# 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:** 2
**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, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/21 "2015-11-25T23:19:55Z")
> [@CarnalK](#): > > And the local farms accept food stamps? If they’re set up to do so, yes. Some farmer’s market vendors do too, in addition to WIC and Senior Nutrition certificates. 🙂 I’ve never seen a bulk-packaged water bottle that had a deposit; some of the larger bottles, made with heavier plastic, do. I’m skeptical about the OP’s story too. :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![scr4](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/59ef9b/32.png) [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/22 "2015-11-25T23:27:16Z")
Just as a data point, [Earth Fare](https://www.earthfare.com/), a health food supermarket (similar to Whole Foods), sells milk in 1/2-gallon glass bottles for $3.49 + $2.00 deposit. And I’m pretty sure they accept food stamps. ---
**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, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/23 "2015-11-25T23:34:50Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > If they’re set up to do so, yes. Some farmer’s market vendors do too, in addition to WIC and Senior Nutrition certificates. 🙂 > > I’ve never seen a bulk-packaged water bottle that had a deposit; some of the larger bottles, made with heavier plastic, do. > > I’m skeptical about the OP’s story too. :dubious: In Maine, all beverage bottles and cans have a deposit. It doesn’t matter what kind of drink it is. The only exceptions are paper cartons. ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/24 "2015-11-25T23:35:27Z")
Snap benefits can accumulate in some states for up to a year (or more IDK) and sufficient for ones total needs with much left over if one is frugal. It may be a way of cashing out benefits that will expire. With recycling now widespread we should get rid of the deposit bottle for everyone. However many people depend on collecting bottles from recycling bins for a living (normally homeless) which is a interesting problem. We would like to move towards single stream recycling, but the homeless need the bottles and should not have to rummage through paper and other non deposit plastics and metals. The SNAP issue you mention speaks of desperation, someone who needs real help, and really getting pennies on the dollar as their only means of getting by (including addictions - which a person needs help for). It is not (or should not be) criminal. As for how you would practicality change the SNAP rules to void out food stamp deposits would not be practical. However perhaps charging the deposit would be practical, and this no advantage to returning them, but It would have to be a wide spread problem, and as pointed out there are better ways of cashing out SNAP benefits. ---
**Author:** ![Onomatopoeia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/onomatopoeia/32/4145_2.png) [@Onomatopoeia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Onomatopoeia)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/25 "2015-11-25T23:42:45Z")
WTF? It is threads like this one that piss me the Hell off. First of all, the OP’s premise is so ridiculous it is laughable. Why would anyone waste their time and the contents of the bottles, which are much more valuable than the bloody deposit, for such a poor return? Why not just buy a twenty-bottle case of water for $6 and sell each bottle for a dollar on the street? Secondly, this seems like simply another attempt to make the lives of those on public assistance as difficult as possible by conjuring up a problem that doesn’t exist and crying out for a solution that causes even more hardship. Now you want to limit the amount of freaking water poor people can buy? I suspect this all started when someone, somewhere saw a poor person redeeming bottle deposits and jumped to the first ridiculous conclusion that came to mind. Even if some enterprising public assistance recipient did find a way to game the oh so lucrative bottle deposit system, SO WHAT? Who the Hell cares about someone getting a dollar on the redemption of 20 freaking bottles? Where will this nonsense end? What’s next, poor people shouldn’t live in apartments because they provide shelter, which makes them too comfortable? Will you people (not necessarily those in this thread) please give me a freaking break with this crap and stop trying to find new and imaginative ways to hurt people whose only crime is being poor? God damn it! ---
**Author:** ![slash2k](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@slash2k](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slash2k)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2015, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/26 "2015-11-25T23:46:02Z")
> [@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. In my part of the world (which is Kansas, not Maine), yes, some specialty dairies sell milk in glass jugs. One of my local grocery stores carries [Hildebrand](http://www.hildebrandfarmsdairy.com/) milk and cream–the bottle deposit is $2.75 for a half-gallon milk bottle (I think it’s lower for smaller bottles of cream). ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2015, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/27 "2015-11-26T00:04:37Z")
> [@Onomatopoeia](#): > > First of all, the OP’s premise is so ridiculous it is laughable. Why would anyone waste their time and the contents of the bottles, which are much more valuable than the bloody deposit, for such a poor return? […] > > I suspect this all started when someone, somewhere saw a poor person redeeming bottle deposits and jumped to the first ridiculous conclusion that came to mind. Easy, easy. While I completely agree with you about the pointlessness and cruelty of “welfare-shaming”, it seems fairly well established that this sort of “dumping scam” is something that [at least a few food stamp recipients](http://bangordailynews.com/2013/02/20/news/state/new-rules-will-penalize-snap-recipients-for-water-dumping/) actually do [commit](http://bangordailynews.com/2011/08/19/news/state/food-stamp-%E2%80%98water-dumping%E2%80%99-scam-continues/). No, it is not a smart way to make money, but it is a very easy and quick way to obtain a small amount of cash. And sometimes people who are strapped for cash are willing to go to some trouble to obtain even a small amount of cash immediately. I concur that while this sort of scam ought to be prohibited and punished, it ought not to be treated in the media like a significant fraud scandal, unless someone can show evidence that it’s actually anything like widespread or costly. Foaming in outrage over the fact that a few poor people here and there are occasionally wasting $6 worth of water to obtain $1.20 in cash is some Scrooge-level pharisaism. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2015, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/28 "2015-11-26T00:55:35Z")
Another one chiming in to say that I’ve never heard of this scam. We don’t have bottle deposits in WI, so it’s possible I wouldn’t know about it but my store takes them and, I assure you, there’s plenty of very good ways to get cash off the cards, and for a better value then 10¢ on the dollar (or whatever it works out to). Two things I want to toss out. 1)SNAP purchases are already tax exempt (which makes sense) so 2)I could understand doing this, however, it’s just _another_ thing we, the retailers, would have to do. It would just be another reason some retailers would just give up accepting them. Wait, three things 3)So you don’t take the deposit, how do you deal with making sure people don’t return the bottles for a deposit? ---
**Author:** ![boffking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/858c86/32.png) [@boffking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/boffking)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2015, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/29 "2015-11-26T02:02:38Z")
> [@CarnalK](#): > > And the local farms accept food stamps? FYI, you can buy Smiling Hill milk at the supermarkets . ---
**Author:** ![yellowjacketcoder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/4bbf92/32.png) [@yellowjacketcoder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yellowjacketcoder)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2015, 2:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/30 "2015-11-26T02:59:04Z")
I’ll accept that this scam occurs. However, no matter what form of assistance there is, there will be some number of people that will (try to) scam it. That’s just the nature of humanity. The question is how much fraud is happening, how much it would cost to defeat that fraud, and how much harm would come to legitimate users of the assistance if anti-fraud measures were put into place. It seems to me this is likely a low-percentage fraud case, simply due to the inefficiency involved - note I am not saying it doesn’t happen, just that it’s not widespread. Anti-fraud measures like tracking every bottle or denying food stamp users the ability to buy bottled milk seem prohibitively expensive or unnecessarily harmful to legitimate users of the service. Sure, it happens, but it’s not worth scheduling an appointment with the dermatologist if you got a paper cut. Besides, if we really wanted to eliminate this, we’d just make the deposit portion of the cost of the bottle unable to be bought with food stamps, while still allowing the rest of the purchase price to be covered. Want that $3.49 bottle of milk (ha, unlikely for a legit user)? Pay the $2 deposit yourself, and they’ll be damn sure to actually recycle the bottle. Sure, that’s a minor hardship to legitimate users, but I don’t think it’s enough of a hardship for the general case (surely very few legit users are buying $3.50 half gallons), but it will for damn sure stop this particular scam. I am assuming programming the registers to do this is possible, which it must be to report the purchase of those bottles to the rebate system. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2015, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/31 "2015-11-26T04:36:18Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > Easy, easy. While I completely agree with you about the pointlessness and cruelty of “welfare-shaming”, it seems fairly well established that this sort of “dumping scam” is something that [at least a few food stamp recipients](http://bangordailynews.com/2013/02/20/news/state/new-rules-will-penalize-snap-recipients-for-water-dumping/) actually do [commit](http://bangordailynews.com/2011/08/19/news/state/food-stamp-%E2%80%98water-dumping%E2%80%99-scam-continues/). It apparently happened ONE TIME in 2011. And according to your story the water cost $6.00 and the scamsters got $2.40 back. That’s some big time scamming. If you think it happened more than one time, then where’s the cite? Both the articles you linked talk about the exact same case. If the crackdown on welfare queens scamming the system costs more than $6.00, that’s a huge waste of taxpayer money. But that’s typical, millions of dollars to prevent one guy from getting a extra $2.40 is worth it for some people. ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2015, 5:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/32 "2015-11-26T05:48:03Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > But that’s typical, millions of dollars to prevent one guy from getting a extra $2.40 is worth it for some people. Bingo. That pretty much sums this up. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2015, 6:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/33 "2015-11-26T06:28:53Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > It apparently happened ONE TIME in 2011. And according to your story the water cost $6.00 and the scamsters got $2.40 back. That’s some big time scamming. > > If you think it happened more than one time, then where’s the cite? Both the articles you linked talk about the exact same case. Um, no? While I completely agree, as I already said, that complaints about welfare “fraud and abuse” tend to be massively disproportionate to the actual scale of the problem, the two cites I linked to discuss different cases (and also mention anecdotal reports from store employees that this is not a very uncommon occurrence). [2013 cite:](http://bangordailynews.com/2013/02/20/news/state/new-rules-will-penalize-snap-recipients-for-water-dumping/) > [@](#): > > The young couple was caught on video dumping the water in front of Shaw ’ s grocery store and told police that they didn’t think there was anything wrong with what they were doing. The bottled water they bought with their SNAP card cost around $6 and the duo got $2.40 back in cash from the redeemed bottles. Which referred to a [2011 incident:](http://bangordailynews.com/2011/08/22/news/bangor/bangor-woman-records-couple-dumping-water-in-food-stamp-scam/?ref=inline) > [@](#): > > The Bangor couple, a 23-year-old man and a 17-year-old female who turned 18 on Sunday, told the investigating officer that they had purchased two cases of water with funding provided by the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as the Food Stamp Program. [2011 cite referring to a different incident:](http://bangordailynews.com/2011/08/19/news/state/food-stamp-%E2%80%98water-dumping%E2%80%99-scam-continues/) > [@](#): > > Bangor police were called to Shaw’s grocery store Thursday night to collect information about a regularly occurring food stamp scam that recently was dubbed “water dumping” by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. > > The USDA has taken a stand on water dumping — buying beverages with food stamps, dumping the liquid and returning the empties for cash — and in June proposed a new rule that could disqualify recipients who engage in the practice. […] > > Bangor police went to the Shaw’s store on Main Street around 7:15 p.m. Thursday to deal with a man buying bottled water and dumping it so he could return the empty bottles for cash, the sergeant said. > > The 58-year-old man used SNAP funds allocated to him to purchase the water and pay for the bottle deposit. What makes it more confusing is that several of the articles used the same photograph which referred to a different incident in 2010: [2010 cite:](http://bangordailynews.com/2010/08/19/news/bangor/bangor-food-stamp-scam-dumps-water-for-deposit/) > [@](#): > > A pair of men at the Shaw’s supermarket on Main Street […] on a recent Tuesday morning […] engaged in a food stamp scam funded by U.S. taxpayers. > > After purchasing a reported 20 24-packs of bottled water, on sale that week for $2.99 a case before taxes and redemption fees were added, the men went behind the store to the loading dock and poured the contents of each bottle on the ground. Shortly thereafter, a reporter also witnessed the pair wheel their shopping cart into the vestibule of the store, feed the 480 bottles into a redemption machine and claim their cash value at the customer service counter. > > In a ploy a number of the store’s employees describe as common, these men had found a way to turn their funds from the federally administered Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, into cold, hard cash, which can then be used to purchase items that do not meet the program’s guidelines. But, you know, you still should have looked at the links a bit more carefully before loudly complaining that they don’t say what in fact they actually do say. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2015, 12:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/34 "2015-11-26T12:23:55Z")
> [@boffking](#): > > 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/) Is Bangor Daily News a popular news source in Maine? I’d never heard of the newspaper or the bizarre claim it makes but clicked and clicked again on _Opinion_. Such opinions! 😛 **boffking** , maybe you didn’t know it, but some post-rational American news sources are full of lies and stupidity. I think we can lump bangordailynews with washingtontimes etc. Your take-away fighting-ignorance tip should be to be more careful about where you get “information” from. ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2015, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/35 "2015-11-26T14:36:33Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > Is Bangor Daily News a popular news source in Maine? I’d never heard of the newspaper or the bizarre claim it makes but clicked and clicked again on _Opinion_. Such opinions! 😛 > > **boffking** , maybe you didn’t know it, but some post-rational American news sources are full of lies and stupidity. I think we can lump bangordailynews with washingtontimes etc. Your take-away fighting-ignorance tip should be to be more careful about where you get “information” from. Speaking as someone who lived near Bangor for quite some time, the paper is not precisely what I’d call “wingnutty”. It was usually pretty down-the-middle with some legitimately great journalism. Although that might have changed since I left, I dunno. I could ask my father, he never left. ---
**Author:** ![Onomatopoeia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/onomatopoeia/32/4145_2.png) [@Onomatopoeia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Onomatopoeia)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2015, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/36 "2015-11-26T15:48:50Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > It apparently happened ONE TIME in 2011. And according to your story the water cost $6.00 and the scamsters got $2.40 back. That’s some big time scamming. > > If you think it happened more than one time, then where’s the cite? Both the articles you linked talk about the exact same case. > > If the crackdown on welfare queens scamming the system costs more than $6.00, that’s a huge waste of taxpayer money. But that’s typical, millions of dollars to prevent one guy from getting a extra $2.40 is worth it for some people. It is worse than that, in my opinion. Its effect, and I would say its actual goal is to cause just enough outrage that the state legislature reacts by passing laws to increase the hardship of all public assistance recipients, not just those ostensibly scamming, while, to your point, spending much more money than any scammer could possibly make in the process. The goal is not to save the state money, or to combat fraud. The goal is to hurt poor people, enough to either drive them out of the state altogether or kill them. Either occurrence would make that bloody nutcase LePage happy. ---
**Author:** ![sleestak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/919ad9/32.png) [@sleestak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sleestak)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2015, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/37 "2015-11-26T17:17:09Z")
Wow, apparently it is easier to accuse people of wanting to kill poor people than it is to do a quick Google search and find out what is actually happening. According to the USDA, these types of scams were costing 4% of the budget, which is 75 billion. So 3 billion a year. The USDA made some changes and claim that the scams are now down to 1% a year. I take both those numbers with a grain of salt, but assuming they are true and not low as I suspect, that is some serious money. The USDA implemented a rule specifc for this scams. Here is a hint, Google USDA water dumping and you can find the info. So, yes, this is a real problem, and even though the percentage is small it is a large amount of money. Yes, asking for solutions is reasonable. Accusing those who want a solution of wanting to kill poor people is beyond stupid. Slee ---
**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 26, 2015, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/38 "2015-11-26T17:34:21Z")
> [@sleestak](#): > > According to the USDA, these types of scams were costing 4% of the budget, which is 75 billion. So 3 billion a year. Which, at 5 cents a bottle, means these scammers would have to have poured out 60 billion bottles of water, which is more bottled water than was sold worldwide. What percentage of “these types of scams” actually consists of people dumping out water bottles for pennies on the dollar? ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2015, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/39 "2015-11-26T17:37:22Z")
> [@sleestak](#): > > Wow, apparently it is easier to accuse people of wanting to kill poor people than it is to do a quick Google search and find out what is actually happening. > > According to the USDA, these types of scams were costing 4% of the budget, which is 75 billion. So 3 billion a year. The USDA made some changes and claim that the scams are now down to 1% a year. I take both those numbers with a grain of salt, but assuming they are true and not low as I suspect, that is some serious money. > > The USDA implemented a rule specifc for this scams. Here is a hint, Google USDA water dumping and you can find the info. > > So, yes, this is a real problem, and even though the percentage is small it is a large amount of money. Yes, asking for solutions is reasonable. > > Accusing those who want a solution of wanting to kill poor people is beyond stupid. > > Slee [Not water dumping, all trafficking combined.](http://www.fns.usda.gov/tags/water-dumping) > [@](#): > > Over the last 15 years, FNS has aggressively implemented a number of measures to reduce the prevalence of trafficking in SNAP from 4 percent down to its current level of 1 percent. ---
**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 26, 2015, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575/40 "2015-11-26T17:45:28Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > Which, at 5 cents a bottle, means these scammers would have to have poured out 60 billion bottles of water, which is more bottled water than was sold worldwide. running coach pointed out already that the number is for all trafficking but this isn’t the right math, istm. The cost to the system would be for the whole product not just the deposit. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-food-stamps-stop-covering-bottle-deposits/738575.md?page=3)