The general premise of the idea is a good one.  There are plenty of "i's" to be dotted and "T's" to be crossed to make it actually work and do give certain folks a few health-condition-mandated dietary options, but it's a good idea.

Funny sidebar anecdote:
  I happened in a Winn Dixie Sunday night.  I'm normally a Publix or Native Sun guy but I just needed a few basic things.
Only two lanes open to checkout with about 14 carts in line.  
The lady in front of me has a cart piled full of frozen pizzas, breakfast cereal, white bread loaves, ham,  milk, and Pepsi products.
She takes a full 10 minutes to glean every penny from three different EBT cards she has and comes up short.
Then she removes a few products from her cart to void from the sale. (Her friend goes to replace them on shelves but just stacks them on top of the chewing gum in the neighboring lane.)
She's still short $11.
Now she tries two different debit or credit cards to pay that.  Very slowly I might add.
Denied twice.

Then...  get this...  after I've waited nearly twenty minutes to buy 5 things...  she pulls out a fifty!!!

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LOL .... fortunately, your 20 minute wait was made much more tolerable since she looked like this ....

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I'm a pretty staunch Libertarian, but if we're going to have these programs let's make them healthy with little motivation to remain on them.

WIC is already that way. And trust me the government has no idea what 'healthy' is. They simply listen to the biggest brands, that's literally what wic is, a straight up subsidy to Kellogg and General Mills etc. Is frosted mini wheat's healthy, how bout granola, or kix? Well that's what the government says thru wic.

I have an intimate familiarity with the program, and quite frankly WIC is way worse than SNAP. WIC has to have each of its individual products approved except for fruits and vegetables, but they only give you about $14 a month for those. But you get over a hundred dollars for brand name cereals that cost more than the store brands and are not healthy. The only things you can sub out for a store brand is cheese basically.

WIC is basically: Meat, Cheese, Eggs, a tiny amount of fruit and veggies, a bunch of cereal, milk, bad bread, and yogurt. Super carb loaded and meat loaded with a lot of dairy on top. At least SNAP you can spend the whole thing on vegetables if you want. I am in a household that regularly eats a lot of fruits and vegetables, and WIC wouldn't really help that at all, even tho fruits and vegetables are basically the healthiest thing you can eat, but they make up the smallest portion of WIC.

But the bigger reason you don't want to end SNAP is that it is actually one of the best run government programs there is. By simply giving people the funds directly to buy food only at grocery stores its pretty much a direct stimulus of the economy. There isn't a ton of middle men, and as far as government programs go most of the money actually goes where it is supposed to. This is one of the programs that almost all economist agree is the worst one to stop. The government wastes lots of money, SNAP is not one of those programs tho.

That's my impression. As appealing as it would be to force the program be used for healthy foods, to eliminate fraud, and to get the slow SNAP users out of the grocery lines, it would probably increase the cost by a factor of 10 if the feds started micromanaging it.

Your take on WIC being mainly a giveaway to major cereal manufacturers is no surprise. Way too much government spending goes to cronies. The only solution is to severely cut government spending. The odds on that are about the same as my winning the lottery.

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"Why should I give information to you when all you want to do is find something wrong with it?"

But the bigger reason you don't want to end SNAP is that it is actually one of the best run government programs there is. By simply giving people the funds directly to buy food only at grocery stores its pretty much a direct stimulus of the economy. There isn't a ton of middle men, and as far as government programs go most of the money actually goes where it is supposed to. This is one of the programs that almost all economist agree is the worst one to stop. The government wastes lots of money, SNAP is not one of those programs tho.

It's never a good idea to take the choice away from the consumer by giving it to the government.

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'02

But the bigger reason you don't want to end SNAP is that it is actually one of the best run government programs there is. By simply giving people the funds directly to buy food only at grocery stores its pretty much a direct stimulus of the economy. There isn't a ton of middle men, and as far as government programs go most of the money actually goes where it is supposed to. This is one of the programs that almost all economist agree is the worst one to stop. The government wastes lots of money, SNAP is not one of those programs tho.

It's never a good idea to take the choice away from the consumer by giving it to the government.

They ARE NOT CONSUMERS, they are DEPENDENTS. They should have no say in what we buy for them to eat.

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“An empty vessel makes the loudest sound, so they that have the least wit are the greatest babblers.”. - Plato

But the bigger reason you don't want to end SNAP is that it is actually one of the best run government programs there is. By simply giving people the funds directly to buy food only at grocery stores its pretty much a direct stimulus of the economy. There isn't a ton of middle men, and as far as government programs go most of the money actually goes where it is supposed to. This is one of the programs that almost all economist agree is the worst one to stop. The government wastes lots of money, SNAP is not one of those programs tho.

It's never a good idea to take the choice away from the consumer by giving it to the government.

So meet in the middle and file away special dietary needs along with limited choices. If we can have call ahead grocery service for $5, why can't we have local chains receive subsidies to provide a SNAP service in similar fashion? With technology today, changing an old antiquated SNAP function to a more efficient one should be a no brainer.

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Sounds like a program that would be fraught with corruption, inefficiency, and exploitation. 

In other words, indistinguishable from every other program in Washington.

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When you get into the endzone, act like you've been there before.

But the bigger reason you don't want to end SNAP is that it is actually one of the best run government programs there is. By simply giving people the funds directly to buy food only at grocery stores its pretty much a direct stimulus of the economy. There isn't a ton of middle men, and as far as government programs go most of the money actually goes where it is supposed to. This is one of the programs that almost all economist agree is the worst one to stop. The government wastes lots of money, SNAP is not one of those programs tho.

It's never a good idea to take the choice away from the consumer by giving it to the government.

Welfare is not a choice driven program. It's an assistance program the fact that it DOES exist means that choices are being made for the consumer no matter what. At that point make it manageable and cost effective. I'm done paying for Soda, Chips, Microwaveable dinners, and Pop Tarts those are not life sustaining foods.

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But the bigger reason you don't want to end SNAP is that it is actually one of the best run government programs there is. By simply giving people the funds directly to buy food only at grocery stores its pretty much a direct stimulus of the economy. There isn't a ton of middle men, and as far as government programs go most of the money actually goes where it is supposed to. This is one of the programs that almost all economist agree is the worst one to stop. The government wastes lots of money, SNAP is not one of those programs tho.

It's never a good idea to take the choice away from the consumer by giving it to the government.

They are not consumers. The government should have the say in what is used.

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The #1 item purchased with SNAP cards is sugary drinks. I believe 4 of the top 5 items are snack foods with 0 nutritional value.

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