Food Boxes: Trump can we please make America Steak again!?
United States President Donald Trump has once again ruffled some feathers. This time he made an announcement (back in February) and decided to put a plan into his [2019 budget] (https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/budget-fy2019.pdf) to reduce the cost of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which 43 million American's are currently receiving. SNAP is also referred to as EBT (Electronic Benefit Transfer), food stamps and welfare.
The plan is essentially for families that are receiving SNAP benefits over $90 which will have their monthly amount cut in half and receive box food called America's Harvest Boxes in lieu of the remaining benefits/balance which was removed. By doing this and reducing benefits for households of more than 6 family members (there are roughly about 204,000 families with 6+ members according to Pres. Trump's 2019 budget) he states that this will reduce the current cost for the program by about $213 billion dollars over a 10-year period...that is 30%. He is purposing 3 trillion in tax cuts for his 2019 budget to reduce costs to taxpayers at a time when the national debt exceeds 20.5 trillion dollars.
Under this new proposed budget The Department of Agriculture (USDA) would purchase food with its bulk buying power, put it into containers and the boxes would go to 16.4 million households around the country. Of course there are two sides to this. Side A (Against this proposal:) is saying that the current program is already efficient and allows families to purchase whatever foods they want directly from retailers, which benefits families, retailer and local economies. They are also questioning how the Harvest Boxes would get to the families. Side B (For this proposal:) Is pointing out that the 1st word of the current program is "supplemental" and is supposedly intended to augment the family's food spending. Side B also noted that container would have 100% American-grown products which would help the overall economy and not just local while still encouraging nutritious diets.
It is also worth noting that the budget requests $19 billion for USDA (excluding changes in mandatory programs), a $3.7 billion or 16-percent decrease from the 2017 enacted level. The Trump Administration requested ideas on "How to shrink the roles of people on SNAP."
Our thoughts on this... You cannot look a gift horse in the month. There would be benefits to a box food plan. The obvious is that it will reduce the cost. They could take this program a step further. The American Harvest Boxes are operated by volunteers. If this plan is put into place this would require a lot of volunteers so just like with SNAP, the families could have a set amount of hours working putting the food into boxes. There have been questions concearning how the families would recieve these boxes, so another thing they could do is setup a central location (which could also be ran by more volunteers) where families come to pick up the boxes. On the other hand this does limit families and there are some concerns about people with food allergies. No program will appease everyone. A system like this is not designed to make you rich, in fact it may shock some but most are usually set up for you to fail. We say that if this plan does get implemented and you don't like it, figure out other options. Maybe there is another way to cover your grocery bill, whether that be getting a job or whatever. One option that you have is to sell the boxes... we could always buy them from you ^^. (Ever had an Army MRE? These come in similar packaging and probably just as many preservatives making their shelf-life a crucial benefit in surviving whats to come if the world keeps getting out of hand at the rate in which it is)
What are you thoughts on this? To our American readers, will this effect you and if so are you for it or against it? To our international readers, are their any programs similar to this one which are active or "in-the-works" in your countries? If they have been active for a little while pleasae tell us "What were the results? Were they good, a mixture or are we walking straight into the Lions mouth?"We truly would love to hear your thoughts, comments and/or concerns about this below. As always, Thank You for reading this article and if you would like to see more of our work visit our steemit page @truthbeyondlies or visit us directly at T.B.L
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Now we know (and knowing is half the battle ^ ^) However, being that this post is only 3 days old would you kindly remove your flags?
I am just wondering how many people in this country could be fed if the lovely government would reduce the "Defense" budged by... hmmm let's say 10% ? But I am afraid that this can not be an option. We also need some money to support our BFF'S in the Middle East, right? As long as we have money to support Israel, who gives a f**k about Americans.
The government could cut quite a bit of it's extra spending out not only with Israel but let's not forget the brand new F-16 fighters we gave to Egypt.I don't see the spending as much of a problem than I see the over-printing of the currency. It is already backed by a promise dipped in hope and sprinkled with a candy-crunch coating of sweet despair. Over printing and trying to confuse me (Example) "Sir your Dollar is only worth $0.71, you will need to add more to purchase your $1.00 menu item and we should change the name"... Instead I get "Sir we have raised our prices due to inflation and the devaluing of your dollar and your once $1.00 menu item will now cost you $1.29"
Yes of course. At the core of it we have the predatory debt based fiat money system as the source of all the evil. And behind that we have the same people who also profit from military spending and never ending wars. Financially and politically. We are being screwed royally...
well, here in Hellgium there's five governments for 10 million people, each with their own administration ... the actual trick to save the country in a few dozen years (maybe) would be to go back to one (its a long story starting like 100+ years ago over a language struggle, seeing as this swamp has three official languages, there's been fighting over that, north and south if you like, the flemish cant stand the french, vice versa and the german annex actually never gets bad press but they didnt really choose to be they were damages for the war) ... but so they fought some decades to separate governments, but they didnt separate the country (which would also be a bad idea actually) which means every part has its own , brussels the capital has its own AND is also capital of europe .. something the germans refused cos they're smarter than that, and the poliethics here glady acccepted with stars in their eyes, prestige ...) the provinces of which there are nine also have one each, every town and city has one, AND there's a federal one, so if you 're a business owner that comes down to so much tax you basically start working for yourself by august if you calculate it.
but its the fault of a few 100.000 unemployed and its probably the fault of the syrians ... poverty rising, crime rising, number of cops rising (which also costs a lot of money, to the point where the ones from Flint Town would have their eyeballs roll out if they saw what they get here ...)
and no one ever talks about going back to one administration, there will never be taxes BEFORE the election, i guess you know that game too
and Luke's gotta eat, and if Luke can't eat, some Lukes dont go hungry and yea they just approved a new budget for the military too (to go fight somewhere on the other side of the planet for someone elses cause and yea)
i hear ya
That is a mess. One government is enough to cause frustration and headaches but five? How does that even work? Situations like yours with 5 governments really do not get the attention that it needs. While it may not be a conspiracy for everyone to sink there teeth into, it does show just how horrible the world is and how people suffer from governments not having there affairs in order(in my opinion). Do you think there will ever be just one government?
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I heavily support the idea, the entire point of the current program is to feed people, this program does just that and it's more than likely going to be at a considerably better rate. The reason why is because when a person goes to the store and buys food, nearly a majority of that money is purely spent on the middle men costs / profits, the actual food / production costs were a fraction of the cost you're paying.
That's not even adding into the point that abusers, albeit may be small in comparison to the users that actually need it, they do still end up wasting millions of dollars per year, millions that could be used to further improve the situation. Providing actual food will obviously discourage such abuse.
Another added bonus is by providing majority (or all) of the box to be actual produce and other healthy foods, it will have significant impacts on the health of the average user and thus, overtime has great potential to reduce future medical costs which obviously will improve life quality.
You bring up some really good points... Money is spent on more than just actual food. Most people do not take aspects like you pointed out into real consideration. If you go here, it says that the food boxes will contain
"USDA would utilize a model similar to that currently used to distribute USDA Foods to other nutrition
assistance programs to provide staple, shelf-stable foods (such as shelf-stable milk, juice, grains, ready-to-eat cereals,pasta, peanut butter, beans, canned meat, poultry or fish, and canned fruits and vegetables) "
And they would still receive some food stamps, so they still will be able to buy other items at the store.
In my sight, the point is how to protect domestic product by using public welfare-related issue which move other countries will do the same. Beside, the distribution aspect leads to the opportunity of playing game such as corruption, in case of my country.
The way the Government has outlined this program, it would use only 100% products that are produced in the US. There is a benefit to doing that, it promotes growth to companies that are in our country. The distribution part has not really been deeply addressed as of yet, but yes corruption is very possible.
Sounds like just another way to stuff Americans with carb laden fluff food grown by special interest big agriculture. Why not educate people on the program about where to get healthy foods at low prices? What I have seen from programs like WIC is most of the food ends up sitting in the user's pantry until they give it away because there is only so much pb and tuna one can eat.
You have a valid point. People that receive WIC do end up storing items that they get and then giving them away or worse just putting it in the trash. We like you idea of showing people where to get healthy foods at low prices. Have you notice that if you go to the store on a budget you will get less food if you are buying fresh fruits and vegetables verse processed food (box and/or frozen)?
I find fruits and veggies to be pretty cheap actually. The hard part about getting them is keeping them fresh. It requires more trips (more gas money) to eat fresh.
I think healthy food could be cheap, but it is trendy to eat well, so companies respond by pricing to a trendy crowd. On top of that, big agriculture gets huge government subsidies which allow them to peddle processed grains at low low prices.
It is not impossible to find fruits and veggies at a low price... it all depends on your area that you live in (IMO). Personally I love spring/summer time because where I live, you can find road side stands that sell fresh (locally grown) fruits and veggies really cheap... and they always taste so good. You are very correct, figuring out how to keep them fresh is a big issue for most. Healthy food should be cheap, but as we all know if something is trendy, you will pay big for it. It is a shame if you go to a fast food restaurant and can buy what they call a burger for under $2, but pay $10 or more for a salad. This world we live in is really a hot mess.
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