# The ethics of food stamps (AITA?) **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 10, 2024, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457 "2024-12-10T20:51:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 10
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2024, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/181 "2024-12-11T21:06:23Z")
> [@MandaJo](#): > > I think there could be an argument that food assistance is generally designated for children I’d like to hear that argument. As that is news to me. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2024, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/182 "2024-12-11T21:41:00Z")
I received food stamps back when they were actually food stamps, and I remember one time getting the stink eye because I wanted to buy a bottle of “Cold Duck” non-alcoholic sparkling grape juice. It was perfectly within guidelines but the cashier thought it was somehow inherently related to alcohol consumption. ETA: apparently the same name is used for a type of actual wine, but this was strictly the mixer variety. ---
**Author:** ![Mk\_VII](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Mk\_VII](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mk_VII)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2024, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/183 "2024-12-11T21:48:55Z")
> “And the peculiar evil is this, that the less money you have, the less inclined you feel to spend it on wholesome food. A millionaire may enjoy breakfasting off orange juice and Ryvita biscuits; an unemployed man doesn’t. Here the tendency of which I spoke at the end of the last chapter comes into play. When you are unemployed, which is to say when you are underfed, harassed, bored, and miserable, you don’t want to eat dull wholesome food. You want something a little bit ‘tasty’. There is always some cheaply pleasant thing to tempt you. Let’s have three pennorth of chips! Run out and buy us a twopenny ice-cream! Put the kettle on and we’ll all have a nice cup of tea!” > George Orwell, _The Road To Wigan Pier_ ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2024, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/184 "2024-12-11T21:51:32Z")
SNAP might not be mostly used by children but food assistance would also include WIC (pregnant women and children) and the school lunch program pretty much entirely benefit children. ---
**Author:** ![Ann\_Hedonia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ann_hedonia/32/319_2.png) [@Ann\_Hedonia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ann_Hedonia)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2024, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/185 "2024-12-11T21:53:36Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > I received food stamps back when they were actually food stamps, and I remember one time getting the stink eye because I wanted to buy a bottle of “Cold Duck” non-alcoholic sparkling grape juice. It was perfectly within guidelines but the cashier thought it was somehow inherently related to alcohol consumption. ETA: apparently the same name is used for a type of actual wine, but this was strictly the mixer variety. That probably happens for the same reason I sometimes get carded when buying non-alcoholic beer (I’m 67 so I’m not complaining) and why in certain locales I’m locked out of buying non-alcoholic beer on Sunday mornings. It’s looks exactly like the alcoholic product unless you read the labels closely and, more importantly, it’s coded into the system as an alcoholic product. ---
**Author:** ![wguy123](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wguy123/32/3161_2.png) [@wguy123](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wguy123)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2024, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/186 "2024-12-11T22:16:46Z")
> [@wguy123](#): > > What about all the rich people and farmers eating caviar off the backs of poor and middle class folks? You know what the Farm Bill that funds SNAP also pays for? You know who can benefit from all the tax loopholes and cheap labor? But yeah, the occasional treat or luxury for someone living below poverty is the one to look down on. Punching down is the way to go. > [@doreen](#): > > and my guess is that most people in the US don’t know this) the food stamp/SNAP program is administered by the Department of Agriculture See my post from way way way up above. > [@Ann\_Hedonia](#): > > Just pretend that the food treat is being purchased with MY tax dollars, and pretend that YOUR tax dollars are being spent on subsidizing a billionaire’s fantasy of space travel or on bombs to drop on children in hospitals overseas or deporting hardworking agricultural laborers or whatever you think constitutes a worthy use of YOUR tax dollars. Maybe that’ll help you sleep at night. You don’t have to pretend. I guarantee the funds for the Farm Bill, same as SNAP, are paying for caviar for rich folk (and dropping bombs). However, when it goes to rich folk it is A-OK. Poor folk paying for caviar is a sin of the ultimate magnitude. Jesus said rich folk deserve it and poor folk don’t. Corinthians 2 and something. ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2024, 10:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/187 "2024-12-11T22:19:42Z")
Crap! You’re right. I forgot about that. ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2024, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/188 "2024-12-11T22:20:53Z")
> [@doreen](#): > > Also ( and my guess is that most people in the US don’t know this) the food stamp/SNAP program is administered by the Department of Agriculture Which reminds me of a story, > Speaker of the House John W. McCormack assigned Shirley Chisholm to serve on the House Agriculture Committee. Given her urban district, she felt the placement was irrelevant to her constituents. When Chisholm confided to Rebbe Menachem M. Schneerson that she was upset and insulted by her assignment, Schneerson suggested that she use the surplus food to help the poor and hungry. Chisholm subsequently met Bob Dole and worked to expand the food-stamp program. She later played a critical role in the creation of the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC). Chisholm would credit Schneerson for the fact that so many “poor babies [now] have milk and poor children have food”. > **[Shirley Chisholm](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shirley_Chisholm#Early_terms)** > > Shirley Anita Chisholm (/ˈtʃɪzəm/ CHIZ-əm; née St. Hill; November 30, 1924 – January 1, 2005) was an American politician who, in 1968, became the first black woman to be elected to the United States Congress. Chisholm represented New York's 12th congressional district, a district centered in Bedford–Stuyvesant, Brooklyn\[a\] for seven terms from 1969 to 1983. In 1972, she became the first black candidate for a major-party nomination for President of the United States and the first woman to run f... ---
**Author:** ![wguy123](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wguy123/32/3161_2.png) [@wguy123](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wguy123)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2024, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/189 "2024-12-11T22:42:44Z")
> [@DocCathode](#): > > I’d like to hear that argument. As that is news to me. Obviously, only children need to eat. Just kidding. SNAP is not just for children. > [@doreen](#): > > WIC WIC is for children and has a specific list of what is allowed. I think folks in this thread are getting them confused. But mainly, this thread is all about telling poor folks how they need to act. No good food for you! Pull yourselves up by your bootstraps like all the rich farmers that also get these benefits and we don’t cast aspersions when they buy caviar! I bet @beowulff doesn’t care when his rich farmer friend getting subsidies from the Farm Bill buys caviar. ---
**Author:** ![beowulff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beowulff/32/542_2.png) [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2024, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/190 "2024-12-11T22:52:34Z")
I do if they don’t leave any for me, to enjoy as I light my cigar with $100 bills… ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2024, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/191 "2024-12-11T23:14:03Z")
> [@wguy123](#): > > But mainly, this thread is all about telling poor folks how they need to act. No good food for you! Pull yourselves up by your bootstraps like all the rich farmers that also get these benefits and we don’t cast aspersions when they buy caviar! Mainly, that’s not what is being said, but thanks for playing! ---
**Author:** ![FluffyBob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ecb155/32.png) [@FluffyBob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FluffyBob)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2024, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/192 "2024-12-11T23:24:09Z")
Oh what a load of pretentious horseshit. I genuinely love that stuff. I don’t care what other people think about it I just enjoy it. I have rarely had anything but a garnish of actual sturgeon caviar, but lumpfish, salmon, tobiko and other more common caviar are very tasty and I am certainly not alone in this belief. Who the hell are you to say what other people actually like? A small jar of lumpfish caviar or something similar is not outrageously expensive and maybe he is using it to make some much more basic fare more interesting. Whats the big deal. There is so much grift, greed, absence of tax responsibilities for the rich in America how can someone even care about jar of caviar from a grocery shelf. It is sickening. ---
**Author:** ![nelliebly](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nelliebly/32/5422_2.png) [@nelliebly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nelliebly)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2024, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/193 "2024-12-11T23:24:48Z")
> [@bump](#): > > If they’re buying it anyway, then any shortfall is coming out of _someone else’s pocket_, be it local food pantries or soup kitchens, etc… because the assumption is that they’re not able to cover that themselves. Shortfalls are a major reason those programs exist. Did you think only homeless and indigent people use those services? My daughter is a grant writer for a major food bank in a US city. It’s not a government agency. It runs on corporate grants and private donations. Inflation has walloped a lot of Americans who make too much for SNAP but not enough to outpace inflation. And SNAP cost of living increases have not kept pace with inflation. [In an Urban Institute study](https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/why-snap-benefits-arent-keeping-up-with-the-rising-cost-of-food), in 98% of US counties, SNAP doesn’t cover the rising cost of food. And then there’s this from Elaine Waxman of the UI: > The fact of the matter is, when we look at the patterns of purchases between people who are on SNAP, and people who have low incomes and are not on SNAP, then there are not very significant differences. The truth of the matter is, is as a country, we don’t eat very well. I once saw a customer “Tsk” roll her eyes at a woman who was paying for cake mix and a little tub of frosting with her EBT card. When someone on SNAP has a child with a birthday coming up, should they not buy cake mix because it’s not nutritious? (“Happy Birthday, Jimmy! Now blow out the matches I stuck in this nice, healthy yam!”) Or is it OK as long as they get permission from other taxpayers? ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2024, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/194 "2024-12-11T23:37:43Z")
> [@FluffyBob](#): > > A small jar of lumpfish caviar or something similar is not outrageously expensive and maybe he is using it to make some much more basic fare more interesting. Whats the big deal. It’s an interesting bit of ‘cognitive dissonance’. The poors are expected to be able to turn their, often recommended, monthly allotment of flour, lard, and other staples that can’t be eaten without a kitchen and the ability to turn those staples into actual edible food. But, it’s not even thinkable that that poor is buying that ‘expensive’ piece of beef with the intention of cutting it up into tiny pieces and making a gallon of soup that will feed their family for three days. ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2024, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/195 "2024-12-11T23:44:56Z")
40% of SNAP recipients are choldren Over 60% of SNAP participants live in households with children. Its not crazy to say the program is designed with the assumption that most participants are responsible for feeding kids with the aid. Elderly are another group that is over represented, and who can also be vulnerable to abuse and neglect. This makes it more difficult for a third party to siphon off funds. I’m not at all convinced that this justifies the program. But I have heard the argument and I can see some merit. ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2024, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/196 "2024-12-11T23:48:45Z")
See **Doreen** ’s post and my response to it- > [@The ethics of food stamps (AITA?)](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/187): > > Crap! You’re right. I forgot about that. ---
**Author:** ![filmore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/7993a0/32.png) [@filmore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/filmore)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2024, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/197 "2024-12-11T23:51:01Z")
With something like meat, there’s expensive because it weighs a lot or expensive because it’s high quality. There’s a big difference in weight between $30 of chicken thighs and $30 of Wagyu beef. The same with the difference in price between Kraft cheddar versus cheddar imported from Cheddar, England. But regardless, someone on SNAP isn’t going to be able to make a lot of meals if they are spending their benefits on the highest quality groceries. They have to make the benefit last the whole month. If they blow it all on fancy steaks, lobster, caviar, and imported cheeses, they’ll go hungry at the end of the month. They’ll hopefully make better choices in the next benefit cycle. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2024, 12:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/198 "2024-12-12T00:01:47Z")
I was thinking about how as a child we and people we knew would get the infamous “government cheese” and big boxes of powdered milk. In my memory the cheese was big 5 lb bricks in cardboard boxes, and googling for government cheese shows exactly what I remember. It was pretty bland mild cheddar IIRC, but at least not the plastic abomination called “American cheese” you get in wrapped slices. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2024, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/199 "2024-12-12T00:26:07Z")
There were probably lots of different cheeses at different times but the couple of ones that I saw were exactly American cheese, just in a block and not sliced. ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2024, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457/200 "2024-12-12T00:38:39Z")
It was American cheese - but it was real American cheese, the kind that you might get sliced at the deli counter or pre-packaged by Boars Head or Dietz and Wattson, not the Kraft "pasteurized prepared cheese product\* slices that come wrapped in plastic . \* It doesn’t meet the definition of cheese and the FDA doesn’t have a standard for “pasteurized prepared cheese product”. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457.md?page=9) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-ethics-of-food-stamps-aita/1011457.md?page=11)