way to stimulate growth by ensuring window repairmen, glass makers and a whole slew of other businesses will have plenty of money?

This is the most insidious aspect of the Food Stamp program being called stimulus.

Sure, it's pretty simple logic to say that people spending food stamps stimulate agriculture.

But what are we stimulating, really? What is being created?

A middle man. And to clearly define what this means, you need to understand just how much money is lost in translation.

Citizens pay more taxes to fund the Food Stamp program, meaning their food actually costs more. So there is another hidden tax.

EDIT FOR CLARITY: I mean to say that the food is not directly more expensive for the taxpayer, but instead of general charity (which is tax deductible and thus makes your expense less) the charity is taken by force and you receieve no benefit for having given (read lost through theft).

The money is then funneled into the government, where it is distrubuted from the top down. That means that there are executive salaries, other managerial salaries, and the salaries of the worker bee at the food stamp office.

The benefits programs for government employees equal or exceed those in the military, and the pensions provided are at the very least highly competitive with the military.

All of these things are paid for through taxes. A large portion is also paid for through the hidden tax of inflation, because whatever is not funded through taxation is merely printed.

Therefore, the price of food inflates. The cost of living is higher. There is a siphon of American wealth that goes directly into the government, and in the process a large portion is redirected into the pockets of overpaid government employees, and what is actually sent to help the people in need is reduced, further increasing the difficulty to feed a family. This, of course, is counterintuitive to the actual reason to have a bread line program.

Hope this was enligtening.