People on Food Stamps (Maine, range, percent, attorney)
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I live in one of the wealthiest counties in the entire nation, the median home price where I live is close to $1 million. So it surprises me that I am seeing a lot of people at the grocery store paying with EBT (Food Stamps). These people at least "look" pretty well off.
I am a bit surprised by this. Isn't there an asset test of < $2,000 in the bank to be eligible for this? Is it possible that these people actually have millions in assets (million dollar home for instance) and gaming the system? Something seems amiss here...
I am guessing they may have a $1+ million home and $1+ million in the 401k and then collecting food stamps because those assets are not included in the asset test.
None of your screen captures proves fraud in obtaining the benefits, now it still could be occurring for sure. I’d also be in the camp that suggest the vast majority of dollars in SNAP/WIC aren’t subject to fraud
Food stamps are not easy to get or keep. Most of the people receiving them work. If you make and pay taxes on 50K per year income, the food stamp program costs you personally around $5. A bargain and a good use of my tax dollars.
There are many reason why people using EBT could be shopping in affluent areas. They rent there. They are the help(maids/landscapers etc) in your area. They have moved in with friends or family. Your store may have had a great sale that made it worthwhile to shop there. Why doesn't really matter.
I have read estimates of a 2% fraud rate for the food stamp program. Pretty low for a program that big. If you are looking for someone to vilify, leave the poor working class alone. Start thinking about all the employers who pay so poorly their workers qualify for food stamps and all the megabuck corporations paying zero taxes like Amazon and Boeing.
Might want to stay out of the deep end of the pool if you don’t understand what’s going on there
If you already have food and don't need food stamps, why bother?
Free is one of my favorite words/phrases:
Free
Cheap
Two for One
All You Can Eat
Perfectly Legal
Beating the System
This is not a bill
My husband is away on business
I was going to mention that some might be unemployed. And, given the insanely high COL in CA, others might be struggling because they're in service-type jobs.
It shows up on the screen or they pay separately for non-food items. And yes, I DO pay attention. Those are my tax dollars being spent.
Bless you. I'm sure the reason a lot of people eat mostly processed foods is that they don't know how to prepare it from basic ingredients.
How far do you have to crane your neck to see the screens of those in front of you in line?
How far do you have to crane your neck to see the screens of those in front of you in line?
Right. How would you know the person isn’t paying with their own debit or credit card? You have to really be upon the person, and really care enough, to see the form of payment they’re using.
I don’t have that kind of energy or care in the world to see how someone is paying for their groceries. Just keep the dang line moving so I can get my groceries and go home.
That's because he only knew the people who were committing the fraud; he didn't see the ones who didn't. So naturally if he was investigating it he might think "wow, there's lot of welfare fraud going on."
And even if there's fraud, it shouldn't prevent honest people from being able to apply for welfare.
I've heard the same thing about collecting unemployment benefits. Some people think "everyone" on UI benefits is "gaming the system".
He was respond to one poster who said there’s no fraud. I know there plenty of fraud. There are many ways to work for cash.
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