Workers turn to food stamps to keep families fed

The skyrocketing dependence on food stamps has joined foreclosures, layoffs and depleted pensions as a measure of the growing suffering unleashed upon workers by the economic crisis.

Dependence of food stamps is rising as the economic crisis deepens.

Federal statistics show food stamp participation rates have been climbing steadily since 2000, with sharp increases in just the last 12 months. Billions of dollars more in food stamp assistance will be needed to keep pace with the growing number of families eligible for benefits in the coming years.

Nationwide, the number of people who use of food stamps each month increased to over 29 million in July, an increase of over 1 million recipients since April. Given the 159,000 jobs that that the U.S. Labor Department reported lost in September followed by fresh announcements of mass layoffs, the number of food stamp recipients is sure to continue increasing dramatically.

In Washington, D.C., the capital of the world’s richest country, working-class people have been applying for assistance in near-record numbers. There, food stamp requests to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program—the new name for the program—have risen by more than 9 percent over the past year. Just blocks from the Capitol Building, where Congress rescued Wall Street billionaires from their self-inflicted crisis with hundreds of billions of tax dollars, the city’s Department of Human Services is flooded with applications from families in need of food.

Neighboring states have also seen huge numbers of people affected by job loss and underpayment flocking to welfare offices for help. Virginia has experienced a 7 percent increase in food stamp use in the last year, and an even larger jump of almost 15 percent took place in Maryland.

Despite these astronomical figures, not everyone in need is getting assistance. The U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates that only 60.5 percent of people eligible are receiving food stamps. Statistics on food stamp recipients do not reflect the millions of single adults and legal immigrants who were made ineligible for benefits in the 1990s when the Clinton administration gutted welfare programs.

For those who do get the stamps, the assistance is just not enough to get by. Karen Johnson, 54, of Hurst, Texas, says the $81 worth of food stamps she receives per month is not enough for her and her 17-year-old daughter.

“Sometimes I have to ask somebody to buy me a little food or something,” Johnson said. “I just hate that. I hate to ask people: ‘Can I have some bread? Can I have some hamburger meat?’ It’s kind of rough on me sometimes.” (Star-Telegram, Sept. 28)

Some states are now beginning to loosen up eligibility requirements, but too little is being done. Fifty-eight percent of respondents in a recent nationwide poll said they have had to make cuts to their purchases as a result of rising food prices. Two-thirds said the federal government should do more to tackle hunger by making it a higher priority and providing more funding. (Business Journal of Milwaukee, Oct. 24)

The rise in food stamp recipients is just a symptom of the larger issue of growing food insecurity. More and more working-class people are struggling to put food on the table while Wall Street tycoons benefit from tax-funded bailouts to the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars. Taxpayers are being robbed so that the coffers of banks, insurance companies and auto manufacturers can be refilled. Tax dollars should be used to quell people’s hunger for food, not the bankers’ hunger for profits!