USDA Refuses to Release Food Stamp Profits Details

Monday, April 15, 2013

Unlike those in charge of other federal programs that spend billions of taxpayer dollars each year helping Americans, officials overseeing food stamps have refused to release details on who benefits financially from this assistance.

 

Currently, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) does not make public how much money individual retailers make from food stamps, officially known as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). Nor does the USDA disclose which products are purchased with SNAP dollars or how much is spent on each product.

 

In 2011, Tulsa World found that nearly half ($506 million out of $1.2 billion) of all food stamp expenditures between July 2009 and March 2011 went to Walmart Stores, according to data supplied by the Oklahoma Department of Human Services.

 

The Association of Health Care Journalists and six other media and open-government groups asked Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack in a letter to change the USDA’s policy regarding food stamps information.

 

“We have yet to hear a good reason for this secrecy,” the letter states. “And we believe it is simply wrong to withhold basic information about a multibillion-dollar program from the people who pay for it.”

 

The coalition argues that more transparency could demonstrate which businesses benefit from SNAP and inform public policy debates about obesity and its causes.

 

They also note that Medicare and Medicaid reveal plenty about their costly programs, and that the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families discloses where recipients used their EBT (Electronic Benefit Transfer) cards to withdraw cash assistance.

-Noel Brinkerhoff

 

To Learn More:

Journalists Call On USDA To Release Food Stamp Information (by Felice J. Freyer and Irene Wielawski, Association of Healthcare Journalists)

Food Stamps: Follow the Money (by Michele Simon, Eat Drink Politics) (pdf)

Which Corporations Profit from Food Stamps? (by Noel Brinkerhoff and Vicki Baker, AllGov)

Should Restaurants be Allowed to Accept Food Stamps? (by Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov)

Food Stamps Equal Big Money (by Ginnie Graham and Gavin Off, Tulsa World)

Comments

@Kevin_P_Wright 11 years ago
Ask an honest homeless guy (we do exist) and you will hear the truth. JP Morgan is the Bankster company behind this fiasco & their PROFITS are through the roof. I see MANY people trading their EBT cards for cash or drugs. Along with Food Stamps (EBT) & Food Bank visits, they also get medical benefits (and free psyche meds), Welfare, Housing (some get hotel vouchers), SSI, etc. Most of them are *seriously* overweight because they get three square meals a day from the homeless shelter, but then still get food stamps, go to the Food Bank, and other regular weekly food-serving events (serve mostly crappy canned food, hotdogs, & *unlimited* cake, cookies, etc). The average government-sponsored moochers get "paid" on the first of the month and head off to a hotel room to party and eat till content. By mid-month, they are back on the streets or at the shelter, and back to "boosting" (stealing) to compensate for their lack of "FREE" government bailout $$$. Those of us who refuse all government "benefits" and refuse to stay at the local shelter (more like a free-range prison) are left to find the few scarce food resources provided by private groups or individuals, and compassionate churches. Even with ALL of the "benefits" many of these people get on the first of the month, by mid-month, I have to compete with them for the limited food now available. The fattest ones usually get their first (including illegals), literally grabbing as much food/sandwiches as they can stuff in their pockets, bags, & backpacks. Amazingly, when someone serves something nutritious or natural/organic, they groan and moan. They devour the sweets & junk like crack addicts. I would 'guesstimate' that maybe 25% of homeless are in actual serious need of help. The rest are mental patients, criminals who are regularly in & out of jail, ones who CHOOSE to live in tent 'camps' in the woods, and the just plain fat and lazy. I've had 18 months to observe this societal degradation. The homeless shelters and various "support" groups/organizations are a huge "FOR PROFIT" scams. If you want "happy pills", just ask the shelter and they will send you to a provider who even "COACHES" them on what to write and say to receive their free drugs. Then they are hooked... if they try to stop (most do), they get REALLY ZOMBIFIED, violent, & even suicidal. Just my "2 cents" (all I have to my name).
Rat Fink 11 years ago
They don't show it cause, there's a boatload of corruption. It's classified, cause if the MUPETS could do the math they would know the truth of the monetary system's future. That's why there is dang near nothing but, THIEVING, MURDERING, LYING, TREASONOUS OATH BREAKERS running government right now who ALL BELONG IN FT LEAVENWORTH FOR THE REST OF THEIR LIVES. When they crash the monetary system, that's when the people will find out what those 1.2 billion DHS hollowpoints are for. THen they will find out what the "Rescue Vehicle" MRAP's are for, Hint: it's not to RESCUE YOU Then they will find out what those FEMA camps are for, and what all these unconstitutional laws and crap over the past decade. THIS IS A COUP. OBAMA doesn't even have a valid ID. He breaks his oath time and time again. You can change laws all you want on paper, but GOD GAVE US THE RIGHTS WRITTEN IN THE US CONSTITUTION. PS: You can only kill me one time.

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