A woman I know applied for food stamps last month.

[redwitch]

She is getting desperate even though she works very hard. Her job just doesn't pay her enough to make ends meet. She swallowed her pride and applied for food stamps. She apparently qualified for $15 a month. Jesus.

[Warpy]

1. That $15 will make a difference, trust me

although she might also have to find the local food bank for staples. I hope she is angry that she's only getting a pittance, thanks to Republicans. I hope everyone is getting angry.

[totodeinhere]

34. It might make a difference but I'm sure we can agree that it's not nearly enough.

And remember that some people, especially those living in more remote rural areas don't have access to a local food bank nor the ability to travel far enough to find a non local one. And sometimes food banks run out and don't have enough to satisfy all of the demand they get.

[Warpy]

40. However, the OP was about one person in one specific area

that does have a food bank.

Yes, rural poverty is different.

[totodeinhere]

44. True. I was commenting in a more generic sense. When we hear about one person's

plight it reminds us of the plight of others as well.

[grasswire]

2. Hopefully there is a food pantry near her.

Encourage her to look for one or more.

[redwitch]

3. There is.

And I will be encouraging her to use it.

[totodeinhere]

35. That God for that. She is luckier than others who don't have a local food bank. n/t

[LeftyMom]

4. Better yet: if she makes a few bucks extra one month

she'll have to apply all over again to get that pittance. She probably won't bother, because who would? And that's how the system keeps people from getting the help they need.

[totodeinhere]

37. Correct. A lot of people don't think it's worth it to go through the humiliating

application process for so little return.

[Herself]

5. that is common. The average is 13-15 a month.

The "allowed" costs for rent, utilities etc are 30 years ago.

I took a Veteran living on 860$ a month, they were given 13$ a month.
The gas to go to file, go back for interview, the telephone interview, drive back to take additional documentation, .. cost more than 3 months of food stamps.

They do this because they can claim a higher "average" for recipient.
If you are single, that is the average.

[redwitch]

8. I just love the way we support our veterans.

Not.

[Herself]

29. I am one of those Veterans

Swimming in the sea of red tape for adjudication .

After WWII our Veterans didn't get a wall, or a memorial statue, they were given a GI BILL.

Congress cuts our Benefits, renigs on our enlistment contracts, and eases their consciences with memorials.

America allows it. There was more grief over phil robertsons "freedom of speech" rights, the same week that Veterans had their Benefits cut in the federal budget.

[redwitch]

31. I am truly sorry Herself.

It is disgraceful.

[Keefer]

26. The minimum...

is $15.

[Herself]

30. don't know what it is now, it' was a while ago I took my friend.

The mins allow the politicians to scew the numbers.

Smoke and mirrors, then they use it to get America hating those that get foodstamps.

[dsc]

6. It will help and it also will qualify her for many other benefits

The low cost phone program is available to those on food stamps and some of the low cost utility programs work the same way.

[redwitch]

10. I will ask her about this.

I know $15 is better than nothing but it really isn't enough.

[jtuck004]

23. There's about 50 million people who would agree with you. n/t

[LiberalArkie]

39. Here is the chart. It is awful hard for a single person to get anything with the calculations

http://www.fns.usda.gov/snap/eligibility


(November 1, 2013 through September 2014)

People in Household Maximum Monthly Allotment
1 $ 189
2 $ 347
3 $ 497
4 $ 632
5 $ 750
6 $ 900
7 $ 995
8 $ 1,137
Each additional person $ 142

Benefit Computation
Example
Multiply net income by 30%... (Round up)
Subtract 30% of net income from the maximum allotment for the household size...
$1,139 net monthly income x .3 = $341.70 (round up to $342)
$632 maximum allotment for 4 - $342 (30% of net income) = $290, SNAP Allotment for a full month

[Frustratedlady]

7. The monied spend more than that on liquor when dining out.

I'll bet the congresscritters can't even tell you how much bread, milk and a cheap jar of peanutbutter cost. They are so out of touch.

Fifteen dollars surely wasn't for a month. Could it have been prorated until the end of this month? If not, that is humiliating to both the one applying and the clerk giving her the information.

[redwitch]

11. It is for the month.

And apparently that is typical, see the other posts in this thread.

[Frustratedlady]

15. I hadn't seen them when I posted. That is unreal...$15?

I thought I stayed up on some of these things, but I sure didn't know that was the average/norm. Who, in their right mind, would think that was sufficient?

I wonder if those proud Repubs and TeaBaggers are aware of that? They are living so far in yesteryear I would doubt it. Shoot, I am pretty progressive and I sure didn't know. Shame on them for cheering on the cuts. Bloomin' idiots.

[redwitch]

17. They know. They don't care. nt

[KT2000]

9. Rent increases here

I don't know what happened but some people I know who are low income and live in low rent (but not subsidized) places are having their rents raised by $75 a month. This is in addition to increases in water, sewer, and electric.
Even the private landlords are requiring the rent be no more than 1/3 the income.

My friend who is barely making it (if the car doesn't need a repair, she doesn't need meds etc.) only qualified for $15 in food stamps too.

What is the end of all of this.

[redwitch]

12. No margin of error if one is hanging by a thread.

I live in fear of the car breaking down. If I don't have a car I don't work. I don't know what we would do. I don't know what the final tipping point will be. Too many of us hanging by a thread.

[totodeinhere]

41. I know it's hard to scrape together any extra money at all. But if people

can somehow do that, or if something unexpected such as some extra overtime comes along you are well advised to spend that money on preventative maintenance for your car. While it might be painful to pay for it will probably be much cheaper than simply waiting for a major breakdown to happen.

[etherealtruth]

13. Horrid

A dear friend (back in the 1980s) applied for assistance for her and her daughter ... she worked and was able to pay for a VERY modest flat, pay for gas in her very old car (a gift from her parents) so that she could get back and forth from work, and almost pay for her utilities (i babysat my pseudo niece for "free" and fed her dinner every time she came home from work). She could not afford food (or anything else) ... when she applied for assistance she was told there was 'nothing' they could do for her ... although the social worker admitted that she could not see how they would survive.

My friend ended up quitting her job and was much better off on "welfare." Once on assistance she went back to school, earned a degree and was self sufficient from that day forward.

She was an intelligent woman that was very capable of earning a degree and fighting her way out of poverty ... not everyone has that capacity or opportunity.

I am sorry for anyone in need of assistance today ... it really does not appear to be there.

[gerogie2]

14. She can now apply for a subsidized phone

She can have it as her landline or a cell phone. The cell phone is free for the 1st 250 Minutes at assurancewireless. A landline phone will give her a credit of about $8 toward her monthly phone bill.

[redwitch]

16. She worries about putting gas in the car to get to work.

15 mile one way commute to a low paying job. Not sure that phone issues exist but I will tell her that.

[anasv]

52. any sort of public transportation?

[redwitch]

53. no.

rural upstate NY

[R. Daneel Olivaw]

18. How many fat millionaires are living high off the hog in Congress?

I would say that someday they would get their comeuppance, but I don't believe that shit.

I'm sorry to hear about your friend

[El_Johns]

19. One of my coworkers was on food stamps before she got this job. She was cut to about the

same. The job is minimum wage.

Basically working for the right to physically exist, survival needs, that's all.

[Auntie Bush]

20. My neighbor just got his cut $75.00 a month. He's really bummed!

[redwitch]

21. He must be feeding a dozen people to get that much!

Living the life of Riley is he? Seriously I am sure he is feeding others from that, I hope it helps I really do.

[Auntie Bush]

22. It's not that he has many mouths to feed...it's that he has little income.

[redwitch]

24. I know my friend makes little enough.

Almost full time in retail. At least with $75/mo. your neighbor can take advantage of the occasional stock up on canned goods and sale items. But I know how expensive it is to buy even the basics, even on sale. I wish him all the best and hope he has enough.

[Coyotl]

59. That's two weeks of groceries!

[Scuba]

25. USA! USA! USA!

This country sucks.

[Cha]

48. The teabaggers in Congress and the Senate Suck.

[DeSwiss]

27. K&R

[center]CAPITALISM WARPS EVERYTHING
According to a study published by the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, Americans waste about 40% of all food produced in the United States. It is also estimated that 70% of all fresh water consumption in the US is attributed to the agricultural production; which means that food waste alone accounts for one quarter of ALL the water consumed within the US. Furthermore, given that the average farm requires 3 kcal of fossil fuel energy to produce 1 kcal of food (before accounting for energy requirements of food processing and transportation) wasted food accounts for roughly 300 million barrels of oil per year. link[/center]

- The system is designed this way on purpose.

[marions ghost]

60. +++++

-----

[Winning1]

28. I wonder what sort of rhetoric Rebutards would parrot on this..

Sorry for all that. My bro's family have just been cut from the food stamp program and with their only income being 2 part time jobs. It sucked hearing my little neice say to me, "tell my daddy to buy me some food".

There is a big difference in "freeloading" and building the citizens of your country.

[redwitch]

32. It makes me furious that anyone goes hungry anywhere.

But in the land of plenty? It is a disgrace.

[Winning1]

58. Me too, redwitch.

It is a damned shame.

[totodeinhere]

43. Most Rebutards would love to see the Food Stamps program eliminated altogether and

they would claim that $15 a month is too much. But they realize that they don't quite have the political wherewithal to eliminate it completely so they do the next best thing from their perspective and continue to chip away at it so that people get less and less benefits. And the smaller the benefits get the less incentive people will have to apply for it in the first place which is what the Rebutards want.

[Winning1]

57. And I truly wonder..

How a poor, hungry republican can vehemently support their leaders every action.

[leftyohiolib]

33. but tomorrow everyone will know who won the grammy's tonight

[redwitch]

36. Our priorities are fucked up.

No doubt about that. Until we find ourselves in a bad situation that requires help. Then we are wide awake.

[leftyohiolib]

38. but by then one is usually out of resources

[Hippo_Tron]

47. I'm not a fan of the grammies, but it's a legitimate reason to celebrate accomplishment

What bugs me is that tomorrow they'll still probably be covering Justin Bieber's arrest last week.

[LeftyMom]

42. The way that food stamps are calculated is itself interesting (by which I mean infuriating)

Decades ago somebody at the USDA calculated what a "thrifty housewife" (their term) would spend on feeding a family healthfully (by that era's standards, mind) on a budget. This is the Thrifty Food Plan, the lowest of their four tiered estimates of what a family might spend to feed themselves (the highest tier is roughly double the thrifty plan for the same family composition.) That budget gets adjusted annually for the CPI. Food stamps pay a maximum of 70% of that estimated food budget, if you have no other income at all.

[blackspade]

45. Wow, $15?

Those government agencies sure are big spenders....

I guess the rest of the money goes to republican cronies on Wall Street.

[totodeinhere]

49. And Third Way cronies on Wall Street as well. n/t

[jwirr]

46. The worker who processed her claim makes more than that in just one hour. I quit taking food stamps

once a long time ago because I only got $10. I did not want to support the system.

[Kath1]

50. That totally sucks.

Thanks for nothing, GOP!

[redwitch]

51. I saw her again today and I think she will access the food pantry.

I will encourage her to do so until she does. She is mortified and I get that but our community gathers food for hungry neighbors and she needs it now. A group of us are working on making more people aware and utilizing the resources.

[anasv]

54. it's been a long time

since I had to watch every penny, so I went to peapod to get prices, made some attempt to avoid scurvy, and this is what $15 buys if you're trying to max out filling yourself up:

white bread loaf of 18 slices $0.99
16 oz peanut butter $2.50
5 lb bag potatoes $2.50
32 oz white rice $2.50
16 oz orange juice $1.50
16 oz orange juice $1.50
16 oz dried split peas $1.00
1 lb carrots $1.30
B&M baked beans, 2 cup size $1.00

[redwitch]

55. Which will last for ?

But at the food pantry she can get pasta and sauce, tuna, and a gift card to local food store for milk and fresh veggies and fruit to add to what she an get with her $15 SNAP benefit. I will watch out for her. One of the hardest things about our fall from financial solvency has been the inability to help others the way we used to do. In the old days when we had some security we would have shown up at her house with a month's worth of groceries or the cash to buy it herself.

[anasv]

56. a week, probably

I didn't claim this would last a month, just said what I'd buy.

Our local food pantry is often empty.

[redwitch]

61. anasv I apologize if I sounded angry at you, I'm not.

I'm just angry at the whole situation. I went in to check our food pantry last week and it is not nearly as full as it used to be at this time of the year. The post office used to do a food drive in December and the shelves were bursting, no more.