The number of Americans receiving subsidized food assistance from the federal government has risen to 101 million, representing roughly a third of the U.S. population.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates that a total of 101,000,000 people currently participate in at least one of the 15 food programs offered by the agency, at a cost of $114 billion in fiscal year 2012.
That means the number of Americans receiving food assistance has surpassed the number of full-time private sector workers in the U.S.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), there were 97,180,000 full-time private sector workers in 2012.
The population of the U.S. is 316.2 million people, meaning nearly a third of Americans receive food aid from the government.
Of the 101 million receiving food benefits, a record 47 million Americans participated in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), commonly known as food stamps. The USDA describes SNAP as the “largest program in the domestic hunger safety net.”
The USDA says the number of Americans on food stamps is a “historically high figure that has risen with the economic downturn.”
SNAP has a monthly average of 46.7 million participants, or 22.5 million households. Food stamps alone had a budget of $88.6 billion in FY 2012.
The USDA also offers nutrition assistance for pregnant women, school children and seniors.
Read more at CNS NEWS.
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The USDA describes SNAP as the largest program in the domestic hunger safety net.
They also state that 68.8% of Americans over age 20 are overweight or obese. So together it says that SNAP is effectively paying for people to be overweight or obese. And then Medicare/ Medicaid/ Obamacare will pay for them too when they have chronic illnesses.
It time to cut all the programs & get people out to work.