Computer Glitch Blamed For Nationwide EBT System Shutdown On Saturday.

Computer Glitch Blamed For Nationwide EBT System Shutdown On Saturday.(CBS).

BOSTON (CBS/AP) - People in Ohio, Michigan and 15 other states found themselves unable to use their food stamp debit-style cards on Saturday, after a routine test of backup systems by vendor Xerox Corp. resulted in a system failure. At about 9 a.m. Saturday, reports from across the country began pouring in that customers’ EBT cards were not working in stores.

At 2 p.m., an EBT customer service representative told CBS Boston that the system was currently down for a computer system upgrade.

Xerox spokeswoman Jennifer Wasmer released further details later in the afternoon in an emailed statement.

“While the electronic benefits system is now up and running, beneficiaries in the 17 affected states continue to experience connectivity issues to access their benefits. Technical staff is addressing the issue and expect the system to be restored soon,” Wasmer said. “Beneficiaries requiring access to their benefits can work with their local retailers who can activate an emergency voucher system where available. We appreciate our clients’ patience while we work through this outage as quickly as possible.”

Wasmer said the affected states also included Alabama, California, Georgia, Iowa, Illinois, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Maryland, Mississippi, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Texas and Virginia.

U.S. Department of Agriculture spokeswoman Courtney Rowe said the outage is not related to the government shutdown.

Shoppers left carts of groceries behind at a packed Market Basket grocery store in Biddeford, Maine, because they couldn’t get their benefits, said fellow shopper Barbara Colman, of Saco, Maine. The manager put up a sign saying the EBT system was not in use. Colman, who receives the benefits, called an 800 telephone line for the program and it said the EBT system was down due to maintenance, she said.

Oklahoma also runs a separate debit card system for other state benefits like unemployment payments. Those cards can be used at ATMs to withdraw cash. Powell said Xerox administers both the EBT and debit card systems, and they both were down initially.

Like Ohio’s Johnson, Powell said that Oklahoma’s cash debit card system has since been restored, but the EBT cards for the SNAP program were still down. Powell said Oklahoma’s Xerox representative told them that the problems stemmed from a power failure at a data center, and power had been restored quickly.

“It just takes a while to reboot these systems,” she said, adding that she did not know where the data center was located.

The federal EBT website was unavailable due to the government shutdown. Hmmmm........“It just takes a while to reboot these systems,” she said, adding that she did not know where the data center was located.......Don't tell me ......let me guess:$2 Billion NSA Spy Center is Going Up in Flames.

Video - "The Food Stamp Nation"

Source: Zero Hedge
From the art of selling excess food stamp dollars at the end of each month, to JP Morgan profiting from the program as a line of business, Liberty Blitzkrieg’s Mike Krieger introduces the following micro-documentary on the rise of our food stamp nation. Produced by Future Money Trends, this video covers it all, exposing the dismal and far-reaching consequences to society.

Fed Judge Rules Food Stamp Recipients Can Unionize in order to assure an uninterrupted flow of payments should the fed gov be forced to temporarily shut down

Fed Judge Rules Food Stamp Recipients Can Unionize in order to assure an uninterrupted flow of payments should the federal government be forced to temporarily shut down.HT: Cei.org. By William Frezza.

In a surprise ruling, a three judge panel of the Ninth Circus Court of Appeals issued a unanimous opinion supporting the right of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) recipients to unionize in order to assure equitable access to benefits, along with an uninterrupted flow of payments should the federal government be forced to temporarily shut down due to congressional budget stalemates.

"For too long so-called Food Stamp beneficiaries have been denied access to union representation seeking to protect their rights," said Justice Gavin Moore Freestuff. In a sharply worded rebuke to attorneys representing the National Taxpayers Union, which sought to block a ruling by the newly reconstituted National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), Justice Freestuff cited recent court precedents establishing the right of home health care workers, nannies, babysitters, and dog walkers to pay compulsory dues which unions could then use to influence elections.

Under the new rules, if a majority of SNAP recipients in any congressional district signs ballot cards accepting the representation of a federally recognized labor union, all SNAP beneficiaries in that district would have 30 days to voluntarily enroll or lose benefits.
Monthly union dues would then be automatically deducted from recipients' Electronic Benefits Transfer (EBT) cards, minus a small fee for the card processor.

Eyeing 47 million potential new members, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) immediately launched an organizing drive, claiming that since Food Stamp recipients were on the government payroll and contributed just as much to the economy as other government employees, their organization would offer the most appropriate representation.

AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka begged to differ. "Were it not for decades of untiring efforts by our brothers and sisters to drive domestic manufacturers out of the country-or if necessary out of business-there is no way we would have so many Food Stamp recipients today. It is only right that we be allowed to recruit these critical providers of aggregate demand to replenish our dwindling membership."

EBT card processor JPMorgan Chase said it could begin deducting union dues as early as October 1, provided unions selected by cardholders cover a modest fee for software to enable funds to be deposited directly into designated politicians' campaign accounts. JPMorgan Chase stock rose four dollars on the news.
If even half of the nation's SNAP recipients elect to join a union, the $100 per month dues would total approximately half a billion dollars a year. Thanks to the Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling, that money will mostly likely be spent assuring fair and balanced elections, thereby ending gridlock in Washington. The subsequent increase in SNAP benefits that would occur once those goals are achieved would easily cover the monthly deductions.

The Reverend Al Sharpton declared a national day of thanksgiving, organizing candlelight vigils to thank the Court, as well as newly appointed member of the NLRB who made this historic civil rights achievement possible.

In related news, Grover Norquist's doctors at the Bethesda Naval Hospital report he is out of danger and recovering nicely after the heart attack he suffered upon learning of the ruling.
President Obama, stopping to speak to his media entourage from the 16th hole at the exclusive Farm Neck Golf Club on Martha's Vineyard, chose to reflect on the long march toward income equality that this ruling represents. "I promised to spread the wealth around when I ran for president in 2008, and again in 2012 when you reelected me to stay the course. I intend to keep that promise despite the protracted economic turmoil caused by fringe elements of the Republican Party who refuse to take a balanced approach to fiscal policy, not to mention those millionaires and billionaires who will not pay their fair share."
The president then called for a nine-iron, "to finish the job I started."

1/3 Population of Puerto Rico Gets Food Stamps from U.S. Gov’t — $2 Billion in 2012.

1/3 Population of Puerto Rico Gets Food Stamps from U.S. Gov’t — $2 Billion in 2012.(CNSNews).

The federal government spent more than $2 billion to provide food stamps to Puerto Rico in 2012, up to 25 percent of which is untraceable because it is distributed in cash and there is “no way to verify that funds are spent on food,” according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA).

The funds are used to supply more than one-third of the population of Puerto Rico with food stamps.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), the Nutrition Assistance Program (NAP) for Puerto Rico, an unincorporated territory of the United States, received $2 billion in Nutrition Assistance Block Grants in fiscal year 2012.

In contrast, in the United States there are currently 47.7 million Americans on food stamps, representing 15.2 percent of the population of 313.9 million. There is, however, a record one-out-of-five households in the United States receiving food stamps.Read the full story here.

"We don't Need Congress" - Obama Administration Already Tossed the Food Stamp Work Requirement.

"We don't Need Congress" -  Obama Administration Already Tossed the Food Stamp Work Requirement.(Heritage).By Kiki Bradley.The Obama Administration sure is getting defensive about its recent action to waive all work requirements in the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) cash welfare program. But this isn’t the first time or the first program in which Obama Administration policy has undermined work requirements.
The welfare reform of 1996 requires that after three months on food stamps, recipients be engaged in some kind of work activity for at least 20 hours a week. Tucked away in the mammoth 2009 so-called “stimulus” spending bill was the suspension of this requirement for able-bodied adults with no children. The suspension expired on September 30, 2010. His next two budgets then requested that the suspension be extended each year. However, he did not wait for Congress to act on these requests; instead his Department of Agriculture issued waivers to 44 states and the District of Columbia freeing them from implementing the food stamp work requirement.
What has been the result?
The number of able-bodied adults without children on food stamps has doubled, increasing from 1.7 million people in 2009 to 3.9 million in 2010 and costing taxpayers an extra $400 million per year.
It’s not surprising, then, that the work requirements in the TANF program are now on the chopping block. As my colleague Robert Rector points out, liberals have a long history of opposing work requirements in welfare.
The sad outcome of the Obama Administration’s action is that millions of families on welfare will no longer be engaged in job preparation activities to help them enter the workforce and become self-sufficient. Instead, the days that welfare reform was supposed to put behind us—of cutting welfare checks to poor families and forgetting about them—are back. The future for these needy families just got bleaker.Hmmm........Obama: "All the Choices We've Made Have Been the Right Ones"Read the full story here.

Are Corporations and Big Banks Making a Windfall From Food Stamps?

 Are Corporations and Big Banks Making a Windfall From Food Stamps?(AN).By Christopher D. Cook.How much food stamp money are Coca-Cola, General Mills and Walmart getting? The government isn't telling.
Perhaps you've heard: At a time of record need for food assistance among America's poor, the U.S. Senate is poised to cut roughly $4.5 billion from food stamps, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which 46 million Americans -- one in seven of us -- rely upon.
While Congress is obsessed with saving money by cutting assistance to our poorest citizens, there's been nary a peep about how major banks and food corporations profit from food stamps, and what that means for recipients and the rest of the taxpaying public.

With minimal oversight or accountability, banks such as JPMorgan Chase administer SNAP in each state, reaping big contracts that reveal little about how they turn a profit off these public benefits. You'd think the austerity-minded Congress might want to know.

Consider a few facts, revealed in an in-depth report released Tuesday by California-based Eat Drink Politics (of which Michele Simon is president and Christopher Cook a contributing researcher):

• JPMorgan Chase holds contracts in 24 states to administer SNAP benefits, indicating concentrated power and a lack of competition;

• In New York, a seven-year deal originally paid JPMorgan Chase $112 million for EBT services, and was recently amended to add $14.3 million--an increase of 13 percent.

States are seeing unexpected increases in administrative costs, while banks and other private contractors are reaping significant windfalls from the economic downturn and increasing SNAP participation. Although a full national accounting of these contracts is not available from the US Department of Agriculture (which administers SNAP), we know that a handful of corporations fight doggedly for these deals, and they are not in the charity business.

In California, a seven-year contract worth $69 million went to Affiliated Computer Services, a subsidiary of Xerox. In Florida, JPMorgan Chase enjoys a five-year contract worth about $83 million, or $16.7 million a year. Northrop Grumman, of military contracting fame, runs SNAP programs in Illinois and Montana. But how much of this money represents outright profits for these private contractors? And why can't the public know this?

Meanwhile, Walmart and other big supermarket chains are reaping huge, and largely secret, rewards from the food stamp program. Although USDA and state agencies insist that retail revenues from SNAP are confidential information, a couple of earlier investigations revealed the following:

• In one year, nine Walmart Supercenters in Massachusetts together received more than $33 million in SNAP dollars--over four times the SNAP money spent at farmers markets nationwide;

• In two years, Walmart received about half of the $1 billion in SNAP expenditures in Oklahoma.

How much more food stamp money is Walmart getting across the country? We don't know, because USDA and state agencies refuse to release this information. We also have no clue how much money the likes of Coca-Cola, Kraft, and General Mills make from SNAP. 

The feds don't even bother to collect that data, despite a national epidemic of diet-related chronic diseases fueled in part by your tax dollars. Then add healthcare on top of that.

But one area of profit from food stamps is quite transparent: food corporations and industry groups have been lobbying intensely to make sure that junk food such as candy and soda can be purchased using SNAP. As New York City and nine states have pushed for health-based reforms to limit such purchases, these industry lobbies have pushed back hard to protect their pot of gold. Powerful food industry lobbying groups such as the American Beverage Association and the Snack Food Association teamed up to oppose health-oriented improvements to SNAP, at times working with anti-hunger groups. Strange bedfellows?

Yet in the farm bill being hashed out on the Senate floor this week, we see the exact opposite: a prevailing move to cut assistance to the poor, while expanding "crop insurance" (essentially a stand-in for much-maligned subsidies) for agribusiness. 

Is the Senate really this blind to the realities on the ground--and to the consequences of the farm bill they are slouching toward? Instead of cutting nutrition assistance to the poor, Congress should demand full transparency to determine how much corporations are profiting from food stamps. And then, if they still feel compelled to cut, they can start by cutting corporate profit margins.

Don't just take our word for it. Listen to Anthony Smukall, a SNAP participant living in Buffalo, New York, where he says his fellow residents are "facing cuts year after year, with no sustainable jobs to be able to get off of programs such as SNAP."

Smukall insists, "Transparency should be mandatory. The people have a right to know where our money is going, plain and simple." He adds: "JPMorgan is shaking state pockets, which then rolls down to every taxpaying citizen. I am disgusted with the numbers in this report, it is unimaginable. If the people knew how such programs were run, and how money is taken in by some of the world's conglomerates, there would be outrage on a grand scale."  Read the full story here.

Record Number Of US Households On Foodstamps, 79K increase in the month of March.

Record Number Of US Households On Foodstamps, 79K increase in the month of March.(ZH).Last month, when the USDA released the latest foodstamps numbers for the month of February, there was some hope that following a third month of declines, we may just have seen the peak of US foodstamp usage and going forward we would only see the number decline.
Sadly, the latest numbers refutes this: in March a total of 46,405,204 persons were at or below poverty level and thus eligible for foodstamps, a 79K increase in the month. Yet while many individuals have learned to game the system, and this numbers at the peak may fluctuate, when it comes to the far more comprehensive and difficult to fudge “households on foodstamps” number, there was no confusion: at 22,257,647, the number of US households receiving the “SNAP treatment” rose to an all time high, even as the benefit per household dropped to the second lowest ever. At least all these impoverished believers in hope and change have FaceBook IPO profits to look forward to. Oh wait.Read the full story here.

Obama Gets a Disastrous Jobs Report, people Not In Labor Force Soar By 522,000.

Obama Gets a Disastrous Jobs Report, people Not In Labor Force Soar By 522,000. (WHD)(ZH).The Labor Department just reported that payrolls rose by 115,000 workers in April, a shockingly low number that signals continued serious economic weakness. Economists had expected about 170,000 workers to be hired, an amount that itself would have done little more than kept the economy on pace for sluggish growth. With the number coming in at only 115,000 – the smallest amount in six months – it appears the unemployment rate may be eventually headed back up and the slow 2.2 percent growth of the first quarter 2012 may be imperilled. The rate declined for now to 8.1 percent, but that was at least partly because 342,000 people left the workforce. Normally the economy needs to create about 150,000 jobs a month to keep unemployment from rising. The decline in unemployment may also reflect that March hiring was revised upward from 120,000 to 154,000, while February’s was revised up to 259,000 from 240,000. But the trend is clearly downward. This is a huge setback for the president, and if things don’t improve soon, a very bad omen for his reelection prospects. They’ll spin the 8.1 percent number at the White House, but they know they have a problem. At this point in a recovery, the economy should be pumping out jobs. Something is very wrong, and the president, who today will be speaking in Virginia about relative trivia like the student loan rate, has no idea what to do about it.
People Not In Labor Force Soar By 522,000, Labor Force Participation Rate Lowest Since 1981.it is just getting sad now. In April the number of people not in the labor force rose by a whopping 522,000 from 87,897,000 to 88,419,000. This is the highest on record. The flip side, and the reason why the unemployment dropped to 8.1% is that the labor force participation rate just dipped to a new 30 year low of 64.3%. Hmmmmm.......I wonder by how much the number of food stamp users went up?Read and see the full story here and here.

Record 5.4 Million workers and their dependents have signed up For Disability Under Obama

Record 5.4 Million workers and their dependents have signed up For Disability Under Obama.(M).A record 5.4 million workers and their dependents have signed up to collect federal disability checks since President Obama took office, according to the latest official government data, as discouraged workers increasingly give up looking for jobs and take advantage of the federal program. This is straining already-stretched government finances while posing a long-term economic threat by creating an ever-growing pool of permanently dependent working-age Americans. Since the recession ended in June 2009, the number of people who’ve signed up for disability benefits is twice the job growth figure. (See chart.)
In just the first four months of this year, 539,000 joined the disability rolls and more than 725,000 put in applications. As a result, by April there were 10.8 million people on disability, according to Social Security Administration data released this week.
Even after accounting for all those who’ve left the program - mainly because they hit retirement age or died - that’s up 53% from a decade ago. To be sure, disability rolls have grown steadily as a share of the workforce since the 1990s. The main causes of this broader trend, according to a study by economists David Autor and Mark Duggan, are the loosening of eligibility rules by Congress in 1984, the rise in disability benefits relative to wages, and the fact that more women have entered the workforce, making them eligible for disability. Their research found that the aging of the population has contributed only modestly to the program’s growth. But the big factor in the recent surge is the slow pace of the economic recovery after the severe recession. That has kept the unemployment rate above 8% and created an enormous pool of long-term unemployed and discouraged workers. More than 5 million people have been jobless for 27 weeks or more, nearly twice the previous high set in 1983, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. “We see a lot of people applying for disability once their unemployment insurance expires,” said Matthew Rutledge, a research economist at Boston College’s Center for Retirement Research. The number of applications last year was up 24% compared with 2008, Social Security Administration data show. As the Congressional Budget Office explained : “When opportunities for employment are plentiful, some people who could quality for (disability insurance) benefits find working more attractive … when employment opportunities are scarce, some of these people participate in the DI program instead.”Hmmmm...........Must be the $$ 'Green jobs' he created?Read the full story here.