[Maru]

White House wants to deliver food to the poor, Blue Apron-style
http://money.cnn.com/2018/02/12/news...ron/index.html

Think of it as Blue Apron for food stamp recipients.

That's how Budget Director Mick Mulvaney described the Trump administration's proposal to replace nearly half of poor Americans' monthly cash benefits with a box of food. It would affect households that receive at least $90 a month in food stamps, or roughly 38 million people.

"USDA America's Harvest Box is a bold, innovative approach to providing nutritious food to people who need assistance feeding themselves and their families -- and all of it is homegrown by American farmers and producers," said Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue in a statement. "It maintains the same level of food value as SNAP [Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program] participants currently receive, provides states flexibility in administering the program, and is responsible to the taxpayers."

Part of the president's fiscal 2019 budget blueprint, the idea immediately sparked concerns and questions among consumer advocates and food retailers. They feared it would upend a much-needed benefit for more than 80% of those in the program.

Related: Why Trump's budget proposal is too optimistic on deficits

Here's how it would work:

Instead of receiving all their food stamp funds, households would get a box of food that the government describes as nutritious and 100% grown and produced in the U.S. The so-called USDA America's Harvest Box would contain items such as shelf-stable milk, juice, grains, cereals, pasta, peanut butter, beans, canned meat, poultry or fish, and canned fruits and vegetables. The box would be valued at about half of the SNAP recipient's monthly benefit. The remainder of their benefits would be given to them on electronic benefit cards, as before.

The administration didn't detail exactly how families would receive the food boxes, saying states could distribute them through existing infrastructure, partnerships or directly to residences through delivery services.

The proposal would save nearly $130 billion over 10 years, as well as improve the nutritional value of the program and reduce the potential for fraud, according to the administration.

Consumer advocates, however, questioned whether the federal government could save that much money by purchasing and distributing food on its own. Also, they were concerned that families would not know what food they would get in advance nor have any choice regarding what they receive. Plus, it could be difficult for families to pick up the box, especially if they don't have a car.

"It's a risky scheme that threatens families' ability to put food on the table," said Stacy Dean, vice president for food assistance policy at the left-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

I think this is a fantastic idea, but only if it's well-executed. There is so much fraud. I've seen so many parents buy things using the funds to buy luxury items for themselves rather than feed their kids. There's also the issue of people taking people to the store and having people buy their food on the card and then taking the cash from them. Many families aren't very good with their food choices either and buy a ton of junk food instead of things that have any actual nutrition to them, which is what many poor folk do. That's like the worst thing you can do for a child is raise them on junk food, it's practically begging for problems with development down the line. It's also a great deterrent for those who want to abuse the program... like how are you going to sell produce when it only lasts so long. They're better off just eating it.

If grocery delivery ever takes off, this would be the thing to move towards I think.

[Mitchell]

I’m pretty impressed with this

[Eddie.]

Wow I'm impressed.

[jaxie]

This seems to be taking money from the poor and choosing food for them. With all the canned food suggested it doesn't sound particularly nutritional either.

[Toy Soldier]

It's infantilizing. I don't have a huge amount more to say about than that. Benefits should be paid in cash / by bank transfer, I don't even agree with the idea of food stamps. If parents on benefits aren't feeding their children properly with the money they get, then they are being neglectful, and that's a whole separate issue that isn't going to be solved by cutting their money and sending them a crate of carrots.

[LeatherTrumpet]

Donald, King of benevolence

[Maru]

Originally Posted by jaxie

This seems to be taking money from the poor and choosing food for them. With all the canned food suggested it doesn't sound particularly nutritional either.

Originally Posted by Toy Soldier

It's infantilizing. I don't have a huge amount more to say about than that. Benefits should be paid in cash / by bank transfer, I don't even agree with the idea of food stamps. If parents on benefits aren't feeding their children properly with the money they get, then they are being neglectful, and that's a whole separate issue that isn't going to be solved by cutting their money and sending them a crate of carrots.

It's not any different than a food bank. SNAP is temporary food assistance, it's not a luxury meal service.

They still get a portion of the money, but they're cutting the costs of the program and making sure there are nutritional options included (as well as supporting local businesses which is nice). It's in idea stages now, but it'd have to figure in some preferences and things like food sensitivities/allergies in the long haul to really work.

I think the forcing of choices is a great idea, especially for children. Parents selecting Captain Crunch as their breakfast and dinner is not only a stupid idea, it's incredibly harmful to their health. I know parents who raised their kids on junk.. almost all of them ended up with learning disabilities, ADHD, all sorts of mental and physical problems. I see that as passing one parent's hardship from them to another... and they don't think they're doing anything wrong, but that's because the problems aren't immediately noticeable until years later, so they think it's just their "terrible luck". I personally think a lot of it comes down to diet.

It also solves a few problems actually. Maybe they didn't know how to cook meals or they don't know how to eat correctly. Perhaps it could be modified so they received the ingredients for a meal for example, by a subscription service, govt subsidized or fully paid in (similar to the school lunch program). Actually, those services are quite good. They also have food services here that the school, prisons, jails, etc share, and they're not terrible actually... so I think tasty options are possible, especially when meal delivery/grocery delivery becomes mainstream (it's getting there in major cities...)

There are people who even if you give these benefits to them, they take it to the drug store, either because of transportation hardship (common in places like Baltimore, etc) or because they're lazy. And buying food there is 2-6x the normal cost and it ends up not meeting the value per $ anyway. So at least this ensures they get the value in food that was factored in.