SNAP dollars are easy target for scammers

When you use your EBT/ SNAP card to pay for groceries, you learn that it has only $6 on it. A scammer has hacked into your card. The program will pay you about half of the money stolen but not for 10 days.

YOU

• Go to food pantries as often as you can without missing work. 

• Skip meals so that your kids don’t go hungry as much as they would.

Wait what? You can only get back half the money? Everyone who has a credit or debit card gets back all (or nearly all) of the money when they report their card as stolen or hacked. Not so with Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) cards. Federal law caps the amount returned to scam victims at two months’ benefits. 

Thanks to SNAP/ EBT cards’ outdated technology, they are easier to hack than regular cards. SNAP cards have only a magnetic stripe and the account number, while most credit and debit cards have chips that encrypt the account information. 

The good news is that SNAP reaches 82% of eligible families nationwide. This is hugely successful, compared to Temporary Aid to Needy Famlies (TANF) which reaches only 26% of the eligible people. 

The bad news is that the SNAP expects families receiving benefits to spend 30 percent of their net income on food. (The SNAP benefit is reduced by 30% of whatever income the family earns.) On average, families in the U.S. spend 11% of their net income on food. With food taking up (eating up?) such a large share, other important things are crowded out like transportation, clothes, and health. 

These built-in hardships make getting out of poverty harder. For example, studying for a degree while battling chronic hunger or counting on an unreliable car is not feasible. No one functions well or has complete command of their mental resources in hunger.  

Let’s commit to doing better. As Donna Beegle says, “Fight poverty, not the people in it.”