Even As The Government Reopens, SNAP Recipients Remain Shaken
“When a little more than half of her monthly food stamp benefit came through on Tuesday, Deana Pearson headed to the grocery store and spent all $172 of it. She bought eggs, cheese, meat, sugar and produce.
For two weeks, Ms. Pearson, 61, of Chouteau, Okla., had been forced to scrimp. Her balance through the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, which helps about 42 million low-income people buy groceries every month, had shrunk to $1.17, she said.
That led Ms. Pearson to visit a local food bank. Some of the food there was moldy, she said, but at least it was free.
She hopes Tuesday’s trip to the grocery store will last for a week or two, but she said she felt uneasy about relying on federal benefits and was worried they could be discontinued again at some point. People already had little faith in government, she said, but at least the food stamp program seemed automatic. “Now you can’t even have that,” she said.
For the roughly one in eight Americans who depend on SNAP, there has never been an interruption of benefits like the one that surprised them this month — a product of the longest government shutdown in American history. Now that the government has reopened, the flow of SNAP money is expected to return to normal soon.
Recipients’ confidence in the program, on the other hand, may be slow to recover.
The New York Times this week followed up with many of the dozens of recipients who had responded to a survey in early November about coping without benefits.
Many expressed lingering worry and frustration. Some were still waiting for their full monthly benefit, while others were making do with less than usual. Even for those whose benefits have been fully restored, grocery shopping felt less like a relief and more like a gamble.”
Read more at New York Times.