/poverty/ - Poverty & Thrift

No idea about creditors, but I doubt employers are allowed to pry into that sort of information about you without your consent.

I tried to get food stamps but was unable to because I didn't have a mail box where I lived. But if it weren't for that obstacle I think I would have gotten them and it really would have helped me out alot, I probably wouldn't have gone broke and been forced to move. I was able to get state healthcare though and that really helped me, when I was very sick. I didn't have to pay for the doctor visit (it was urgent care so would have been in the hundred range) but I do think I had to pay $100 for the antibiotics.

Why feel ashamed about it? If you're not scamming the system, if you're actually below the poverty line, then you are simply signing up for something that was designed to help someone in your exact position. Taxes you have paid in the past or will pay in the future went to funding things like this. It's your right to benefit from it if you need it. Pop culture and media has led public opinion to feel like anyone who gets welfare is some kind of lazy scammer, when in reality they are probably just someone who makes minimum wage.


Some info:
http://www.statisticbrain.com/welfare-statistics/

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/08/just-how-wrong-is-conventional-wisdom-about-government-fraud/278690/?single_page=true
>the majority of welfare fraud is committed not by recipients of welfare, but by managers and government officials misappropriating the funds

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/new-face-food-stamps-working-age-americans-0
>Food stamp participation since 1980 has grown the fastest among workers with some college training
>The findings coincide with the latest economic data showing workers' wages and salaries growing at the lowest rate relative to corporate profits in U.S. history.

http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/7Welfare.htm

Can anyone from the USA share their stories of getting welfare/food assistance? How did it go down?

Easy, no stigma except the occasional conservative retard. And no it can't.

>>483
You apply online. Get a cell phone call a few days later. They ship you a card with a pin. Load food stamps on it. You shop.

Medical assistance is the same, just a different card.

OP, if you don't have dependent children, you won't get any assistance at all unless you're disabled.

Unless you happen to live in the bluest of blue states, you're screwed if you're single.

>>618
i got it and im single… but im in california

>walk into office
>file papers
>sit down for 30 minutes
>leave with $600 worth of ebt

Yeah it's easy as fuck.

>>620
But I'm talking about normal states. California gives freebies to anybody who walks into a welfare office.

>>657
>ohio
>friend was single, got 200/month (which is supposedly the average)
>pregnant living with the father we got like 320
>kid born 350
you can apply online and do a phone interview but we applied at the office (not really a stigma everyone else is as broke as you)
in store not a huge deal, cashiers have to hit an extra button so if you dont want to double swipe, flash the card and theyll be discreet. i dont get embarrassed so i just tell them its EBT.
ive only had issues a couple times and it was a mixture of using WIC (no card annoying checks that take 10 minutes), at a store with one lane open at 11 pm (one car with him working 2nd shift) and living in a college town with half the line hammered already.
if you go to a store in a "poorer" area or one with "poor" employees (marcs, aldys, walmart) theyll bitch about how they cant buy monster on their EBT.
i was also raised conservative and still am. i believe social welfare is a good thing its just abused far too much. were making ends meet, not buying a new caddy.