Working for Food

The Cow Exploder · Jan 25, 2015

Need food? Maine’s governor wants you to work for it

The state of Maine plans to reinstate work requirements for food stamp recipients, part of a broad effort by Republican Gov. Paul LePage (R) to reform what he has characterized as the state’s unhealthy reliance on welfare.

Maine has for years taken advantage of a federal waiver of work requirements for food stamp recipients, offered as states were plagued by high unemployment during and after the Great Recession. But now the state is scheduled to put the requirements back in place Oct. 1. The policy change would affect an estimated 12,000 residents who collect roughly $15 million in benefits, paid for by the federal government.

“People who are in need deserve a hand up, but we should not be giving able-bodied individuals a handout,’’ LePage said in a statement. “We must continue to do all that we can to eliminate generational poverty and get people back to work. We must protect our limited resources for those who are truly in need and who are doing all they can to be self-sufficient.”

LePage has set his sights on broad welfare reform, arguing in his state of the state speech that “there is no excuse for able-bodied adults to spend a lifetime on welfare at the expense of hard-working, struggling Mainers.” This spring, he introduced a four-bill package aimed at reducing fraud in welfare payouts and encouraging job-seeking.

Under the new policy announced Wednesday, work-capable adults would be limited to three months of food stamp benefits over a three-year period unless they work a minimum of 20 hours a week, volunteer a certain set of hours for a community agency, or participate in a state skills-training program.

The three-month limit was introduced in the 1996 federal welfare reform law, which made waivers available for areas of high unemployment - where, presumably, the difficulty in gaining employment may be attributable to larger economic patterns. More than forty states had such waivers at some point in the past several years, with 32 states implementing it statewide and 10 others implementing it in certain regions during the 2014 fiscal year. Maine has qualified and implemented the waiver since 2010.

In June, roughly 231,000 people received roughly $27.2 million in benefits in Maine. The state had an unemployment rate of 5.5 percent in June, ranking it 19th in the country.

Sounds reasonable to me, especially since the White House keeps saying unemployment is down and the economy's getting all better.

dennishoddy · Jan 25, 2015

How are the welfare moms going to do this? Is there an exemption for5-10 kids?

John6185 · Jan 26, 2015

Good idea, everyone surely owes this country or his/her state something, especially if they've been living off of other folks tax dollars.

tran · Jan 26, 2015

dennishoddy said:
How are the welfare moms going to do this? Is there an exemption for5-10 kids?

Why can't she baby sit so someone else can go out and work. Where there is a will there is a way!

dennishoddy · Jan 26, 2015

tran said:
Why can't she baby sit so someone else can go out and work. Where there is a will there is a way!

I like your thinking. Welfare moms babysit other welfare moms kids while moms go to work.

1krr · Jan 26, 2015

tran said:
Why can't she baby sit so someone else can go out and work. Where there is a will there is a way!

Exactly...

Not a sin to work for a living and it's not a sin to starve. It's up to them.

meatGrinder · Jan 26, 2015

I think tran may be on to something...

Then someone can watch HER kids while she goes and bags groceries or washes cars or whatever.

Working for Food

The Cow Exploder

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dennishoddy

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John6185

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tran

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dennishoddy

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1krr

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meatGrinder

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