Quote:
Originally Posted by genuinegirly
I tend to be of the opinion that food stamps should be only for basic food items. Things like rice, beans, flour, yeast, salt, sugar, generic-only canned vegetables, canned beans, frozen vegetables, eggs, milk, and cheese. No meat, no fresh or specialty-brand anything. Stuff to help you eeek by with your basic nutritional needs met. Food stamps should have some amount of stigma and hassle associated with their use. Then again, I am more familiar and comfortable with community foodbanks than foodstamps.
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Well, and when the USDA did the calculations to figure out how much money in SNAP benefits need to be offered to meet minimal nutritional needs, they calculated it based on cooking with staples. Unfortunately, there's no educational component associated with using SNAP, so many people on SNAP benefits don't have the knowledge to be able to cook a meal from scratch. Further, many of them don't have the time to cook a meal from scratch--or they think they don't. SNAP benefits are largely used by the working poor.
And Baraka: SNAP benefits are accepted at many farmer's markets around the United States now. This is why I suggested there by an educational component--the awareness level regarding SNAP benefits and farmer's markets is abysmally low. Our local farmer's market even offers a program that offers those who use SNAP benefits at the farmer's market an extra $6 to spend.