I find it terrible how bitter people get about this stuff. Be grateful you don't need gov't help. So it doesn't work perfectly in all situations... how could it, really? For every person you see with a lot in their "cash account" there are plenty of people who don't get enough who are eating ramen every night and putting off the dentist for years because they don't have any money.

So, how does this effect you personally? I'm just curious.

What really kills me is, when the tribe here gives vouchers to use at the grocery store for food, some of the people will try to buy toys and childrens books with it, because they want so badly to get their kids something. It's hard to tell them they can't use it for that. The job situation here is abysmal. And I hear you on putting off the dentist... I had to do that for a long time. I was also on snap for a few years back in the early 2000's and did buy steak with it from time to time because I was hungry for it.

I'm sure that it is explained, but they still try. I would if I were in that situation too.

I'm don't feel mad but the entire situation is maddening.

Once in a while someone brings some hot chicken or whatever up to buy with their EBT and doesn't realize they can't get it. It's not a big deal, they get something else but sometimes they have kids with them who are really looking forward to chowing down. I also see cards decline and people walk away with nothing. I bought a kid a sub once because his (parent's) EBT turned out to have like 20 cents on it and he was by himself and he looked so fucking sad.

Have you ever had Medicaid? Here, you can't find a doctor with it without waiting months. It does pay if you have to go to the hospital or get medications, but forget routine or preventative care. It doesn't pay enough for doctors to get on board with taking it.

You do have to taking employment counseling under certain conditions for EBT, but if you are employed and still qualify for it because you have a big family or whatever, you don't have to do anything else AFAIK.

We should eat the poor's babies

Medicaid is for poor people. Medicare is for retired people. Or if you're retired AND really poor and in a certain states you can get both! Medicare is federal and Medicaid is state run. I don't know why the fuck they chose names that are so close together.

A ton of docs take Medicare. Very few take Medicaid.

Unemployment is separate from food stamps, they are not the same program.

You could be employed but still not make enough money and continue getting benefits from food stamps while being employed. In that case I do not believe you'd have to attend any type of class. But it's been some years since I really learned about this stuff.

right

that is what i was trying to say

That's true. We have to submit the qualifying UPC info to each state for approval. If we're found to be out of compliance states will take away our ability to accept SNAP cards. There's very little room for people to buy anything other than staple items.

The only thing the government should be doing is handing people some bootstraps. Because it's all you need. Providing you have the will to pull on them and are not one of those poor people who are like "depressed from being poor". Being poor should be a motivation to make something out of yourself. If these people were taught anything in the (probably limited) time they went to school it should be that.

That's a joke right?

I agree with this. Labour in return for shelter, education, food, water, sanitation, health care. The catch is that the administrators need to be people/families who are prepared to live-in and muck-in with the rest and who are equipping others to become administrators so that everyone ends up on an equal footing...finding those kinds of people/families is difficult.

That's stupid. Why make people do work that machines are already doing?

How about the poor see some of the extra wealth we generate from industrialization

Because occupational therapy and benefitting directly from the fruits of their own labour will boost the mood of most humans, whereas alienation from the land that feeds them, and idleness, tends to create problems.

Work for the sake of work is really patronizing...

The problem is that industrialization allows workers to produce 10 times more than they used to making a lot of jobs obsolete and yet the proles see very little of the wealth that's generated as things become more efficient.

We should be trying to move to a point where straight up labor is obsolete, not the other way around

Work for the sake of creating a worthwhile product and benefitting from that labour is not 'work for the sake of work'.

Don't know if you follow the news or have heard about this thing called Peak Oil, but our go-to cheap fertilisers and pesticides are about to run out. In addition to that, intensive farming has created a lot of pollution and land degradation. Using human labour in place of machines (which require fuel or an energy source to operate - this comes with its own set of problems) is IMO a viable business model - most discerning consumers are now weary of food produced by intensive, pesticide/fertiliser heavy, GM monoculture farming. A lower yield, higher labour cost operation is far more sustainable.

Humans need food. Producing it and selling it, and receiving an equal share of the profits, is not in any way...work 'for the sake of work'....

From my understanding, human health sciences are in direct conflict with this. We're not adapted to live without active labour - it's part of what keeps us healthy. The demise of active labour and the introduction of machine driven production is a huge part of the developed world's obesity epidemic.

Well that's different. If you're saying that humans can do the labor in a way that's better than machines then sure

Yes, let's set the tractors and combines aside so poor people can bust their asses in the blazing sun all day. If the workers are paid a living wage, it will cause produce and food prices to skyrocket, along with falling corporate profits. Nobody is going to get behind that, vixnix.

Nobody is saying you have to spend all your off time watching TV.

The model of working so you don't starve is not ideal, and we should be trying to move away from it. (But obviously it is the best we can do for now)