Food Stamp Fraud, Rare but Troubling
By KIM SEVERSON, NYT
IRWINTON, Ga. — In the back of Shinholster’s Grocery and Meat Market, they simmer pig skin and lard in an old black kettle. Hams from animals raised in the yard hang near an aging cash register.
It is hard to imagine that this tiny store off a country road in the middle of Georgia was the center of $4.6 million in food stamp fraud.
As Republicans in Congress demand cuts to the $79.8 billion food stamp program, every aspect of it is being examined, including whether people should be allowed to buy candy bars and energy drinks with the aid, and who qualifies for help that averages out to about $133 a month for one person.
Allegations of fraud, including an informal economy in which food stamps are turned into cash or used to buy liquor, gasoline or other items besides food have been used to argue that the program is out of control. In fact, the black market accounts for just over 1 percent of the total food stamp program, which is far less than fraud in other government programs like Medicare and Medicaid.
(More here.)
IRWINTON, Ga. — In the back of Shinholster’s Grocery and Meat Market, they simmer pig skin and lard in an old black kettle. Hams from animals raised in the yard hang near an aging cash register.
It is hard to imagine that this tiny store off a country road in the middle of Georgia was the center of $4.6 million in food stamp fraud.
As Republicans in Congress demand cuts to the $79.8 billion food stamp program, every aspect of it is being examined, including whether people should be allowed to buy candy bars and energy drinks with the aid, and who qualifies for help that averages out to about $133 a month for one person.
Allegations of fraud, including an informal economy in which food stamps are turned into cash or used to buy liquor, gasoline or other items besides food have been used to argue that the program is out of control. In fact, the black market accounts for just over 1 percent of the total food stamp program, which is far less than fraud in other government programs like Medicare and Medicaid.
(More here.)
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2 Comments:
Rare? Only because food stamp fraud is rarely investigate. I call bull****!
http://www.mprnews.org/story/2012/09/24/law/feds-pressure-minn-to-reduce-food-stamp-fraud
What is unfortunate is that is rare to have a grown up discussion on welfare, after all it was FDR who stated; “The lessons of history, confirmed by the evidence immediately before me, show conclusively that continued dependence upon relief induces a spiritual and moral disintegration fundamentally destructive to the national fibre. To dole out relief in this way is to administer a narcotic, a subtle destroyer of the human spirit.” Politicians who bring up this point up (or Medicare) have groups who run ads against them showing a grandmother, in a wheel chair being thrown off a cliff. Nice. Real nice.
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