Thousands in Georgia finding out they are no longer eligible for food stamps

Not so new

Sandra Frederick, with the Georgia Department of Human Services, said the requirement isn't new.

“This has been around for years, and it can just come up down or whatever depending on the unemployment rate,” she said.

This has been law since Clinton signed it in the 90's.

Now, able-bodied adults without children will need to get a job or enroll in workforce training in order to receive benefits. Those who don't will only receive 3 months worth of food stamps every 3 years.

This is not about cutting off children's food or hammering the person that is too weak-bodied to work. This is about states cutting food stamps to people who should be working since the unemployment rate is supposedly dropping. These people have 3 months to find a job( not even full time, can be 20 hours a week), enroll in school, or performing community service. If they can't do some community service but want community handouts, I'd tell them to piss off too. Get some self-respect.

a reply to: kyred

This also happened recently in South Carolina ( able bodied childless food stamps ) I think there is a job search program in place now, however.

Here in Michigan I can't count the people that apply for our laborer jobs and get up and walk out when they find out they will be getting a paycheck. We have signs in the office that we pay by check not cash. Then some that do take it quit as soon as they find out they have to wait a week to get paid or are gone after their first check. Eaters we call em. Every Thursday the payroll woman sends a list of people to the state that have quit coming to work. Funny thing is we used to pay $25 an hour but couldn't keep people now we start at $15 and if they make it for 30 days they get $5 pay raise.

Pa here...

I did not see a video but I just wanted to throw my 2c in.

First of all we never qualify. Ever. Which is ok but I try. We are a family of 5 and gross 65k for reference. And no our base medical is not free.
Then last year I found out that most places have their own discount programs the only issue is that you HAVE to apply and be denied for welfare. So every fall I start the process over which takes me 7 months from start to finish
.
I get denied reduced lunches and the apply at the school and get approved

I apply for medical and get denied then take that paperwork to the local hospitals and get approved for 100% to 75% coverage.

That's it. No food stamps nothing. But I try.

It's NOT EASY. Every year I have to collect my entire life in paperwork just to get help. I used to think like so many others until the hospital reached out and said hey we can cover this you just have to do xyz... In pa you aren't getting a handout and if you're lying in your paperwork I'd love to know how you're doing it because they want everything.

after my husband passed, I was told that the only thing they could help with with was food stamps. It took me close to a year to get social security to confirm what I knew for years, that I was disabled. I just couldn't afford the doctor's costs. so that was a long time to go trying to live off of what I could sell in the house.

but, my point is, for some of these people, this might be the only help they are getting, and well, a women who's been a stay at home mother most of her working years and decides to just stay home because hubby's earnings seem to be sufficient might just find herself facing some hard times if her husband happens to pass away suddenly.

I'm sorry, but if can't find it in our hearts to feed our own unemployed poor, regardless of weather or not they have dependents, then we have no business spending millions shipping goats to afghanistan, increasing the sales of hand-knotted Afghan carpet, and all the other insane stuff they spend money on!

www.blacklistednews.com...

originally posted by: damwel
Bmw? In my day they said Cadillacs. Lol nobody on welfare is driving a bmw, they barely get enough to eat.

Here is the story of the white lady that drove a Mercedes to get her foodstamps.
Washington Post
It can happen.

Sometimes, you even happen upon a guy that will try to pay for a $60,000 BMW with an EBT card.... but I think he may have had a screw or two that wasn't tightened to torque specs.
FOX

a reply to: mikell

Does that sound like mentally sound behavior? Really, would you live like that just to not work? And I sure would not want to work beside them. We have seriously sick people in the US as studies have shown suicides are up. All this death, hunger,war is going to bring bad times.

It's a shame to see so many dependent on government aid. And here I thought that Obama had fixed the economy.

It's a sad fact that people go hungry. But there have always been hungry people.

The question we should be asking each other is what are WE doing to feed them?

It's easy to point fingers at government programs and to say that the government is doing a crappy job. Government always does a crappy job.

What are we, as neighbors, fellow citizens, doing though?

We should ignore government, and take care of our neighbors. Not under any socialist bullcrap mandate, but because it is the right thing to do.

a reply to: DBCowboy

What are we, as neighbors, fellow citizens, doing though?

why isn't EMPLOYERS included in that list?? I mean maybe if the employers did a better job of ensuring their employees were fed, they wouldn't be draining the funds from the food stamp program and those funds could be used to feed some of these completely destitute people?

but, oh ya, those poor working folks should be sharing their food stamps with their unemployed neighbors, which I have no doubt some do just this, but charity is not going to provide an answer to this problem.

a reply to: Komodo

So they cannot find work. You mean to tell me they also can't join a job training program, or do volunteer work?

Hard time finding any sorrow in this case.

Food Stamp (SNAP) recipients, especially able bodied adults, are probably NOT on Welfare (Cash Benefits), but were able to show that some "qualifying event" that put them in financial straps, caused them to become eligible for the program.

I highly doubt that the $2.50 per day they receive to supplement their food budget is discouraging anyone from finding a job.

However, I find no fault with this policy. Many SNAP recipients are depressed, overwhelmed and don't even know how to begin to find work. Now days, there are job programs/education for people to do at home, federally funded, answering phones and recording data, etc., that these people probably don't even know that they can do.

Education and employment outreach programs are never a bad thing for people in need.

ETA: Lest's not forget about all the able bodied adults that are working for companies like Walmart and McDonald's that still qualify for food stamp benefits.

originally posted by: dawnstar
why isn't EMPLOYERS included in that list?? I mean maybe if the employers did a better job of ensuring their employees were fed, they wouldn't be draining the funds from the food stamp program and those funds could be used to feed some of these completely destitute people?

Because the vast, vast majority of business owners are just scraping by?

It's nice that everybody likes to parade around these mega-corps, with CEO's making millions, and share holders getting steady dividends as the norm, but that will never make it the reality.

The reality is that the majority of business owners in the US are small business owners. The reality is also that 75% of those small business' are "nonemployers" with a revenue, not profit - just revenue, of $44,000 per year. Once you take out expenses and taxes, most of them qualify for assistance of some kind.

But, by all means, the media says that business owners are BAD, so go after them more.

a reply to: dawnstar

Hey, if you can't help someone out, then you can't. But there are plenty that probably could. No sense in blaming business owners when government and the people fail to feed the hungry.

originally posted by: Wardaddy454
And I bet this isn't about balancing the budget or anything either, if true. Gotta make room in the budget for the 'undocumented immigrants' you know.

BINGO,I bet that is the bottom-line reason for this new policy.Making room for the new
welfare kings and queens.

a reply to: peck420

ya know, it's funny, but when I read about these deals that the state and local gov'ts make with businesses to con them into moving into the state, it seems that they aren't helping the small businesses though, are they? no they are willing to pitch in the bulk of the expense for building a new stadium in ny city (in the form a tax cuts, grants, ect), and crap like that.
they could use those bribes that they are so eager to hand out to pressure the businesses to pay decent wages for their employees, but I don't believe they do. And, they could do it in a way that wouldn't harm any business (large corp or small) in any way whatsoever.

I stand by my statement, people shouldn't be meeting their financial needs from the gov't, or charity groups, or from the kindness of their friends and neighbors but instead THROUGH EMPLOYMENT! and their job training programs is not going to do much to address the underlying problem, there isn't enough good paying jobs for everyone in the workforce, even if they all had phd's in stem areas! there are many jobs that in years past did provide living wages but those wages have been depressed in recent times.

originally posted by: Psychonautics

originally posted by: Komodo
*BEFORE YOU POST, LISTEN TO THE VIDEO~! NOT ALL OF US ARE ABLE TO JUST GO OUT AND GRAB A JOB~TRUST ME, THE RABBIT HOLE GOES DEEPER THAN MOST BELIEVE! PLEASE DO NOT JUDGE PEOPLE WHO ARE STUCK AND DON'T JUMP TO CONCLUSIONS UNTIL YOU HEAR THEIR STORY*


Need some confirmation on this news, it's also being reported on RT New (which, is why I'm requesting confirmation); I knew about 3 months ago this was coming and about 2 months ago, I thought it was already in place since I had to renew my app for EBT, which is odd, since I remember doing it just 3 months before. If this is true and the states/Gov are implementing the rule, then...you can do your own 'math'.

I'm really hoping that this isn't so but......

Not all, but most could get a job.

I lived and worked around these types for a long time.

I will always support cutting the hand outs. I work two jobs to make ends meet, and I have a broken spine from a car accident, it causes pain every day, you don't see me crying and asking for a handout.

WHo would hire you with a broken spine??? Dude apply for disability. get all your medical records first though. sheesh.
As to the stamps. If you are in school,have a kid ,or in proceedings liek i am with disability you are exempt.

a reply to: yuppa

bad advice probably, unless it gets impossible for him to work...
first he might be earning more now than he could possibly get from disability..
and well, I'm not sure, but he might end up waiting a good time with no income..
by working, he is proving to them that he can work, he could get disability, maybe, but him working reduces his chances considerably. and well, unless he can prove that he had a disablility that prevented him from working, there's something like a three or four month waiting period.... and well the max that pays out is a little over $700 dollars.

The video said all able-bodied people without dependents will have to go to work OR...get in a job-training program.

That's what it said. What is wrong with this policy? I don't understand the beef.

a reply to: queenofswords

well... here's the deal...
lots of the chronically unemployed are older adults, near retirement. no one wants to hire them, to retrain them for what really is the very little amount of time they have in the workforce. personally, I am in that age bracket.
me and my husband worked hard to raise up our kids....(while helping those who were at the time sitting on the arse and doing nothing raise their kids on welfare), we struggled just to keep up with the welfare jones. so there wasn't much savings. and then when our kids reached adulthood, well, the jobs are crap, we couldn't help them with college, and we found ourselves still helping them out. I had tried a couple of times after losing my job due to health reasons. one job the let me go within a few hours, I wasn't physically able to do the job, the other, well, I lasted about a week in a half before the pain got so unbearable while I was working that I about passed out and just quit. I knew I was disabled, but didn't have much of anything to back it up, because, well, we were too drained from taxes so that our neighbors could run their kids to the doctors when I was finding myself falling down when getting up out of bed in the morning!
so here I was, he passed away, the only income I had, very little in savings, still couldn't afford a doctor, and well, nope, sorry, can't help you with the rent, can't help you with the medical, and for the longest time, they were telling me that they coudn't help me get disability, unless I had the medical records to back it up! but, oh, ya, they would help with the food stamps..... as long as I could keep a roof over my head, which without a way to pay that rent, well, was impossible. so well, I now have two kids living with me in a two bedrooms house.. who can sometimes help out, sometimes can't.

it took me close to a year to be able to do grocery shopping without crying! there is no doubt in my mind that there wouldn't have been times when I would have broken down in a job training program! and well, to be honest, I would much rather they put my kids in some kind of job training program!! at least then, society might get something back for it!

a reply to: dawnstar

Sorry for all the difficulties you have been through, especially the passing of your husband.

Are you saying that now, there are you and two grown adults (your kids) living together and none of you are working or are in a job-training program?

Do your two grown children have kids?