Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
I would encourage you to give generously to your community food banks out of the spirit of the holidays this season, or out of empathy and human compassion for your fellow man, because people are going to need it.
Brad Plumer explains at Wonkblog, Food stamps will get cut by $5 billion this week — and more cuts could follow:
The U.S. food-stamp program is set to shrink in the months ahead. The only real question is by how much.
The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) currently costs
about $80 billion per year and provides food aid to 14 percent of all
U.S. households — some 47 million people. Those numbers swelled dramatically during the recession.
But the food-stamp program is now set to downsize in the weeks ahead.
There's a big automatic cut scheduled for Nov. 1, as a temporary boost
from the 2009 stimulus bill expires. That change will trim about $5
billion from federal food-stamp spending over the coming year.
And that's not all: The number of Americans on food stamps could drop
even further in the months ahead, as Congress and various states
contemplate further changes to the program. Here's a rundown:
1) The end of the stimulus boost. First up is a big
automatic cut to SNAP scheduled for Nov. 1. This is happening because
the food-stamp program was temporarily expanded in 2009 as part of the
Recovery Act. That bill spent $45.2 billion to increase monthly benefit
levels to around $133, on average.
That bump will end on Friday, and benefits will shrink by around 5
percent on average. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities has a short report calculating what this will mean for individual households:
So, for instance: The maximum monthly benefit for a family of four will
drop from $668 per month down to $632. The maximum monthly benefit for
an individual will drop from $200 per month to $189. ("The cut is
equivalent to about 16 meals a month for a family of three based on the
cost of the U.S. Agriculture Department’s 'Thrifty Food Plan,' notes
CBPP).
