The Patriot Post® · Wednesday Opinion
Best of Right Opinion
- Ben Shapiro: The Day the Iran Deal Died
- Marc A. Thiessen: Gina Haspel Is Too Qualified to Pass Up
- Byron York: Time to End the Crazy Secrecy of Trump-Russia Investigation
- Star Parker: Draining the Food Stamp Swamp
- Walter Williams: Before and After Welfare Handouts
For more of today’s columns, visit Right Opinion.
Opinion in Brief
Star Parker: “As we might expect, food stamp enrollees skyrocketed as the recession set in heavily in 2008. The number of recipients went from approximately 26 million in 2007 to a peak of 47.6 million in 2013. With the economic recovery, the number has dropped off to about 43 million. The Labor Department now reports that unemployment has fallen to 3.9 percent — the lowest since December 2000. Unemployment peaked during the recession at almost 10 percent. Why, when unemployment has dropped by 61 percent, has the number of food stamp recipients dropped by only 10 percent? The number of recipients is about 17 million higher than before the recession. The answer is that it’s a lot easier to get aid recipients onto a welfare program than get them off. Although the unemployment rate has dropped dramatically, the employment rate — the percentage of the population over 16 working — is still far below where it was prior to the recession. The latest jobs report shows the employment rate at 60.3 percent. Just prior to the recession in 2007, it was at 63.4 percent. If today’s employment rate stood where it was before the recession, there would be eight million more Americans working. These eight million Americans are not sitting on the sidelines just because of food stamps. Disability insurance and other welfare programs also leave the door open to not working. How to solve this problem? Start with the Reagan rule: ‘Government is not the solution to our problem; government IS the problem.’”