# Should food stamps stop covering bottle deposits? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 25, 2015, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575 "2015-11-25T20:01:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![boffking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/858c86/32.png) [@boffking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/boffking)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/1 "2015-11-25T20:01:26Z")
A fairly common Form of food stamp abuse is to buy cases of bottled water, or some other beverage, and dump the drinks in the street. Then the person will redeem the bottles for cash. I do not think taxpayer money should be spent encouraging people to waste water. Would it be possible to just void the deposit if a beverage is paid for with food stamps? So they don’t pay, and the bottle is not redeemable. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/2 "2015-11-25T20:09:50Z")
> [@boffking](#): > > A fairly common Form of food stamp abuse is to buy cases of bottled water, or some other beverage, and dump the drinks in the street. Then the person will redeem the bottles for cash. “Fairly common” where? I’ve never heard of this before. Why not just resell the beverages for 2-3 times purchase value, instead of dumping them out and exchanging the empties for 3 cents each? Hell, why not _drink_ them? Frankly, I can think of a lot of ways to abuse food stamps with a much better profit margin. > [@](#): > > Would it be possible to just void the deposit if a beverage is paid for with food stamps? So they don’t pay, and the bottle is not redeemable. So people will just have to keep all their receipts with them next time they go to the recycling center? ---
**Author:** ![Memnon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f1d935/32.png) [@Memnon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Memnon)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/3 "2015-11-25T20:10:02Z")
I’m from England and we don’t have food stamps as such so forgive me if this is a stupid question, but surely the value of the empty bottles is much less than the value of the food stamps. What’s the point of doing this? ---
**Author:** ![Defensive\_Indifference](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/defensive_indifference/32/6502_2.png) [@Defensive\_Indifference](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Defensive_Indifference)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/4 "2015-11-25T20:15:46Z")
Add me to the list of those who are skeptical this happens with any regularity. Even if it were, don’t you usually redeem the bottles at a third party recycler? How could they know how you’d purchased the drinks? How would the grocery store or wherever you bought them from void the deposit? ---
**Author:** ![boffking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/858c86/32.png) [@boffking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/boffking)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/5 "2015-11-25T20:17:29Z")
It is a problem here in Maine. [http://bangordailynews.com/2015/03/27/news/lewiston-auburn/norway-police-investigate-water-dumping-welfare-scam/](http://bangordailynews.com/2015/03/27/news/lewiston-auburn/norway-police-investigate-water-dumping-welfare-scam/) I don’t know why this seems to be the method of choice, but it is. ---
**Author:** ![steronz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steronz/32/11765_2.png) [@steronz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/steronz)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/6 "2015-11-25T20:18:07Z")
> [@Tithonus](#): > > I’m from England and we don’t have food stamps as such so forgive me if this is a stupid question, but surely the value of the empty bottles is much less than the value of the food stamps. What’s the point of doing this? To convert food stamps to drug money. I’m pretty sure that food stamp abuse in general is pretty rare, but add me into the pile of skeptics about this particular method. ---
**Author:** ![steronz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steronz/32/11765_2.png) [@steronz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/steronz)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/7 "2015-11-25T20:21:52Z")
Yeesh, from your own bloody cite: > [@](#): > > Hill said he’s investigating his \*\*first \*\*case of water dumping. > > “Well, we had this **one incident** reported to us, and it was a tip given to us,” he said. So one instance of this allegedly happening, there’s been no conformation yet of this one case even, and yet per the OP this is a “fairly common” thing. Come on. eta: Well, I’ll apologize for my tone, I was looking for a followup from that March article and apparently the Bangor Daily News has been [covering this for a while](http://bangordailynews.com/2011/08/19/news/state/food-stamp-%E2%80%98water-dumping%E2%80%99-scam-continues/). The USDA apparently considers it a problem. My bad. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/8 "2015-11-25T20:27:41Z")
> [@steronz](#): > > I’m pretty sure that food stamp abuse in general is pretty rare, but add me into the pile of skeptics about this particular method. Moreover, the only other people the article cites as calling this “widespread” are people appointed by a governor who [boasts about how many people he’s kicked off food stamps](http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2015/01/21/3613618/lepage-snap-waivers/), [wants to police what food stamp recipients are allowed to eat,](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/04/24/paul-lepage-food-stamps_n_7134902.html) [thinks people who own cars are too wealthy to need food stamps,](http://wonkette.com/594156/maine-gov-paul-lepage-finds-exciting-new-way-to-dick-over-food-stamp-recipients) [and once pledged to abolish the program entirely and give poor people hunting permits instead.](https://sardinereport.wordpress.com/2011/10/03/hunting-fishing-permits-to-replace-food-stamps/) How odd that a state run by an anti-food-stamp zealot is the only one where this “widespread scam” seems to be being perpetrated. ---
**Author:** ![Grumman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/43a26b/32.png) [@Grumman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grumman)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/9 "2015-11-25T20:37:26Z")
I agree with **Smapti** that if someone wants to launder their food stamps for real currency, there are much more efficient ways of doing it. Just find someone who is willing to let _you_ pay _them_ to do their grocery shopping for them (buying them $100 of groceries for $50, for example), and you’ve done it better than buying bottled water for its scrap value. And since the bottle deposits are meant as an incentive for people to recycle, making it so that poor people - the people who are most susceptible to this 5 cent refund - cannot profit from recycling their own rubbish or the rubbish of other poor people (or even worse, cannot profit from recycling _any_ rubbish without a receipt) defeats the purpose. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/10 "2015-11-25T22:10:17Z")
This sounds like something that was proposed at a “troll the teabaggers by feeding them ridiculous stories” bull session, but got rejected for being too ridiculous. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/11 "2015-11-25T22:15:27Z")
> [@boffking](#): > > A fairly common Form of food stamp abuse is to buy cases of bottled water, or some other beverage, and dump the drinks in the street. Then the person will redeem the bottles for cash. I do not think taxpayer money should be spent encouraging people to waste water. Would it be possible to just void the deposit if a beverage is paid for with food stamps? So they don’t pay, and the bottle is not redeemable. News to me - do you have a cite for this? Of course, this assumes the recipient of SNAP resides in a location where there are bottle deposits - my area, for example, does not have this. And why dump the beverage? Why not _drink_ the beverage, then turn the containers in? It’s not like the bottle deposits expire or anything. It’s not like you’re going to get that much for the effort, either. As stated, this does not make sense. Do you have \*proof \*that this is occurring anywhere? ---
**Author:** ![Saintly\_Loser](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saintly_loser/32/4045_2.png) [@Saintly\_Loser](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saintly_Loser)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/12 "2015-11-25T22:15:30Z")
Let’s say a case of bottled water goes for $12.00 to $15.00. So the bottle deposits would add up to $1.20 (at five cents a bottle, which is the rate here in NYC – not sure about in Maine or anywhere else). This is an insanely inefficient way to scam the system. The scammer could, for example, buy the cases of water with his/her SNAP, then sell the cases to a convenience store for $5 or $7 or so. Way better than just returning the bottles. Seems like a ridiculous way to get a pack of cigarettes or a bottle of booze or whatever with SNAP benefits. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 10:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/13 "2015-11-25T22:19:21Z")
> [@Tithonus](#): > > I’m from England and we don’t have food stamps as such so forgive me if this is a stupid question, but surely the value of the empty bottles is much less than the value of the food stamps. What’s the point of doing this? The point would be to convert the food stamps - which can only be used for food - into cash, which you can get for returning bottles with deposits on them. It’s something like 5 or 10 centers a bottle - so, 10 to 20 bottles to “earn” a dollar. Would be much more profitable to attempt to re-sell the bottled beverage, as someone else has mentioned. The reason for doing this sort of thing is usually given as “cigarettes”, “alcohol”, or “drugs”, none of which can be purchased via food stamps. Given the cost of those three, you’d have to purchase a _hell_ of a lot of bottled beverages. I’m not sure the average food stamp allotment per month would even cover that. As a cashier in a retail center that sells food I see a lot of people making purchases with food stamps. Oddly enough, what they are buying with them is… food. Not case after case of “bottled beverage” but food that can reasonably be presumed will be consumed for sustenance. ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/14 "2015-11-25T22:28:06Z")
This scam doesn’t need accomplices or planning unlike buying someone’s groceries for them or reselling. You can go do it and be done in a half hour. Being “ineffecient” is hardly proof it’s not happening. I doubt it’s very common though. Your solution though, boffking, is totally unworkable. Are we going to mark or keep a database on every bottle bought with foodstamps? If a foodstamp bottle is lying by the side of the road do we not want anyone to recycle it? All we can do is make stores aware and if someone comes in and tries to buy 10 cases of water with foodstamps, they refuse him and/or call the authorities. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/15 "2015-11-25T22:31:19Z")
> [@Saintly\_Loser](#): > > Let’s say a case of bottled water goes for $12.00 to $15.00. So the bottle deposits would add up to $1.20 (at five cents a bottle, which is the rate here in NYC – not sure about in Maine or anywhere else). > > This is an insanely inefficient way to scam the system. The OP’s [linked article](http://bangordailynews.com/2015/03/27/news/lewiston-auburn/norway-police-investigate-water-dumping-welfare-scam/) from post #5 says that this kind of scam “more often involves glass milk jugs that have a $2.50 deposit”. In any case, to return to the OP’s proposed debate, I think such “bottle scams” and all other forms of welfare fraud should be investigated and punished, but I don’t think removing bottled drinks from food stamp coverage is an appropriate response. Although I’d be prepared to listen to arguments that bottled water, soda, candy, and unnecessary/junk foods in general shouldn’t be covered by food stamps in the first place, just because they’re not healthy and nobody needs them. (With the requisite amount of caution based on awareness that the food purchases available to low-income people are often heavily skewed to junk-type foods, and it’s marginally better for welfare recipients to be eating junk food than no food.) ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/16 "2015-11-25T22:37:18Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > The OP’s [linked article](http://bangordailynews.com/2015/03/27/news/lewiston-auburn/norway-police-investigate-water-dumping-welfare-scam/) from post #5 says that this kind of scam “more often involves glass milk jugs that have a $2.50 deposit”. In which case, it seems that the more viable solution would be to _not have a $2.50 deposit on glass milk jugs_. Do they even _sell_ milk like that in Maine? I’ve never seen milk for sale in a glass jug at a grocery store, let alone one where the bottle would be worth nearly as much as its actual content. ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/17 "2015-11-25T22:39:31Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > Do they even _sell_ milk like that in Maine? I’ve never seen milk for sale in a glass jug at a grocery store, let alone one where the bottle would be worth nearly as much as its actual content. That is weird. Didn’t everyone stop using glass for milk in the 50’s. According to [Bottle Bill](http://www.bottlebill.org/legislation/usa/maine.htm), Maine has a deposit of 15c for wine/liquor and 5c for everything else. Maybe alocal can clarify what the article is talking about. ---
**Author:** ![boffking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/858c86/32.png) [@boffking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/boffking)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/18 "2015-11-25T23:14:05Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > In which case, it seems that the more viable solution would be to _not have a $2.50 deposit on glass milk jugs_. > > Do they even _sell_ milk like that in Maine? I’ve never seen milk for sale in a glass jug at a grocery store, let alone one where the bottle would be worth nearly as much as its actual content. Some local farms sell their milk in their own glass jugs. Smiling Hill is one of the bigger ones. ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/19 "2015-11-25T23:15:11Z")
And the local farms accept food stamps? ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/20 "2015-11-25T23:17:50Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > In which case, it seems that the more viable solution would be to _not have a $2.50 deposit on glass milk jugs_. > > Do they even _sell_ milk like that in Maine? I’ve never seen milk for sale in a glass jug at a grocery store, let alone one where the bottle would be worth nearly as much as its actual content. There are some small Midwestern dairies that do, but their deposits are more like 50 cents to $1, not $2.50. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575.md?page=2)