A California electronic benefit transfer (food stamp) card. (Associated Press/Photo by Rich Pedroncelli)
Recent numbers from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) show the number of food stamp recipients continuing its upward climb.
Most concerning is the next generation's dependency on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP): 19.9 million children, 26.9 percent of all Americans under 18, received aid from SNAP in 2011. They made up 45 percent of SNAP participants.
The latest data released Friday shows SNAP had 47.5 million participants in October. That means 1 in 6.5 Americans are now on food stamps, compared to 1 in 50 Americans in 1970. In just the past decade, the number of Americans on SNAP rose by 29.5 million.
This increase in SNAP recipients is the result of campaign efforts by welfare advocates to get more low-income families to join the program. In outreach efforts across the nation, they present SNAP not as a welfare program, but as an entitlement program, and encourage states to sign-up anyone who qualifies for aid. Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., who speaks up against the expansion of SNAP, said in rural North Carolina the USDA even gave an award to one women for helping others overcome "mountain pride."
"What [USDA] said was this lady should be given an award because when people in the mountains-who are independent and believe they can take care of themselves, thank you, without the federal government--she overcame that," Sessions told Congress in December.
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SOURCE: WORLD Magazine
