States are moving to once again require able-bodied adults to put in work hours in exchange for food stamps, after the requirements largely were suspended by the Obama administration.
The slow-moving reversal follows the administration pulling back on Clinton-era changes that required recipients to work for government welfare benefits. Signing the reform bill in 1996 alongside then-Speaker Newt Gingrich, then-President Bill Clinton said the goal was to make welfare “a second chance, not a way of life.”
But during the last recession, President Obama allowed states to suspend a requirement that able-bodied adults without children work at least 20 hours per week or participate in a training program to receive benefits for more than three months.
He allowed recipients to stay on food stamps indefinitely, arguing the three-month maximum was unfair with unemployment at 10 percent.
"Food stamp recipients didn't cause the financial crisis, Wall Street did," said Obama at this past January’s State of the Union address.
Unemployment today is half of what it was in 2009, yet last year more than 40 states did not require welfare recipients to work.
Kansas was one of the first states to reverse that in 2013.
"I believe most Americans and most Kansans think it's common sense," said Andrew Wiens of the Kansas Department for Children & Families. "These are able-bodied adults without dependents. They don't have children in the home. They're not elderly, they're not disabled. These folks should be working."
Since Kansas reinstated work rules, food stamp rolls dropped by 20,000 and the incomes of those who left increased by 127 percent, Wiens said.
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It angers me when I get behind someone at the grocery store and notice they are buying expensive steaks, Roasts, and seafood and all I can afford is ground beef and chicken thighs.
ReplyDeleteI work hard for what little money I receive and it burns me up to see some using an EBT card and driving a new car filling their cart up with items I can only afford on special occasions.
I've even seen them request cash back from these cards then then turn around and buy a carton of cigarettes. When I ask the cashier about this, all they do is shrug it off and say this happens all the time.
It should also be mandatory for anyone that has an EBT card, to somehow be randomly drug tested.
ReplyDeleteMaryland will never be on that list.
ReplyDeleteOhhh gov Hogan lets start enforcing this.
DeleteI want random drug testing
DeleteNo soda
No candy
No chips
25% has to be FRUIT/VEGETABLES.
ALSO make it for only every other month up too a YEAR .
Deletebut u gots to have your lottery tickets
ReplyDeleteI was forced to go apply for stamps in 2010 when my unemployment ran out and was appalled that they gave me near $600 a month for my son and I! We can't eat that much! Not buying burger and chicken! 8 months later I had like $650 built up in my account, so I offered it back to the food stamp office. They had no "program" to send it back, so I wound up having to use it to buy shrimp, lobster, filet and give some to friends and extended family.
ReplyDeleteNo wonder the food stamp crowd is too fat to go to work!