When you think about who is going to be hit the hardest by pollution, whether it’s conventional air water and soil pollution or climate change, it is very often low-income communities and communities of color. The undercutting of these kinds of protections is going to have a disproportionate impact on these very same communities.
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Department of Agriculture
largely hidden. There are means-tested food-support programs in the USDA (specially FNS), whereas most means-tested programs are at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). All means-tested antipoverty programs should be overseen by one department—specifically HHS, which handles most welfare programs.
Reform SNAP. Ostensibly, SNAP sends money through electronic-bene
fit-transfer (EBT) cards to help “low-income” individuals buy food. It is the largest of the federal nutrition programs. Food stamps are designed to be supplemented by
other forms of income—whether through paid employment or nonprofit support. SNAP serves 41.1 million individuals—an increase of 4.3 million people during the Biden years.* In 2020, the food stamp program cost $79.1 billion. That number continued to rise—by 2022, outlays hit $119.5 billion.*°
The next Administration should:
Re-implement work requirements. The statutory language covering food stamps allows states to waive work requirements that otherwise apply to work-capable individuals—that is, adult beneficiaries between the ages 18 and 50 who are not disabled and do not have any children or other dependents in the home.*”
Even in a strong economy, work expectations are fairly limited: Individuals who are work-capable and without dependents are required to work or prepare for work for 20 hours per week.** The work requirements are then implemented unless the state requests a waiver from the USDA’s Food and Nutrition Services.*? Waivers from statutory work requirements can be approved in two instances: an unemployment rate of more than 10 percent or a lack of sufficient jobs.
The Trump Administration bolstered USDA work expectations in the
food stamp program. In February 2019, FNS issued a modest regulatory change that applied only to able-bodied individuals without dependents— beneficiaries aged 18 to 49, not elderly or disabled, who did not have children or other dependents in the home (ABAWD).°! The FNS rule changed
when a state could receive a waiver from implementing the ABAWD work requirement.
Under the new rule, in order to waive the work requirement, the state’s unemployment rate had to be above 6 percent for more than 24 months. The rule also defined “area” in such a way that states would be unable to combine non-contiguous counties in order to maximize their waivers. Of