The US Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, historically and commonly known as the Food Stamp Program, is a federal assistance program that provides food to low and no income people living in the United States. Benefits are distributed by the individual states, but the program is administered through the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Most food stamp benefits are now distributed using cards but for most of its history the program had actually used paper denominational stamps/coupons worth $1, $5, and $10. These stamps could be used to purchase any prepackaged edible foods regardless of nutritional value (for example soft drinks and confectionery could be purchased on food stamps).
In the late 1990s, the food stamp program was revamped and actual stamps were phased out in favor of a specialized debit card system known as Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) provided by private contractors. Many states merged the use of the EBT card for public assistance welfare programs as well.
The purpose of the Food Stamp Program as laid out in its implementation was to assist low-income households in obtaining adequate and nutritious diets. According to Rossi, “the program rests on the assumption that households with restricted incomes may skimp on food purchases and live on diets that are inadequate in quantity and quality, or, alternatively skimp on other necessities to maintain an adequate diet”.
Food stamps, as many like Rossi, MacDonald and Eisinger contend, are used not only for increasing food but also as income maintenance. Income Maintenance basically is the money that household would have spent on food that they no longer have to; since households no longer have to spend this money on food, they can spend it on other things. The FSP is meant solely to increase food purchases, not to act as a tool of income maintenance.
According to various studies shown by Rossi, because of income maintenance only about $0.17-$0.47 more is being spent on food for every food stamp dollar than was spent prior to individuals receiving food stamps
Nutritional improvement
Another benefit sometimes attributed to the Food Stamp Program is that it makes nutritious food more readily available.
According to the National Food Consumption Survey individuals in food stamp households do not differ significantly from those living in non-recipient households in the nutritional quality of the food eaten. As a result, Rossi argues that this objective is not being met.
Source: Excerpts from Wikipedia
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