Governor of Oregon on food stamps

Tweet

Earlier this week, the Governor of Oreegon went shopping with food stamps to raise the awareness of how tough it is to buy groceries when you are on food stamps. His limit was $21.00 for the week. I don't know if oregon issues food stamps weekly, but I thought most states do it monthly, which, causes its own share of budgeting problems. While I don't question the difficulties of buying groceries with food stamps, I do question some of the observations the governor made while grocery shopping. Such comments included disappointment that he could not buy organic bananas, so he had to settle for regular bananas, that he couldn't buy Progresso brand soup, so he had to buy Cup O' Noodles, that he couldn't buy his favorite brand of peanut butter. ?? was my reaction. I'm not on public assistance, yet I buy products on sale, use coupons (which the governor apparently did not), forego my favorite brands because others are on sale. To me, it's common sense that when you have a limited amount to spend, you stretch that dollar to buy the most it can buy. And especially if you are on public assistance, you have a responsibility to be responsible to spend wisely. Not to sound mean, but beggers can't be choosers. Whether or not Oregon should increase its food stamp amount isn't my issue here, but the amount should not be determined by how much an affluent spendthrift spends, but rather how much a person who uses the assistance wisely will need to purchase groceries for the week or the month.