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Some 70% of households that relied on food stamps last year had no earned income, a new report shows. Click here for an interactive map. More than 40 million individuals and nearly 19 million households tapped the food stamp program in 2010, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. While the recession technically ended in 2009, a sluggish economic recovery left millions out of work or underemployed and leaning on the government for assistance last year. The Agriculture Department’s annual snapshot on the characteristics of food stamp households, released Friday, shows that seven in 10 households receiving food stamps had...

(CNN) -- That is the reality for the more than 40 million Americans who rely on food stamps. According to the Food Research and Action Center the average food stamp allotment is just $30 per week. I began thinking about taking a food stamp challenge earlier this month when I met several women who we profiled on hunger for two CNN stories airing this week. These women had to make tough choices between paying bills and buying food. Often they skipped meals so their children could eat. Often the amount of food stamps they received was not enough. Living on...

With a two-year budget of more than $22 billion in state and federal funds, the Human Services Department is involved in the lives of more than a million Minnesotans who rely on state programs for health care, food support, welfare, mental health treatment, home care, nursing homes and child care aid. The agency also licenses 24,000 medical and social service providers.

In an ever-growing number of states, if you crave a taco or fried chicken from a fast-food restaurant, you can pay for it with food stamps. Food stamps - known more formally as the USDA’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program - have been in use for grocery staples, such as bread and milk, since 1934, but now, for the first time, they can be used for fast food in four states across the country. The number of businesses – including convenience and discount stores, gas stations and pharmacies – that have been approved to accept food stamps has increased by a...

... Meet the members of what might be called Generation Limbo: highly educated 20-somethings, whose careers are stuck in neutral, coping with dead-end jobs and listless prospects. And so they wait: for the economy to turn, for good jobs to materialize, for their lucky break. Some do so bitterly, frustrated that their well-mapped careers have gone astray. Others do so anxiously, wondering how they are going to pay their rent, their school loans, their living expenses — sometimes resorting to once-unthinkable government handouts. “We did everything we were supposed to,” said Stephanie Morales, 23, who graduated from Dartmouth College in...

Jobs have fled, lawbreaking hasn’t risen—and criminologists are scratching their heads.During the seventies and eighties, scarcely any newspaper story about rising crime failed to mention that it was strongly linked to unemployment and poverty. The argument was straightforward: if less legitimate work was available, more illegal work would take place. Certain scholars agreed. Economist Gary Becker of the University of Chicago, a Nobel laureate, developed a powerful theory that crime was rational—that a person will commit crime if the expected utility exceeds that of using his time and other resources in pursuit of alternative activities, such as leisure or legitimate...

It was the first Monday of the month, and a line numbering more than a hundred spilled from the doors of the District's largest food stamp office and down the sidewalk nearly a half-block to the corner of Seventh and H streets NE. Children darted among the adults as the procession moved at a funereal pace toward the building -- a 10-minute walk from the U.S. Capitol -- where food stamps are dispensed. The hustlers who trade drugs, stolen goods and cash for food stamps waited patiently outside for people to emerge clutching books of stamps. "For a $65 book,...

A former state welfare worker has been charged in a $1.3 million scam for stealing personal information to get food stamps, which she traded for cash. Meera Khan's indictment on Thursday culminates a two-year investigation. She faces numerous charges including grand theft and racketeering which she allegedly committed while working with the Department of Children and Families. According to the indictment, Khan used welfare victims' personal information to obtain food stamps. She conspired with "unscrupulous businesses" to convert the food stamps to cash and collected insurance premiums and other fees for processing food stamp benefits.

Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day.

Genna Saucedo supervises cashiers at a Wal-Mart in Pico Rivera, California, but her wages aren't enough to feed herself and her 12-year-old son. Saucedo, who earns $9.70 an hour for about 26 hours a week and lives with her mother, is one of the many Americans who survive because of government handouts in what has rapidly become a food stamp nation. Altogether, there are now almost 46 million people in the United States on food stamps, roughly 15 percent of the population. That's an increase of 74 percent since 2007, just before the financial crisis and a deep recession led...

'Big Beautiful' fans helping her in her bid Her 4,900 calorie main course at dinner consists of 12 filled tacos Obese model Susanne Eman is saying 'Supersize Me' for real - in her bid to become the fattest woman ever. The 52-stone bombshell aims to reach a whopping 115 stone, or 1,600lb, by guzzling at least 20,000 calories a day. Susanne, 32, from Arizona, USA, hopes to pass the half-way milestone of 57 stones by the end of the year. And Susanne - who is creating a stir among fans of 'Super Size Big Beautiful Women' (SSBBWs) - plans to...

A national poll has found that approximately 25 percent of Springfield households with children report a hardship in affording food. The report by the Food Research and Action Center, based in Washington, D.C., ranks the Springfield metropolitan area as having the 37th highest “food hardship” rate among the 100 largest metropolitan statistical areas in the country. The rankings are based on data gathered in 2009 and 2010 as part of the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index project, the center reported. “The food hardship rates in Springfield for households with or without children are unconscionable,” said Andrew Morehouse, executive director of The Food...

Obama Agriculture Secretary: Food Stamps Create Jobs Tuesday, August 16, 2011 By Matt Cover (CNSNews.com) – Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack repeated the White House claim that food stamps and other forms of government welfare are stimulus programs in disguise, stating that when government gives out money, it is creating jobs. “But I should point out that when you talk about the SNAP program or the food stamp program, you have to recognize that it’s also an economic stimulus,” Vilsack said Tuesday on MSNBC’s Morning Joe program. (SNAP is the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.) “If people are able to buy a...

Obama's Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack: "Well, obviously, it's putting people to work. Which is why we're going to have some interesting things in the course of the forum this morning. Later this morning, we're going have a press conference with Secretary Mavis and Secretary Chu to announce something that's never happened in this country -- something that we think is exciting in terms of job growth. I should point out, when you talk about the SNAP program or the foot stamp program, you have to recognize that it's also an economic stimulus. Every dollar of SNAP benefits generates $1.84...

Obama's Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack: "Well, obviously, it's putting people to work. Which is why we're going to have some interesting things in the course of the forum this morning. Later this morning, we're going have a press conference with Secretary Mavis and Secretary Chu to announce something that's never happened in this country -- something that we think is exciting in terms of job growth. I should point out, when you talk about the SNAP program or the foot stamp program, you have to recognize that it's also an economic stimulus. Every dollar of SNAP benefits generates $1.84...

Tom Vilsack, President Obama's Secretary of Agriculture, appeared on MSNBC and said that foodstamps are putting people to work and are acting as an 'economic stimulus'. Vilsack said: "Well, obviously, it's putting people to work. Which is why we're going to have some interesting things in the course of the forum this morning. Later this morning, we're going have a press conference with Secretary Mavis and Secretary Chu to announce something that's never happened in this country -- something that we think is exciting in terms of job growth. I should point out, when you talk about the SNAP program...

The scenes from London aren't far off folks. Prepare now.

AUGUST 15, 2011 Immigration Audits Drive Illegal Workers Underground BY MIRIAM JORDAN MINNEAPOLIS—In 2009, Alba and Eugenio were making almost twice the federal minimum wage, plus benefits, cleaning a skyscraper for a national janitorial company. With two toddlers, the Mexican couple enjoyed relative prosperity in a tidy one-bedroom duplex in a working-class neighborhood here. Late that year, federal agents audited employee records of ABM Industries Inc., forcing it to shed all the illegal workers on its payrolls in the Twin Cities. Among them was the couple, undocumented immigrants who had worked at ABM for more than a decade.

The purpose of this website is to expose waste, fraud, and abuse within our food assistance programs. Our intention is not to harass those people who legitimately need help, but to expose those who are committing fraud or abusing this safety net for personal gain at the expense of hard working tax payers. Our goal is to bring to light and hopefully reduce the abuse occurring with our food assistance programs. In doing so we hope that State food assistance funds will be available to those who truly need the assistance and unavailable for those who do not need it...

NEW YORK—American consumers can expect bigger grocery bills in 2012, even as commodity prices are forecast to fall. (snip) In a recent report, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said grocery-store prices will likely rise 3% to 4% in 2012, on par with this year, even though ingredient costs may fall. The biggest increases would likely be in the first half of next year, but prices would most likely ease later in 2012, said USDA economist Richard Volpe.