So, let’s get this straight: not only must Louisiana taxpayers continue to bestow gifts, but that the receivers get to tell what gifts and in a manner that costs taxpayers even more?
More evidence about just how far off the rails the political left has gone in Louisiana, and America, came at a Louisiana Senate committee hearing last week where it claimed taxpayers should continue to facilitate poorer health outcomes. This came over debate about SB 14 by Republican state Sen. Patrick McMath, a bill that would disallow public schools from serving meals that contain ingredients nutrition experts have identified as encouraging chronically bad health conditions and to start a process to remove soft drinks from eligibility for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program purchases, which also contain some of the cited ingredients.
According to extremely old data, about half of all Louisiana students attend schools qualifying for Title I assistance, meaning eligibility for provision of breakfast and/or lunch for free. About a fifth of Louisianans participate in SNAP, which nationally costs almost $113 billion in 2023.
It makes sense that taxpayers should steer children and families towards healthier alternatives. By definition, qualification for these benefits denotes lower income families participating, who also disproportionally rely upon taxpayer-funded health care. Spending public dollars in a manner that ends up causing more public dollars to be spent dependent upon choices made by those receiving the benefits gift is not only counterintuitive, but wasteful.
Except in the eyes of some committee Democrats. Katrina Jackson-Andrews, for example, moaned about under the bill how parents couldn’t give their children “treats.” Gerald Boudreaux whined that this was too restrictive by government of people’s behavior. This echoed the rhetoric of some interest groups representing vendors of food and drink who also objected to labelling requirements under the law.
You would think the leftists involved would welcome an opportunity to stick it to Big Food and Drink, who they kvetch constantly about over pricing and availability of its products for poorer households. That they maintain the less-productive segment of society has a divine right to purchase whatever they want with the munificence of others betrays they don’t really care about best use of tax dollars or the welfare of clients, but that their main goal is wealth redistribution with no questions asked and no expectations that public assistance be a tool pushing people towards genuine autonomy and independence.
Most nauseating is the attitude that by placing restrictions on purchases, whether through SNAP or choices at the school cafeteria, this somehow stigmatizes beneficiaries. Why would anybody care if someone drank milk in the cafeteria or picks it up at the store, as opposed to soft drinks? And if you’re dumb enough to turn your nose up at free food and drink for which somebody else paid because you took it upon yourself to feel hurt, that’s on you.
Above all, we cannot forget the purpose of assistance is to encourage and cultivate behavior that moves people off of it. For a small segment, bad luck or aging may prevent that progression, but for the remainder assistance policy cannot be formulated around the idea that it’s a kind of no-strings-attached entitled payback of sorts, as the left would have it.
If it’s your money, buy whatever you want on the shelves. But if you’re living off of somebody else’s, you don’t get to make that call. The bill passed committee and heads to the Senate floor, where if anything more restrictions should be requested from the federal government for SNAP use.
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