Cigarettes and Scatchcards

Back when I used social media, one of the things I saw across most platforms I tried were posts, comments, or Tweets about how people that receive SNAP always buy cigarettes and scratchcards with their food. The kind of person that thinks this is information worth sharing online also thinks that SNAP is what they use to buy those things, so for my sanity, it is physically impossible for SNAP to be spent on cigarettes or scratchcards. An EBT card will only allow SNAP to be spent on items that are marked as food when scanned, and when someone tries to buy both food and non-food products, the card will cover just the food and leave the recipient to cover the rest with a different payment method.

The sentiment that people on welfare make poor choices is incredibly widespread, not just online. Given the current political climate of the US, I probably don't have to tell you that. I can't really talk about how welfare recipients are demonized without mentioning Ronald Reagan and the concept of a "welfare queen," so here's that mention now. The right has always fought to erode any progress towards equity and Reagan's presidency was one of the most successful smear campaigns against welfare in US history. The idea that welfare recipients are lazy at best, fraudsters at worst, is commonplace in American life. It is commonplace to believe that poverty is caused by bad financial choices and that it is bad financial choices that keep someone poor. The perceived need to scrutinize welfare recipients and their choices is so pervasive that almost everyone I've ever known has had some kind of discriminatory belief about them, no matter how progressive they are, even if they themselves are on welfare.

The average person has something they do to unwind at the end of the day. An office worker can come home from their boring job, order a large pizza, and drink a few beers while watching TV without society at large taking issue with it. Is it healthy to drink beer? No, but it's human. Is it a good financial choice to order a pizza you probably won't finish? Maybe not, but it's a choice that people with rights are allowed to make. This hypothetical office worker has the right to make less-than-perfect decisions that sometimes aren't healthy without much if any scrutiny, even if they do it very frequently. Even if the office worker needs to drink beer every night to get by, so long as they keep their job, people don't scoff and Tweet about it when they buy a pack with their groceries.

The scrutiny that welfare recipients face gets justified with the whole "it's my tax dollars" thing, though it's more insidious than that. Progressives won't say this part out loud, but people generally believe that those in poverty need to suffer in order to climb out of this hole they supposedly put themselves in. They believe that, while it's good to help people in need, they should only be given the absolute minimum that is necessary to survive—otherwise, they'll have no reason to improve their financial situation. The amount of benefits welfare recipients make puts them significantly below the poverty line and yet it is still too much when it allows a poor person to afford literally anything that could be enjoyable. What is considered "enjoyable" includes substance dependency, because addiction is seen as overindulgence and/or lacking discipline rather than a maladaptive coping mechanism for chronic stress.

Just like an office worker with a boring job, someone on disability benefits needs a way to unwind at the end of the day. They might struggle home from a doctor's appointment with people giving them dirty looks on the bus because they look "too young" to need a cane. Most of the $967 they make per month goes to rent, utilities, and all the other little cost of living expenses that you don't think much about when you aren't poor, so they can't really order pizza or buy a pack of beers every time they have a bad day, nor do they have a TV to watch at home. When the world is against you and you need to unwind, what's the cheapest vice? When you have almost nothing and you need to feel something, anything, what's the cheapest thrill?

Cigarettes and scratchcards.