Food-Stamp use starting to fall, By Neil Shah, September 1, 2014, Wall Street Journal: “After soaring in the years since the recession, use of food stamps, one of the federal government’s biggest social-welfare programs, is beginning to decline. There were 46.2 million Americans on food stamps in May, the latest data available, down 1.6 million from a record 47.8 million in December 2012. Some 14.8% of the U.S. population is on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, down from 15.3% last August, U.S. Department of Agriculture data show…”
Tag: Recession
Wage Stagnation
This is why it feels like the recession never ended, By Christopher Ingraham, August 28, 2014, Washington Post: “Take a look at this chart. It shows everything you need to know about why Americans are still so down on the economy. From the start of the recession in 2007 to today, the average price of the things you buy – clothes, food, housing – has risen by 15 percent. This, in itself, isn’t a problem at all. The problem is that wages haven’t kept pace with that increase. In fact, for all but the top wage earners, real (inflation-adjusted) earnings are actually down over the same period…”
SNAP and Underemployment
Food stamp use shows continued ‘underemployment’ pain, By Tim Henderson, August 15, 2014, USA Today: “Luxuries were affordable for Linda Fish before she lost her job in retail management in 2009. ‘I won’t lie. The dinners out, the perfect martinis, the salon visits with a master stylist, and the rooms at nice hotels when I was too lazy or tired to do the long commute home—these things I could afford and they made me very, very happy,’ the Chicago resident wrote on her blog soon after she became unemployed. But in the years after she lost her job, Fish “learned to stop worrying and love minimum wage.” She gained a new appreciation for beans, pasta, and oatmeal when she took a $9 per hour job as a bookstore clerk. It was a shock…”