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So you think my 85-year-old mom, if she couldn't drive, should walk a mile and a half to the nearest grocery store, just because she is capable of walking? Nevermind walking home from the store with bsgs of groceries ...
There are many adjectives to described attitudes like this heartless, naive, ignorant, unaware, rude ...
Actually, yes, I do think that IFshe is capable of doing that with little trouble. I should have said that I am NOT talking about some elderly person who needs a walker or who has a lot of trouble walking due to arthritis or whatever. What I was thinking of when I wrote that was my mother (age 86) who is in very good health and has no trouble walking -- in fact, she participated in 5k runs until she was about 70. (I do admit that my mother is unusual.) I was also thinking of myself and my husband who are in our 60's and often walk four miles or more. Also, I don't think that carrying one or two bags of groceries is difficult for most people, although, of course, you may disagree with that.
I am sorry that I was not more clear, but I personally find it very rude when people immediately resort to harsh adjectives when they disagree with someone's viewpoint.
Welfare recipients don't fund their food purchases entirely with SNAP. They supplement with their "own" money. So if they are paying $8 or whatever to have the food delivered, that's $8 less they have for food itself. Sorry, but able-bodied adults within a reasonable reach of a grocery store need to get their butts over there.
The poorest of the recipients tend to be the elderly disabled. If they cannot afford the delivery fee, it seems they will still have to schlep on over to the grocery store. The able bodied working recipients will be better able to afford the delivery. Unless delivery fee is waived for SNAP recipients, this seems to defeat the purpose.
Why should any store be allowed to collect SNAP benefits for junk food? We are helping feed their families, and food purchases should be limited to seafood less than $10/lb, hamburger, chicken, frozen bags of veggies, fruit, milk, juice, cereal, eggs, cheese, and bread.
This is reasonable I don't understand why it's not supported
I've been thinking about this a little more, and I now think that this is not a good idea for everyone.
If an elderly and/or disabled person can walk but doesn't drive, and the grocery store is less than a mile or two away, it forces him or her to at least get some exercise. If the necessity of physically shopping for groceries is taken away, I think it would just encourage the person to be even more shut in and possibly 'lazy' then s/he might already be.
Or deliveries should be limited to maybe no more than two in one month. But even then it gets tricky because people with severe health issues might be fine one month and too ill to walk in the next. Plus, weight of groceries, ability to use a push cart, and terrain which can be lots of hills and uneven surfaces. Weather also hampers a sick persons ability to get out and walk.
Actually, it is quite easy. WalMart, etc. just code it in to their computers like they do all the other ineligible items. When the UPC code is scanned, it tells what is eligible for payment by SNAP.
For example, pet foods, beer, wine, cigarettes, vitamins, soap, paper products, grooming supplies, cosmetics, ... all will ring up as ineligible for payment with a SNAP card.
Personally, I think soda pop should be added to the list. Food Stamps are supposed to provide nutritional support. Soda pop does not fit that definition.
Neither do cookies or candy, however I understand the difficulty in drawing the line between healthy and unhealthy foods.
As to treating them like children, not sure I agree with you there. The goal is to provide nutritional assistance. If having groceries delivered helps with that, I think that is fine.
However, I don't think it is fine for Food Stamps to pay for items that do not provide any nutritional value.
It's easy to identify a food item vs a non food items in a cash register, in most states that's already necessary because non food items are taxed. But you are talking about having to do a nutritional analysis of 650,000 food items (with 20,000 new ones introduced every year) and making decisions based upon caloric content, sugar, etc. You can't just ban "soda" or "chips" because if you did that manufacturers would simply call those foods something else. For instance, soft drinks have less total fat, saturated fat and sodium per serving than some granola bars so are we going to ban granola bars, or maybe just everything except cheese fish and carrots? What about chocolate milk, is it a dairy product or a sugary sweet?
If those foods are so bad, why should we allow anyone to buy them? It seems that the basis of this 'concern' has to do with the idea that we need to make decisions for the poor but everyone else is smarter and only buy nutritious foods. Here is a summary of the findings of a USDA study of food types purchased by SNAP vs non-SNAP households
Quote:
There were no major differences in the expenditure patterns of SNAP and non-SNAP households, no matter how the data were categorized. Similar to most American households:
About 40 cents of every dollar of food expenditures by SNAP households was spent on basic items such as meat, fruits, vegetables, milk, eggs, and bread.
Another 20 cents out of every dollar was spent on sweetened beverages, desserts, salty snacks, candy and sugar.
The remaining 40 cents were spent on a variety of items such as cereal, prepared foods, dairy products, rice, and beans.
The top 10 summary categories and the top 7 commodities by expenditure were the same for SNAP and non-SNAP households, although ranked in slightly different orders.
Less healthy food items were common purchases for both SNAP and non-SNAP households. Sweetened beverages, prepared desserts and salty snacks were among the top 10 summary categories for both groups. Expenditures were greater for sweetened beverages compared to all milk for both groups, as well.
Expenditures were concentrated in a relatively small number of similar food-item categories. The top 5 summary groups totaled half (50%) of the expenditures for SNAP households and nearly half (47%) for non-SNAP households. Twenty-five commodities accounted for nearly half of the food expenditures in these data with SNAP and nonSNAP households having 20 of them in common. The top 25 sub-commodities for SNAP households and non-SNAP households, respectively, accounted for over one-fifth of
food expenditures for each group with 16 subcommodities in common for the two groups.
Or deliveries should be limited to maybe no more than two in one month. But even then it gets tricky because people with severe health issues might be fine one month and too ill to walk in the next. Plus, weight of groceries, ability to use a push cart, and terrain which can be lots of hills and uneven surfaces. Weather also hampers a sick persons ability to get out and walk.
If the recipient pays for the delivery why do you want to make a rule about how often they can utilize the service?
Or deliveries should be limited to maybe no more than two in one month. But even then it gets tricky because people with severe health issues might be fine one month and too ill to walk in the next. Plus, weight of groceries, ability to use a push cart, and terrain which can be lots of hills and uneven surfaces. Weather also hampers a sick persons ability to get out and walk.
All of this is very true, and I don't disagree with any of that.
People are going to fall over to hear me say this, but for those who are genuinely physically disabled to the point that they cannot work even a sedentary job and have little to no mobility, this is going to be a godsend.
I agree with you, this is great for physically disabled. No one knows what it's like to have trouble getting around until it happens to them. Unfortunately, and as usual there are people who can get around who will take advantage of it.
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