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Fri, 12-18-09 - 8:56am by reportergary
Time To Stop Fingerprinting Food Stamp Recipients
Paltalk News Network
New York Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum is questioning the costs of a program where food stamp recipients in the Big Apple must be fingerprinted.
While the costs of the program should rightly be questioned, the real issue here has to do with privacy and civil liberties.
Why is it so imperative that food stamp recipients be fingerprinted? Is it because the city figures that if you're poor you're more likely to be a criminal?
The program really speaks to how we, as a society, view our poor. The indignities they face are many. Local governments shouldn't make things worse for them by adding more.
Those who support fingerprinting argue that it reduces fraud. Well, then, why not fingerprint every person who uses a credit card? There's plenty of credit card fraud out there.
Of course, if you have a credit card, it's unlikely you're on food stamps. Which means that, while you may be struggling, you've not hit rock bottom. Not yet anyway.
It also means you probably still have a voice in society. You're valued. You're adding to the economy by making purchases. Not draining the economy by being on the public dole. So if you'd complain - as surely you would - you'd be listened to.
Or you might just tear up your credit cards and turn to cash to avoid being fingerprinted. A poor person, who needs his or her food stamps to eat, doesn't have the option of opting out.
New York's not the only place that has a fingerprinting requirement for food stamp recipients. So do California, Texas and Arizona.
And here's the best part of all this. The U.S. Agriculture Department which administers food stamps says fingerprinting does nothing to reduce fraud in the program.
One-in-five New Yorkers are on food stamps. One-in-five! That's a lot of fingerprint data that's being collected.
The program should be stopped. If you don't like my arguments about privacy or civil liberties, look at Gotbaum's. It costs money to run the program - and the program - doesn't work.
3 comments
Sat, 12-19-09 - 11:29 am by uKn0wIt
Call me Scrooge then
I think there should be stricter rules for all government programs! Nothing makes me madder than standing behind a woman with a cart overflowing with snack cakes, chips and coke, then has the nerve to whip out food stamps to pay for it.
Also, I'm sorry, but has there ever been an audit done to see how many felones are on this program?
And another thing, tax payer dollars should not be used to fund people's personal choices. There has been research done that shows a large percentage of food stamp recepients are polygamists. They qualify because the women are technically single mothers. They chose that lifestyle, so let the man of the house provide for them.
Sorry, this is just one of those issues that makes my blood boil! There are children starving because their parents aren't able to fill out the paperwork or have no address to receive the benefits.
3 replies
Wed, 12-23-09 - 03:45 pm by LexSays
j_ernst, do some research! There have been studies of areas with a large population of polygamist communities. The women are treated as single mothers just as mentioned before. So they technically qualify for food stamps.
the real question is should they be allowed to participate in these programs! At some point people need to be responsible for their actions.
Fingerprinting isn't the answer, but there should be some regulations in place to prevent people to abuse the program.
Mon, 12-21-09 - 10:31 am by j_ernst
Sat, 12-19-09 - 11:39 am by reportergary
I spoke with a guy on food stamps. He says the fingerprinting does nothing to prevent fraud because he could sell his card to someone else to use anytime - they don't check your fingerprints at the store.
Fri, 12-18-09 - 10:36 am by j_ernst
I agree that it's unnecessary
I agree that it's unnecessary to fingerprint people for food stamps; it shouldn't be such a process to get food from the government when you're hungry. I feel like this policy is emulative of how the government does not want to take responsibility for its people- impose stupid rules that don't make sense/work so that people will not want to seek food stamps in the first place. And how and when does the government decide who deserves food stamps?
Fri, 12-18-09 - 09:59 am by antoniom626
Sometime I just don't understand some of these programs!
Keep it simple...The point of food stamps is to feed people who can't afford food. Thats where all the money should be going to not wasting money trying to implement a fingerprint system. I understand that New York City is a very big city and its hard to keep track of everyone but that could provide more jobs for people in offices. It would be a better idea to implement this system on credit cards instead. Whatever happened checking signatures on credit cards? Hopefully this is just a trial run.
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