According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 20 percent of St. Clair County, Illinois residents lived below the national poverty level in 2012.
And minorities in St. Clair County (as usual) were disproportionately impacted, with 40 percent of African Americans (about 32,270) and 27 percent of Hispanics (about 2,500) suffering from economic disenfranchisement. However, only 10 percent of whites (about 41,400) suffered the same plight.
At press time, U.S. House Republicans were preparing to vote to cut food stamps by $40 billion over the next 10 years. These cuts would summarily push about 4-6 million low-income people (including millions of very low-income unemployed parents, who cannot find work) from the SNAP (food stamp) program and create mass hysteria among the poor.
These deep cuts to the food stamp program are being defended by House Republicans like Tim Huelskamp (R-Kansas), who was quoted as saying, “It’s welfare reform 2.0. It’s pretty exciting…I think it’s a very compassionate approach”.
That, of course, is absurd on its face when one considers that every dollar provided for the food stamp program puts $1.70 back into the U.S. economy, according to research done by Moody’s Analytics.
Try explaining Huelskamp’s convoluted logic to a poor black food stamp recipient in “East Boogie” or a poor Hispanic food stamp recipient in Fairmont City, and they will glare at you with the same contempt that I had upon hearing such lunacy.
And with all due respect to all of the commendable local anti-crime efforts by U.S. Attorney Steven Wigginton, if you want to see a major increase in crime, then just let the GOP succeed in passing these senseless cuts and crime will indeed increase; especially in the ‘hood.
The GOP’s budget-cutting measures amount to hurting those who are already hurting the most.
The impact on communities like East St. Louis, Washington Park, Centreville and Alorton would be immediate and immeasurable.
When poor people are forced into a position of desperation, they don’t go to the suburbs to rob, pillage and steal. They will invariably rip-off their neighbors who do work or senior citizens who rely upon fixed income.
The ripple effect will be that those merchants who have set up shop in poor communities will receive less income from the food stamp program and will experience more shoplifting and robberies because some people will do whatever they feel is necessary to feed their families.
This, of course, will burden an already overworked law enforcement community in these disproportionately impacted communities and cause the local merchants to increase the already ridiculously prices of their merchandise in order to compensate for the spike in crime.
Let’s just hope that the U.S. Senate can bring some sanity to this debate and prevent what would surely be an event of devastation and overwhelming suffering to the poor of this nation.
Email: jtingram_1960@yahoo.com; Twitter@JamesTIngram.
