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I dont understand this? Why do you guys have foodstamps? Are you not one of the richest nations in the world?

jadedhacker 9y ago
You got downvoted, but here's what the UN Special Rapporteur on Extreme Poverty and Human Rights said about the US: http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=22533 http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?Ne... "3. The United States is one of the world’s richest, most powerful and technologically innovative countries; but neither its wealth nor its power nor its technology is being harnessed to address the situation in which 40 million people continue to live in poverty." "6. American exceptionalism was a constant theme in my conversations. But instead of realizing its founders’ admirable commitments, today’s United States has proved itself to be exceptional in far more problematic ways that are shockingly at odds with its immense wealth and its founding commitment to human rights. As a result, contrasts between private wealth and public squalor abound." As an American I can't agree more.
- martin_bech 9y ago
  I agree completely. Why discus some apps access to cardbalances, when the issue is actually, why do people, making the minimum wage (or similar), need foodstamps? Here in Europe we had foodstamps during WW2.. but not since.
- conanbatt 9y ago
  The US is so unique in so many aspects. What hits the poor the most in the US is definitely government provoked..bad public education, terrible incarceration rates, high cost of health care. Those 3 together decimate you if you are poor.
logfromblammo 9y ago
Those riches are not distributed optimally. Additionally, the US is a major agricultural exporter. The food voucher program is likely more about sweeping domestic poverty under the rug, so that no one can complain about shipping food abroad across the globe, even as people are starving at home. It isn't enough to keep everybody fed all the time, but it is just enough to keep people from blocking the train tracks that go from the grain elevators and meatpackers to the seaports. This is a somewhat cynical view, I admit.
- martin_bech 9y ago
  That could surely explain some of it. And since foodstamps apparently account for 48bln usd yearly, one could also assume, that a lot of companies directly, or indirectly make a lot of money of it, and are determined to keep the status quo.
- yellowapple 9y ago
  "Those riches are not distributed optimally." Define "optimally". What's optimal for the rich is probably not optimal for the poor, and vice versa.
  - logfromblammo 9y ago
    My definition of optimal includes a provision that most people are able to plan their meals at least a week in advance, and no one ever has uncertainty over the place and time where they can eat their next meal. Like those candy bar ads imply, people tend to make poor decisions when they are hungry, but the results in the real world aren't always amusing, or solvable by a timely application of chocolate and nougat. The total quantity of food-producing capital in the US is large enough that it boggles my mind that there could be anyone in the country that can't always afford to eat nutritious foods, but such people exist. And they make poor financial decisions, because they have to constantly live in the short run, and are never able to plan far enough ahead to buy their way out of poverty. Optimal would be when everyone has the ability to carefully consider and negotiate every financial decision, without being forced to act contrary to their own long-term interests by some exigent circumstance or necessity. Oxygen and water are mostly sorted already, but food security and secure shelter are also required before people can start thinking past tomorrow, and considering "do nothing" as a viable alternative to a negotiated deal.
fjsolwmv 9y ago
Yes, that's why we can afford food stamps. If the country wasn't rich, it couldn't afford to feed people.

You got downvoted, but here's what the UN Special Rapporteur on Extreme Poverty and Human Rights said about the US: http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=22533 http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?Ne... "3. The United States is one of the world’s richest, most powerful and technologically innovative countries; but neither its wealth nor its power nor its technology is being harnessed to address the situation in which 40 million people continue to live in poverty." "6. American exceptionalism was a constant theme in my conversations. But instead of realizing its founders’ admirable commitments, today’s United States has proved itself to be exceptional in far more problematic ways that are shockingly at odds with its immense wealth and its founding commitment to human rights. As a result, contrasts between private wealth and public squalor abound." As an American I can't agree more.

martin_bech 9y ago
I agree completely. Why discus some apps access to cardbalances, when the issue is actually, why do people, making the minimum wage (or similar), need foodstamps? Here in Europe we had foodstamps during WW2.. but not since.
conanbatt 9y ago
The US is so unique in so many aspects. What hits the poor the most in the US is definitely government provoked..bad public education, terrible incarceration rates, high cost of health care. Those 3 together decimate you if you are poor.

logfromblammo 9y ago

Those riches are not distributed optimally. Additionally, the US is a major agricultural exporter. The food voucher program is likely more about sweeping domestic poverty under the rug, so that no one can complain about shipping food abroad across the globe, even as people are starving at home. It isn't enough to keep everybody fed all the time, but it is just enough to keep people from blocking the train tracks that go from the grain elevators and meatpackers to the seaports. This is a somewhat cynical view, I admit.

martin_bech 9y ago
That could surely explain some of it. And since foodstamps apparently account for 48bln usd yearly, one could also assume, that a lot of companies directly, or indirectly make a lot of money of it, and are determined to keep the status quo.
yellowapple 9y ago
"Those riches are not distributed optimally." Define "optimally". What's optimal for the rich is probably not optimal for the poor, and vice versa.
- logfromblammo 9y ago
  My definition of optimal includes a provision that most people are able to plan their meals at least a week in advance, and no one ever has uncertainty over the place and time where they can eat their next meal. Like those candy bar ads imply, people tend to make poor decisions when they are hungry, but the results in the real world aren't always amusing, or solvable by a timely application of chocolate and nougat. The total quantity of food-producing capital in the US is large enough that it boggles my mind that there could be anyone in the country that can't always afford to eat nutritious foods, but such people exist. And they make poor financial decisions, because they have to constantly live in the short run, and are never able to plan far enough ahead to buy their way out of poverty. Optimal would be when everyone has the ability to carefully consider and negotiate every financial decision, without being forced to act contrary to their own long-term interests by some exigent circumstance or necessity. Oxygen and water are mostly sorted already, but food security and secure shelter are also required before people can start thinking past tomorrow, and considering "do nothing" as a viable alternative to a negotiated deal.

fjsolwmv 9y ago

Yes, that's why we can afford food stamps. If the country wasn't rich, it couldn't afford to feed people.