Food Stamps... for Fast Food?!

Thread Hop

I'm honestly torn about this matter. On one hand, fast food is extremely unhealthy but, on the other hand, I have one family member who is a social worker and another who worked on a nutrition project. They've both told me that the reason people eat fast food is due to the fact 1.) That's the only thing they can afford and/or 2.) There aren't any grocery stores where they live.

edited 19th Oct '11 11:34:51 PM by RedViking

Yeah. It really does sound like the only people who will take advantage of this are the people who seriously need to.

Speaking as someone who actually is on food stamps, I kind of would like to be able to use them on prepared foods and some fast food places.

Mainly because I cannot cook worth crap. It doesn't matter how carefully I try to follow a recipe or how many people have tried to teach me, anything I cook more complicated than sautéing pierogis tends to turn out as an inedible mess.

As a result, being able to get a veggie grinder from Subway or a chicken dinner from the supermarket probably would be healthier than my current diet of mainly cereal, canned soup, bread, and broccoli & cheese frozen dinners. It at least would be more interesting.

edited 19th Oct '11 4:52:12 PM by Jeysie

-thread hop- Candy, soda, and energy drinks are all available on Food Stamp purchases, which is rather BS in my opinion. However, hot foods or things from the deli at the store where I work aren't. Hot meals make more sense over candy, but certainly not from fast food joints.

I personally used to buy 2 liters of diet cola, before Publix jacked the price up.

"Subway is too expensive for most people living off of food stamps, methinks."

Late to the party, but this is false. Compared to the dollar menu, yes, it's slightly pricier, but while a foot long will feed you for a day and a half, a dollar menu item will not fill you up. A meal at places like Mc Donald's and Burger King is, incidentally, usually upwards of $6 (around here at least).

Whereas Subway always has a "meal of the day" for $5, but you get more selection and much more nutrition by skipping the drink and side (chips, cookies, or a few measly calories of fruit) in favor of twice as much sandwich.

Yeah, I've always just gotten a foot long ham with double American cheese and spicy mustard.

Note: It's easy to regulate where food stamps go. They give you an electronic card as the food stamps now. In Indiana the food stamps are programmed to only pay what are acceptable expense. You buy stuff, you swipe, it pays for acceptable stuff, while non-acceptable stuff gets left on the bill to be paid for in other ways.

Right, but there's extra transaction costs involved in creating a huge specific list of approved and unapproved items. Right now, they just have a few distinct categories.

Government is very bureaucratic and trends to do things that way anyways.

Needs a citation, but I can certainly believe that much.

Which costs more the transactions or the food?

The food -_-

Unless it's ramen, then it's probably a bit of a wash.

You can buy subway sandwhiches from Safeway, along with TV dinners and stuff like that.

I'd think the deli department of a grocery store should fall into food-stamp approved. There's some good stuff there.

I don't believe so. I know Sushi isn't.

You can buy Safeway sandwiches, but you can't buy any hot or prepared items like hot chicken, jojos, mashed potatoes, Chinese food, etc. (I work at Safeway)

edited 20th Oct '11 12:14:11 PM by Sakan4k

I'd think the deli department of a grocery store should fall into food-stamp approved. There's some good stuff there.

It isn't? That's too bad.

@pvtnum 11

Some deli stuff counts. I generally buy a single tin of potato salad or General Tso's chicken each week as my treat for that week. Grinders, pizza slices, prepared dinners, etc. stuff don't count, though.

Microwave dinners are fine though.

That would worsen an already bad public health problem which would strain the health care system even more.

Eh, I'm not convinced that we're really talking about a level of impact that would significantly affect health costs in America.

Let's see... 1 in 6 Americans is on Food Stamps or something? So if one in 3 of those radically augmentted their eating habits from fast food, 1 in 18 Americans would increase the medical costs of Medicaid...

Meh, maybe?

edited 20th Oct '11 4:01:35 PM by TheyCallMeTomu

Maybe not, but still, obessity most be fought, if anything, such a move would cancel out other types of initiatives aimed at reducing it.

Well, again, you have to consider areas where there may not really be any alternatives.

And, again, the thing that I'm curious about is the stimulative effects (or lack thereof) of subsidizing the food service industry.

Fair enough.

You know... American fast food is... I miss it :(