Food stamps are welfare, but farm aid isn't?

By The Des Moines Register

----

Iowa pays close attention to the farm bill moving through Congress for an obvious reason: This is an agricultural state, and the bill provides financial subsidies to farmers.

However, it is just as important because it funds food assistance (what used to be known as food stamps) that help about 190,000 Iowans buy food each month. About half the recipients are children. Now, Washington lawmakers are considering bills that would chop away at this important program for low-income Americans.

Last week, the Senate passed a version of the farm bill that cuts $4.1 billion from food stamps over the next 10 years. A House version would cut about $20 billion. House Republicans seem more focused on maintaining - or even expanding - assistance to farmers, while reducing it to low-income people. That is difficult to stomach.

While lawmakers need to balance the federal budget, helping people secure the most basic need is the right thing for the government to do. And low-income Iowans are hardly receiving a windfall of money, with an average monthly benefit being about $122.

Yet, if Congress can't find it in its heart to help average people eat, perhaps they can muster the will to maintain funding for the program to help the economy.

Cuts to food stamps will hurt businesses. The $4 received by an eligible Iowan each day is used to purchase food - including food grown by Iowa farmers and sold by Iowa grocery stores. Less money for consumers ultimately translates into less revenue for businesses. Food assistance stimulates the economy.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture calculates that $5 spent on food generates $9.20 in local and state economic activity. An evaluation of federal stimulus spending by the Congressional Budget Office found food assistance was among the efforts that provided the greatest boost to the economy.

Of course, some members of Congress refuse to acknowledge this. These are some of the same members who consider food assistance a form of “welfare,” but would never attach such an ugly term to the taxpayer subsidies given to farmers. Perhaps that's because some members of Congress are recipients of the subsidies themselves.

The Environmental Working Group's 2013 update of its farm subsidy database shows 15 members of Congress or their spouses benefited from taxpayer-funded payments last year. They included Sen. Chuck Grassley, who owns a farm in Butler County and received nearly $10,000 in direct and conservation payments.

Not a single member of Congress is eligible for food assistance. As they work through negotiations on the farm bill, perhaps each of them should try to eat on $4 per day. This might provide the insight they appear to desperately need.