Under Obama, Food Stamp Costs Growing Much Faster than Food Stamp Rolls
One of the least-appreciated reasons for conservatives to dislike former President George W. Bush is that even while the unemployment rate was declining, the U.S. saw a massive increase in participation in the food-stamp programs (Women, Infants and Children, or WIC; and Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP). It’s quite accurate to refer, as the Washington Examiner recently did, to the “Great Bush-Obama food-stamp expansion.” But a recent article on the subject of food-stamp costs in National Review didn’t even mention Bush’s name. Firebrand Newt Gingrich, who has tirelessly focused attention on this topic, has been similarly negligent in omitting Bush from the picture.
Yet Obama has done much more than simply oversee an increase in participation.
Obama brings up Bush’s expansion when challenged about his food-stamp record — he has aggressively sought to blame his performance on his Republican predecessor. Here’s what he told ABC News when confronted on this issue:
First of all, I don’t put people on food stamps. People become eligible for food stamps. Second of all, the initial expansion of food-stamp eligibility happened under my Republican predecessor, not under me. No. 3, when you have a disastrous economic crash that results in eight million people losing their jobs, more people are going to need more support from government.
It’s stunning that the Romney campaign is allowing Obama to get away with not mentioning the costs that have no precedent whatsoever in Bush administration records or policy.
Under Obama, 14.7 million more Americans began using the food-stamp program than had been using it under Bush. That’s a whopping increase of 46%, from 31.9 million users in 2009 to 46.6 million today. One in every seven Americans. The WIC program now purchases over half of all infant formula sold in the United States.
But most importantly, the cost of the program to taxpayers has increased by far more than the expected, proportionate 46%.
Under eight years of George Bush, annual spending on food stamps rose from $15 billion to $35 billion — an increase of about $2.5 billion per year. But in just the first two years of the Obama administration alone, spending rose from $35 billion to $75 billion — a staggering increase of $20 billion per year, nearly ten times the rate of increase in cost under Bush.
The cost of food stamps under Obama rose from an average of $3.6 billion per month when he came to office to $6.2 billion per month now, a disproportional increase of 72% compared to the 46% increase in program usage. And even that figure is misleading because it is based on averages: the total cost of the program over Obama’s four years in office, as noted above, actually rose by well over 100%, now running in excess of $75 billion per year. If you compare 2007 and 2011, the total cost increase is an astounding 135%.
There are two possible explanations for the wildly disproportionate rise in food stamp costs under Obama: either he’s being much more generous with recipients than Bush ever dreamed of being, or food prices are rising because of his inflationary policies. Earlier this year, the Congressional Budget Office weighed in. They concluded that a combination of both factors was in play — but that Obama’s generosity (with taxpayer money) is the much bigger culprit.
Hate to be the one to tell you but food stamps are not used for food!I can take a walk this morning and buy $300 worth of food stamps for $150!Il let you work your early morning in America imaginations to guess what there used for.The cardboard boxes that the government uses to carry on its business are wet on the bottom!
I hear that here in San Francisco $300 of food stamps usually buys $200 dollars worth of Dope.
Not credible. No stamps, just debit cards good for a year, loaded monthly.
Not credible? You’re kidding, right? Here’s 50 bucks CASH for you. You scan your card (or give me your card if we’re BFF’s who “trust” each other)…I buy $100 (or the agreed upon amount) of “groceries” or whatever passes for food these days like Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, Long John Silver’s, KFC, McDonald’s, Jack in the Box, Domino’s, Subway, etc. depending on your state. Simple…EZ…No Fuss, No Muss! Thanx taxPAYERS!
Recently we stopped by the local Wal-Mart and the fairly well dressed woman was using her credit card and and EBT card to pay for her purchases. She apparently was new to the EBT card (or was using someone else’s card) because she has some difficulty using it. After she finished and left I made a snide comment about welfare queens to the checker and she laughed and related the case of another EBT user a few customers ahead of us. This woman used her EBT card to buy a bag of ice and demanded $100 in cash. She used some of the cash to buy candy bars for her kids, all the while telling a fellow customer about her new Mercedes.
Recently we stopped by the local Neiman Marcus and the fairly well dressed woman was using her AmEx Platinum card to pay for her purchases, which included a $5,000 Fendi handbag, some jewelry and clothing. The total was over $40.000. She apparently was new to the Platinum card because she had some difficulty using it. After she finished and left I made a snide comment about to the checker about how these Ann Romney types haven’t a clue and she laughed and related the case of another Platinum card user a few customers ahead of us. This woman used her Platinum card to buy a bottle of fragrance and demanded $100,000 in cash. She used some of the cash to buy handbags for her two girls, all the while telling a fellow customer about her new Mercedes that was made possible through the generous deficit financed tax cuts that were meant for job creation. She just said that they didn’t feel like creating jobs. Handbags and jewelry were more important.
There, FIFY
@Cynical Wonder.
You sure are the best troll/flamebaiter I’ve come across in recent years.
Cheers!!
“Deficit-financed tax cuts” sounds like an armed robber using a credit card instead of holding up liquor stores.
You dissing Michelle now too?
One big difference. In your example they are making the purchase with their own money, while in harry’s example they are buying that stuff with my tax money. And dont tell me that money people get to keep because you are not hiking their taxes is also taxpayer money. Although maybe you leftists really do think that, all our money belongs to you, and letting us keep some of it is somehow giving something away. By the way, romney is not giving tax cuts to the rich, he is repealing special interest tax breaks for the rich, in exchange for lower overall rates. His plan is revenue neutral for the upper brackets.
“She just said that they didn’t feel like creating jobs. Handbags and jewelry were more important.”
Just to be clear, you are aware that saying “Here’s money, make jewelry for me” IS creating a job, right?
Or… where did you think jewelry comes from?
Ahh.. wait.. you’re a liberal.. .magic fairies, like health care, right?
Can we make a deal, conservative to liberal here? I’ll believe in Evolution, you believe in Economics, okay? When you pay another person to provide a good or service that you want, and the agreements are voluntary, then both parties gain, and we have a positive effect on the economy. Jobs are created. And that’s good.
Frankly, I’m appalled you missed that. Do you actually not understand how voluntary purchasing of goods and services powers the economy? Or were you so giddy about making a stupid, cheap point you overlooked the obvious?
The difference is the Platnum card holder will pay for her purchases from her own (or her husband’s) pocket. The food stamp queen is spending my money.
That’s what the military contractors who have profited handsomely off the two unfunded wars that were never put on the books: Thanx taxPAYERS!
Gimme, gimme, gimme, more free goodies …
Flush! Is that enough?
Yes Credible,sorry Sir.She need only to lend me her card and pin #.
Minnesota has landed in trouble and is being forced to reform its program because of the very high number of cards that are “lost” and need to be replaced. A high number of lost cards is felt to be indicative of fraud.
When you “loose” a card that means that you sold that card to somebody at a discount approx 60% of real value plus the pin #. They then loose the card so to speak and call in for another one!
Last time I was at Whole Foods there was a lady in front on me paying with her California EBT card (the pretty one with the beach on it). The cashier asked for her I.D. The lady wasn’t buying anything extravagant. She was white, nicely dressed and had a girl with her, I’m guessing she was 5 or 6. This is the first time I have seen them ask for I.D., so maybe they just do it randomly. I don’t know what this woman’s personal circumstances are, but she had a kid and was buying food. I don’t have a problem with my tax dollars helping to feed people. This is America, not Calcutta, India.
I look forward to a time when we don’t scapegoat our fellow Americans as the source of our woes. Is the state of affairs we are facing economically really the disabled person who is *perceived* as “milking the system?” Or is it the mom who lost her job and is trying to feed her kids with food stamps? Maybe it’s the two old men who live down the street that have been together for 30 years and want to tie the knot. Yup, they’re the real enemy. Those socialists, they want to bring us all down. How do we get people to “participate” when one party is so hell bent on excluding so many? What ever happened to “We The People?”
I think it is too easy to point at the *other* as the source of our problems, but where is the outrage over the deficit financed tax cuts for, so called, “job creators” who never created any jobs? Indeed, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics before President Obama even stepped foot in the WH we were losing over 800,000 jobs a month. Also, “deficit financed” means the money was not offset by cutting spending elsewhere, it was just added to the national debt, which means these welfare freebies for CEOs were paid for with my tax dollars, and yours. It would be one thing if they did what they were supposed to in creating jobs but they didn’t. Now the same guys who drove the car into the ditch say that President Obama isn’t pulling the car out fast enough, so they want the keys back! I won’t even get into the two unfunded wars that were never put on the books. If you really want to know what cratered our economy and who is “milking the system” this is a good place to start. We’re talking trillions upon trillions of dollars here. The problem isn’t the mother who wants to buy food for her kid because she lost her job.
No offense intentended but in my experience what they usually need is to buy drugs. Many are about to get (sick) and need some narcotic to get better! Usually this includes the live in boyfriend too.
I have a similar feeling about what all those CEOs (oops, I meant *job creators*) did with all those tax breaks they were supposed to have created jobs with. My guess is that they’ve all been having a good time on the tax payers dime taking hookers on spa vacations and snorting blow off their tits.
Sure the beats snorting lines off of Philosophical Notebooks. Or Persons Galore.
Party! C. Blunder’s buyin’!
Clang!
Again the gov giving somebody cash, vs letting somebody keep cash they have earned.
Did you slip her a $20 to help her along, right then and there, you poor teary eyed guilt racked Modern Liberal.
Just think, if all “you people” put down a $20, that lady might have had a chance to start her own business. All private funds! Imagine! Put you money where the cesspool emotes.
Then again, “you people” would boot heel to face her with some kind of Modern Liberal rule, like, we have ours, stay out newcomer (unions). After all regulations (professional snobs) are just as much about keeping out newcomers and protecting the Modern Liberal Establishment types as about protecting some insect species (The Lying C. Blunder Fece Fly).
Hey C. Blunder, didn’t you play the part of a basted Modern Liberal Turkey some time back? With that black ancestor, Anvil?
Now and Then….???
Who is Your Sensei? Jaycen? Alice Nolin? Can’t answer? Just sit and take it turkey, with the Kick Me sign nailed to your ass. Clang!
Just like the old days, caught, basted, baked and flushed.
The Hall of Shame is coming!
Buuuuk, buck, buck, buck.
Taking more and more of those blue pills doesn’t make it harder (or sexier to the ladies in the retirement community) it just makes you crazy. Calm down geezer …
Gooosssssh C. Blunder, do write Joe Biden’s stuff too? Or Harry Belafonte? Such an intellect reduced “Blue Pill” material! Oh well, a dollar is a sort of dollar.
Can’t answer a simple question can you? Just sit there and take it, Persons Galore. The cesspool makes quite a prison for “you people”. You going to use that again? Behavior modification.
How about a new name? You know, start mellow, so you post on more blogs here, and then go in for that oh so clever “kill”. Get rejected here and there, but usually able to get in where authors come in occasionally. Yeah, that’s a plan!
All that Micro Targeting work and no movement in the polls. And Mr. President gets released into the wild for a bit and gets run down by such nasty, nasty questions!
Clang! Nothing like a Modern Liberal Liar self kicking it’s Kick Me sign nailed to its ass.
Buuuck, buck, buck, buck.
You dont mind feeding hungry mom and her children? Neither do I. On the other hand where is the father? Is it OK that he has no responsability? Also I see people buying very expensive imported food that is too expensive for me to buy. Also I know for sure that many people were selling the food stamps for half the price. Thats why they changed the system,but still it seems that it can be gamed. And how many people have jobs helping the poor? It seems that for every poor there is a psychiatrist 2 psychologists 3 social workers 4 public administrators and 1 politician administering the funds for all the programs that go to help the poor. Tax me to help the widows and orphans.
Beautiful, campassionate sentiments, please feel free to give people as much of your own money as you want.
I only ask you not put a gun to my head to express your compassionate generosity.
Funny how Cynical Wonder spotted this white woman in Whole Foods(an overpriced store) Most poorer people would go to a less expensive store(Pathmark or Stop and Shop) if they needed food as they could purchase more. I see black women with fancy fake nails and weaves purchasing junk items and expensive name brand foods in the neighborhood where I work. The other day I was in Brownsville, BKlyn and heard a young black girl on the phone , she said “My mother said I don’t need Food Stamps but I’m going to get them anyway”
The cards can and are cashed out,a Mamma san (Old Chinese or Vietnamese woman) will have a deal with an minority owned store,a brother is usually the go between for the druggie and mamma san, then he scores the drugs for them. I’ve seen it hundreds of times in the Tenderloin,common knowledge on the street.
I recall that when Bush was President the “Food Pantries” were always on the verge of emptiness. I’d look at the unemployment number, the pages of jobs in the pager, the increases to the School Lunch Program, and the increases in SNAP and ask “How in the name of RINO can there be any hungry people in this country?”. It was vivid proof of “the more you do, the more you have to do”. It reminds me of a line from Eastwood’s movie “Any which way you can” which goes “A hand out is what you get from the government, a hand up is what you get from a friend. “. The implications being that a hand-out is not a hand-up and that the government is not your friend.
Have you ever heard of anyone going OFF food stamps? If you get food stamps, here’s your Obamaphone (New & Improved: data plan coming soon). If you get an Obamaphone, sign right here for Medicaid. If you get Medicaid, just present your PHOTO ID & we’ll pay your electric bill without you ever seeing it. If we pay your electric bill, surely you qualify for free heating oil. If we fill your tank w/free heating oil, we’ll also hand over Cash 4 Childcare. If you’ve got childcare, how about a night out? You can buy some brewskis with the money you got for letting someone else use your food stamp account. That’s why no one EVER goes OFF food stamps. It ain’t just food stamps anymore. If the cost of food stamps has skyrocketed, imagine the price tag on the rest of the goodies.
about putting gas in my car or paying my mortgage…”
I always wondered why some people thought electing Obama negated their adulthood.
Now I know.
Jes’ swipe yo’ EBT!
I just want to point out that people that are on food stamps right now are finding out that that if they do not use it they lose it. Used to be they would roll over unused $’s to the next month, but not anymore. This might be a good thing but for the elderly and those who are home bound this can be a rough thing. Some family members I know have found out the hard way that if they cannot get a ride to the store, the are sol. This is our government at work touting a program that is supposed to be great and wonderful, but then you find out just how beholden you are to them. People think that if they do not work the government will take take care of them but they do not realize that while the government is trying to get them on the dole, they are also taking back what they give if you do not use it in a timely manner.For what it’s worth….
I recently attended to an elderly lady with advanced heart disease, arrhythmia, diabetes, etc, etc. She seemed to be doing pretty well, living by herself, and taking care of her routine chores. She was accompanied by her daughter who requested that I arrange for a visiting nurse for her mother. Why, I asked? To check her blood presssure, draw blood samples, assist her in her shower, she replied. Well, I pointed out that there was no need to check her blood pressure, her mother indicated that she was perfectly capable of showering by herself, and the blood test was checked on a monthly basis. The daughter then requested that I arrange for occupational therapy for her mother. For what exactly, I replied. She wan’t sure how to respond, but then loudly stated that her elderly mother had ‘earned it; and that, anyhow, it was free. I declined, and expected them to bolt form the office, but they didn’t and planned on requesting these services from the mother’s primary physician. And that’s the way it is in realville.
We are living in the days of GIMME GIMME and Me-First! Since it’s ALL free, I want mine, and I want it NOW!
I don’t fault the elderly mother; she is from my generation and believes in at least TRYING to make it on her own. Her daughter, on the other hand, is from this newer generation, who never learned to be self-sufficient and expects free handouts and for the government to take care of her from the cradle to the grave.
As for the use-it-or-lose it stuff, that needs to be looked into by our super-intelligent government and corrected. NO ONE should ever be forced into a situation like that! But, then, bureaucracies are well known for doing idiotic things like that! And STILL the liberals think THEY can do a better job than the free market!
just present your PHOTO ID
Wait. Doesn’t that discriminate against blacks? Call the NAACP. Oh, the horror.
Hey! That’s 14.7 million votes for Obama. What’s wrong with him using your tax money to buy votes for his re-election?
Thomas Jefferson on banks, central banks, freedom American founding fathers warning!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAKSDum_biQ
“Either he’s being much more generous with recipients than Bush ever dreamed of being, or food prices are rising because of his inflationary policies.”
This is one of the dirty little secrets of Obama’s economy, the skyrocketing cost of food in America. I’m surprised that the Romney campaign isn’t making more of this.
All Americans have to buy food and fuel, and the cost for both has gone up dramatically in four years. Forget about the food stamps. That’s bad enough. But for the middle class, the very people Obama claims he wants to “help,” the cost of food and fuel have placed terrible burdens on both their spending and on their savings. This all happened under Obama’s administration and he shouldn’t be allowed to just walk away from it. We should be seeing more commercials about food and fuel in this country and then ask, “Are you better off today than you were four years ago?”
Libertyship46 RE: Rising Food and Gas Prices
Food and gas prices are being driven up by the Federal Reserves QE/Printing money policies necessary to sustain the out of control spending of Obama and congress.
This is a feature not a bug, the United States is bankrupt and WILL use inflation to “stealth default” on it’s debt.
Besides Food Stamps, guess what else is hidden inside the “Farm Bill”?
Price-Hiking Scheme Hidden In Farm Bill Would Constrict Dairy Production The culprit is a disturbing, Soviet-style, price-hiking scheme called the Dairy Market Stabilization Program (DMSP). Hidden deep within the nearly $1 trillion “Farm Bill” (the Federal Agriculture Reform and Risk Management Act), this provision would force dairy farmers to artificially constrict supply.
http://cnsnews.com/blog/douglas-kellogg/price-hiking-scheme-hidden-farm-bill-would-constrict-dairy-production
One of fourteen children from at least six different fathers, Larmondo “Flair” Allen went into the family business early collecting 950 dollars each in welfare checks for each of his nine children for a total of $8,550 a month. which with other benefits comes out to over $100,000 a year.
Larmondo “Flair” Allen,a self-described entrepreneur, was shot on Martin Luther King Boulevard by rival entrepreneurs in his very competitive line of work. Dead at the age of 25.
The good news is that government jobs like these, unlike private sector jobs, do not end with the death of the “man” in the family. Larmondo’s death frees up his companion and many children to collect even more welfare checks which will create even more government jobs for the people who print welfare checks, the people who sign them and the people who collect the taxes that goes to fund the welfare checks.
CBS (KMOV) -
Rami Mohammad has been convicted of bilking taxpayers out of $1,590,000 with food stamp fraud when he was the manager at the Quik Stop Store in Washington Park,IL.
Mohammad told reporters he was being targeted because of his name, and that he did nothing wrong.Mohammad said, “It’s not that I’m a terrorist, they just have to check.”
According to Platte County Prosecutor Eric Zahnd, 29 residents of an apartment complex were involved in serious food stamp, Section 8 housing assistance and other types of welfare fraud.
In court papers filed by the prosecution, HUD investigators allege that residents of the Englewood Apartments engaged in a pattern of falsifying income statements so that they could receive larger living subsidies.
ST. LOUIS (KMOV) — The culmination of a six month investigation into food stamp and welfare fraud revealed Illinois Link and Missouri EBT cards have been accessed in Las Vegas.
Vice President of Global Cash Access, the company that programs ATMs, Scott Dowgy told us their company works with the government to block welfare withdrawls on casino floors. However, Dowgy also said there’s nothing to prevent withdrawls from ATMs at small neighborhood casinos or from businesses across the street from big casinos. News 4′s examination of electronic records revealed a pattern of withdrawls at businesses close to the Vegas resorts.
A hotel concierge also reveals something surprising, some EBT cardholders are trying to pay for time shares at Las Vegas resorts with welfare benefits.
oops forgot link.
http://frontpagemag.com/2012/dgreenfield/larmondo-flair-allen-another-obama-job-creator/
“The Great Depression, like most other periods of severe unemployment, was produced by government mismanagement rather than by any inherent instability of the private economy.” Milton Friedman
Price-Hiking Scheme Hidden In Farm Bill Would Constrict Dairy Production By Douglas Kellogg September 19, 2012
http://cnsnews.com/blog/douglas-kellogg/price-hiking-scheme-hidden-farm-bill-would-constrict-dairy-production