A Blizzard of Anecdotes about Food Stamps

New York magazine has a piece discussing how the welfare queen myth isn't backed up by statistics. In truth, their "no evidence exists" argument is pretty weak. But Freepers are not equipped to actually argue. They prefer sample bias to reality, so they embrace anecdotes over data, as though anyone was arguing that food stamp fraud never happened.

So, here come the on-site reports from every Freeper! It turns out every Freeper is looking over the shoulder of every black person ahead of them in line at the supermarket, has eagle-eyed vision, and finds countless stories that seem suspiciously tailor made to prove the worst of stereotypes...

Gamecock rails against mythbusting generally:

Why even waste the electrons to publish this article if it REALLY isn’t a problem.

Army Air Corps even invokes Welfare Queens:

I hate to tell the NYT, but I have seen the Food Stamp Queens and Kings with my own eyes. Sorry, guys, but the phenomenon is real.

central_va sees it all the time, and keeps track of their cars!

Everyone I see at the Food Lion that uses EBT usually drives a new car.

Qiviut didn't even bother to say he saw an EBT card. He saw a couple buying a bunch of stuff and wearing bling years ago, and is still pissed off:

With my own eyes: King Crab legs, steaks, & the most expensive bagged dog food in the store. Two carts full of stuff that I (working full time at a good salary & living independently) could not afford. The man & woman were dripping with what appeared to be very nice gold jewelry, they both had cell phones, & the woman was dressed to the “T”. I’m still pissed off ..... and this was a few years back.

Restless managed to spot EBT cards twice, and did not approve of their nutrition decisions!

So, I guess I gotta learn not to trust my lyin’ eyes week after week? Like the woman I got stuck behind in line who used $325 on her EBT to buy a cart full of spare ribs, steaks and chops? Or the woman who bought $30 worth of flavored bottled water, gum, candy and chips? At our local discount grocery store, because of people’s EBT habits, clerks are actually trained NOT to judge or react to the things people buy with EBT. It’s tough to work a low-wage job at a grocery store and see person after person using EBT to buy things you can’t afford.

Buckeye McFrog worked part-time grocery, which is almost like a statistical study:

Anyone who has ever had a part-time job in a grocery store and watched buggies full of Ding-Dongs, Twinkies and Ho-Hos being paid for with Food Stamps knows this is true.

Pan_Yan has an odd definition of fraudulent:

I can’t count the number of times I’ve watched someone use their money for beer and cigarettes and my money for food. The system is fraudulent by nature.

dljordan brings in race and car models:

Two very well dressed ‘Hispanic’ ladies with two carts full to the brim with the best food. Saw them getting into a brand new Escalade later. What a great country, unless you work for a living.

CodeToad brings in some well known facts about many wealthy people what he has professional knowledge of:

It is a well known fact that many very wealthy people receive food stamps. They show no income because they have blind trusts they live off of. I have professional knowledge of this.

PGR88 knows an Asian who tells him it's all true:

I know a Chinese guy who runs an Asian grocery store.

He just put in big tanks for Alaskan crabs, oysters, Lobsters.

One Alaskan crab was $35/lb. I asked him - who pays that for crab?

Then he said “its all EBT.” He pointed to a group of Russians out in the parking lot getting into a Lexus and said “they paid with Foodstamps.”

I only know what I hear and see....

Psalm 144 often waits behind people buying junk food, and seems to assume food stamps:

It is not a myth. I’ve waited behind some of these people in the checkout line. Very few of them spend money on the kinds of groceries that will stretch a dollar and are actually better for you. Flour, corn meal, potatoes, greens, beans, onions, peppers, corn. Mostly I see prepared kludge, meats, and high fat junk food. And yes, I have seen crab legs and shrimp in abundance.

reegs has seen it, right down to the fancy fingernails:

This is such unmitigated horse crap. The pixels to produce this tripe were completely wasted. I’ve seen with my own eyes grocery carts loaded down with food I can’t afford as the shopper hangs up their iPhone and pulls out and swipes their EBT card with their extravagantly-done fingernails. Back when I was trying to feed a family of 6 on $120 a week. Do we need a safety net for folks who need one temporarily? Absolutely. Do we need a Tempur-Pedic California king sized bed for them? Absolutely not.

Why do I think that Freepers assume any black person with a full cart is on food stamps?

KC Burke tells a story of people getting arrested for fraud as proof that the system is broken. He also has his own spin on the myth:

Recently in Phoenix we had a couple that defrauded the Food Stamp system of 93,000 in a little over thirty-six months. Well reported, but not to the author of this article.

Many college student seek emancipation to get grants and food stamps while on an extended play time in their twenties.

Captain Peter Blood worked retail and complains that people stock up when they get their food stamps:

I was a front end manager for Walmart, I saw this stuff all the time. At the beginning of every month it would blow my mind when people would come in to shop on their EBT and WICK cards and checks. You could have someone with two baskets of food come up to check out. The mess we would have to go through on what qualified and what didn’t.

WICK is freaking full of restrictions.

nixonsnose joins the group who thinks food stamps are all blown in the first week, since no one really needs them:

When I worked in a grocery store, we loaded the meat case with premium steaks on the first week of the month.

It was cheap grind and hamburger helper in the case on the last week of the month.

Every month for years....

informavoracious attacks the author for being rich, and then rails against the poor for having the temerity to hope for quality:

“Claire” would probably never stoop to shopping at WalMart or Food4Less, so she doesn’t see what the rest of us see. Her black lipstick cones from a trendy and exclusive store, no doubt.

Conservatives will never lose the myth of EBT shoppers spending foolishly because it is not a myth. Food stamps and debit money go a long way when your kids eat free at school and you can stock up at a free pantry. I actually heard a woman complain that her local food pantry mostly had store-brand foods and why can’t people donate name brand foods, do they think people getting food at the pantry deserve less?

Maverick68 is getting a bit eugenic here:

I was approached by a black woman in Wal-Mart one day and she wanted to pay for my groceries with her food stamp card, so i would give her the $$ in cash..................

In America, we pay stupid people to breed, feed and vote Democrat....

bushwon blows things wide open on glasses fraud!

A couple months ago I was standing in the "No more than 12 items" line behind a minority woman. She had at least 30 items in her cart. Paid with an EBT card. I had one item so I was right behind her out the door. She was parked a couple spaces from my 15 year old Highlander. She got into a giant black Caddy Escalade. It still had the stickers in the back side window and temp plates! EBT!

I hear ya!

so after your customer in the Caddy EBT’d her 30 items in the 12-item line, she probably went on over to the vision place next :(

I have good vision, but was fearful that I might need classes to pass driving test...So I went to a Pearl Vision (large national chain) located by our DMV for a quick test, and the doctor told me there is much fraud with glasses...Tho she did not have a lot of time to elaborate, she said unbelievable they types of cars the people with medicaid drive—she mentioned Escalades!

Makes me furious, but 35 years ago, someone once told me that foods stamps are the best for of riot control we have—that was 35 years ago, and I am sure the numbers were small by comparison :(

Yes, the dehumanizing "poors will riot unless we bribe them" theory.

nascarnation read a story about rural Kentucky, which is basically just like America:

I read a story about how this is done in rural Kentucky.

Folks buy 100 bucks worth of soft drinks in cans with EBT.
Then they take the cases of soft drinks to another store which buys them at the back door for 60 bucks cash.

And repeat.

bgill rails against modern prices for junk food:

I can’t remember when I last bought gum and candy.

A bag of potato chips is outrageous these days. Walmart.com shows a “family size”, snort, bag weighing 10 oz. costs over $3. A raw potato weighs about 6-7 oz. and costs mere pennies. Frying one and a half potatoes equals the weight of a Lays bag but costs about 50 cents. Look at the money savings across the nation if they’d just ban packaged chips from EBTs.

bgill also had some friend on welfare, and drew every negative conclusion he could:

I had a friend who was on food stamps for a very short while. The husband got a job like a month or two into the program but the welfare office wouldn't take them off until around the 6 mo. mark. Or so she claimed. She is also on SSI and is more physically fit than I am. Claims she can't work but drives to the city 2-3 times a week to shop and visit. Visits and shops locally on the other days of the week. Goes to the pool every other day. Has a garden and works with kids. I have to plan it out just to do simple daily chores so they don't kill me. Notice the past tense in "had" a friend. Makes me angry thinking about it. That's another government program that is being scammed big time.

bgill seems to constantly resent other people whenever he spends any money:

Old school Southern home cook here, too. I can stretch the stretchings. Just opened a jar of home canned corn cob jelly and have a pot of chicken broth in the fridge from the chicken bones saved from dinner a couple nights ago. The leftover meat had been picked off the bones for a BBQ Chicken pizza - of course, homemade dough. Dinner tonight will be sandwiches from a bit of leftover pork chops that was originally from a boneless pork roast bought on sale and cheaper than bone-in chops. The onions on the sandwich are from the smaller rings not used from frying onion rings. The onion root went to the garden and the skins went to the compost. The sauted bell pepper was home grown. The sandwich spread will be homemade so didn’t have to buy a costly pre-made spread.

I can make 5 Scholtzsky’s sandwiches on a homemade bun and homemade spread for what one costs at the drive-thru. That’s still a costly sandwich but so good.

Can’t stand it when the grocery cashier says, “You saved $14.28!” for buying the cheaper store brand. My normal reply is, “No, I spent $223.87.” The only thing that’s stopped me from throwing the eggs at them is that the eggs have been paid for.

In her Malthusian enthusiasm, rhoda_penmark kinda proved environmentalism and alternative energy are important:

conservatives have been unable to rid themselves of the image of the food-stamp queen

Sometimes I wonder WTF people even think the word “conservative” means.

It means someone who understands that the supply of everything is NOT unlimited, and unless conserved, will RUN OUT!

Freaking Morons.

husky ed was actually on food stamp, and these stories didn't ring true with him. Luckily, he has an explanation!

I was on food stamps at one time and only got $30 a month. But I'm white.

Yes, black people get special extra food stamps. Good Lord.