Posted on 08/15/2012 4:25:02 AM PDT by massmike
A Walpole (Ma) baker — appalled that welfare abuse now seems almost as American as apple pie — is putting her whoopie pies where her mouth is in a dispute with the Braintree Farmers Market, refusing to take EBT cards for her baked treats.
“I don’t think American taxpayers should be footing the bill for people’s pie purchases,” said Andrea Taber, proprietor of the Ever So Humble Pie Co. in Walpole, who peddles her wares at the Braintree market on Fridays and now finds herself in the middle of the state’s raging fight over welfare benefits.
“To me it’s no different than nail salons and Lottery tickets,” Taber said. “It’s pastry, it’s dessert. My pies are great, but come on.”
Taber told the Herald she has no problem with customers using their taxpayer-funded welfare benefits to buy fresh fruit and vegetables. But she draws a line when it comes to her own sweet, fatty goods.
“They looked at me like I had six heads,” said Taber, who fired off an email on July 20 stating her objections.
“I know it’s been a struggle for you to accept this program but we really need to work something out,” (Braintree Farmers Market chairwoman Donna )Ingemanson emailed back the same day. “Other markets make it mandatory to sign on to these programs and my guess is that it will be for us soon. ... In fact, you’re the only one who is resistant to the idea.”
(Excerpt) Read more at bostonherald.com ...
There’s the difference, the democrats used to promise pie in the sky, by and by but now they demand it now and free.
She should get a letter of support from Moochelle.
The public debate we MUST have is who is “indigent” and needs our help and who must be expected to provide for their own needs. Socialism is the ideology that we each can live at the expense of everyone else. Not only does this violate the Commandments that forbid coveting and theft, but both Hayek and Mises prove (in different ways) that it is not a “sustainable” economic system, a concept the left otherwise loves to scold us about.
Putting aside how government social benefits originally justified to help the indigent have destroyed the charity-oriented social support network that functioned in this country since its founding, these benefits have been expanded and expanded. One study I read stated that for a family of four, in order for a wage-earner to provide the same standard of living, he would have to earn a wage of about $60k/year.
We have made not working pay so much that employers with lower skilled jobs must pay more in order to compete with free medical care, free housing, free utilities, free food, free school lunches and free cell phones. This is one factor in the dismal rate of labor force participation.
Apart from the broader liberty question, or more directly, how this fosters dependency, having government “benefits” that extend to such a large fraction of society means that government must become an economic predator on the shrinking portion that creates wealth. The larger government gets, the less economic wealth creation we will have. We are on the road to serfdom.
Government takes $100 from the half that has taxable income, borrows $40 from China and then offers a $90 “benefit” to everyone who qualifies. The first disqualifier of course is that your income is too high. But those who do qualify climb all over each other to make sure they get what they are “entitled” to. There is never any suggestion that the program is for those who are truly in need and when a person is not in need, even though their income is low, they should not apply.
But even States do this with federal programs. If the States would just say no, the pols in Washington would not be working day and night to find ways to make money flow back home. If States would decline to accept federal bucks, the federal deficit would be much smaller.
We are being enslaved with our own money and our own credit rating. Worse, we are enslaving our children like no previous generation ever has.
American hero. And in MA no less.
“You didn’t build that. EBT built that.”
She built it with her sons!
Eh. People who take welfare should be watched like hawks ... but I don’t think we need to go so far as to monitor their diets.
SnakeDoc
Even The Jeffersons finally only got a piece of the pie!
i don’t think it’s so much about monitoring their diets, as it is monitoring their expenditure of taxpayer provided funds on LUXURY items. As i recall it, PA has no sales tax on groceries, but you do pay tax on prepared foods, restaurant etc. It’s a natural distinction.
This EBT card thing is way out of hand and a huge expense for taxpayers. They use the cards to buy treats, cigarettes, lottery tickets, and then ask for cash in change so they can head off to casinos. Or, they sell the cards for cash. Yet, the gov’t can’t dish them out fast enough. In fact, they even were advertising for you to come and get one. An entitlement society under Obama? You bet!
It is still monitoring food expenditures. Cut welfare if you want ... I’m fine with that. But, if you’re going to give it to ‘em, let them buy their food without a babysitter. Its just a pie. Not the best use of welfare money ... but not nearly the worst. There are bigger fish to fry.
Businesses should have the option of not accepting food stamps, though. Not sure if they do.
SnakeDoc
When we are paying for it??
I think EBT should ONLY pay for unprepared starches, vegetables, and non-premium cuts of meat. It has nothing to do with nutrition and everything to do with expectation.
If someone wants to improve their lot and eat lobster, they can start working for it. There is no better incentive than diet.
I wonder if the EBT cards could bear the recipient’s name, and then require photo ID when it is used? That might at least eliminate the sale of the cards.
Whether and how the EBT cards are limited is a little harder question. On one hand I am for liberty, but in the case of EBT cards, the recipients have proven that they cannot handle liberty, at least as to financial matters, especially when they want to use the cards for tobacco, alcohol and other luxuries.
My family had to receive welfare assistance for a very short time after my mother left my father (she kept children in our home as our only income). I remember going downtown monthly to get the government cheese, etc. It was embarrassing— as it should be. It was the impetus for hard work in school and a desire to do what was necessary to earn a decent living.
Spot on, Buckwheat.
And the thing that’s going to bring this whole house of cards down is runaway inflation.
At its most fundamental level, money is supposed to represent the value of goods and services. True barter is an extremely cumbersome way for people to get what they want or need. The purpose of money is to facilitate the trade of these goods and services between the people who produce them.
The problem is that our government is flat-out GIVING money, in ever-increasing amounts, to people who are producing NOTHING.
The effect on our currency is a steady erosion of its value.
Under Obama, this process has rapidly accelerated and those on fixed incomes are now getting hammered by skyrocketing food and gas prices.
Other prices are steadily rising, as well. The only life vest we have right now is cheap imports, and that will go by the wayside as our currency continues to decline in real value.
At that point, no other countries will lend us any more money to support these massive welfare programs and everything will come crashing down upon us.
If Barack Obama is re-elected, financial collapse and runaway inflation will follow. The first victims will be senior citizens.
Andrea Taber: the Tea Party’s Rosa Parks?
God bless her.
Yeah, when we pay for it. I’m open to the argument that we shouldn’t pay for it. But, once we do, I don’t think we need to monitor exactly what people are eating.
If they have $200 in welfare, it doesn’t matter to me if they buy all junk food, or lobster, or bare essentials — $200 is $200 is $200. Costs me the same either way. Let ‘em starve because they spent their whole check on one meal, or get fat because they bought a bunch of sugary junk, or whatever. I just don’t care if welfare queens eat healthy. Cut benefits to $100, or $0, if you want ... but using the manpower to police people’s diet is just a waste of time.
Make sure they’re using it on food — not strippers, or drugs, or cigarettes, or booze, or whatever — and let ‘em be. We can monitor diet. We have the right to monitor diet. I just don’t think its worth the time or energy.
SnakeDoc
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