WIC. Whack!

I went to the grocery store at noon hour today to buy my lunch. While I was standing in line I noticed a revised WIC price list posted to the cash register with today's date on it. WIC stands for Women, Infants, Children and is part of the government's food assistance program. This piqued my curiosity so I asked the pimply cashier facing me if food stamp recipients pay a different price for food than those not receiving the benefit. He said no, but if the price on an item is higher than what the government has agreed to pay then the store has to honor the established price, thus the store eats the difference. Further, he says that they don't pay tax on "soda". This got me so incensed that I am compelled to conduct an investigative probe into this program. I despise being ripped off or at least feeling like I am.

Of course the government is tax exempt, that's not what I take umbrage with. What smarts is that we, the taxpayers, are paying almost 60 billion dollars/year for this "nutritional" program and soda (among other sugary, fatty, salty, processed products) is on the approved list? Furthermore, the cost that the grocer "absorbs" obviously gets passed on to the consumer so we're being double dipped! I can see this rant spinning off more times than "All in the Family" so I'll try to stay on point.

The Food & Nutrition Service, according to a publication on its website titled, Food Stamps Make America Stronger, seems genuinely proud that the eligible participant statistic is rising. Reading on they boast that 26 million people, roughly 10% of the population in the richest nation in the world, need welfare to feed themselves. And they congratulate themselves that only about a 1/2 million people receiving the benefit are doing so fraudulently.

I'm not an ogre and do passionately care to help out my brethren in need but as is the case with hand-outs in general it begets a sense of entitlement and may foster unscrupulous behavior, at least by a certain few. This assertion is evidenced by an amusing and disturbing blog posted by a grocery clerk where, assuming he's telling the truth, he relates first-hand experience.

I hope this program "helps" more people than it hurts. At first blush, however, it looks like it hurts the very people it purports to help - in more ways than one.