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  1. #1
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    Ryan wants passage in June

    There will be lots of nasty stuff for Americans and plenty of great stuff for the oligarchy, so let's get started.

    House Republican Farm Bill Will Hurt People With Disabilities and Older Adults

    threatens to compound the hardships faced by millions of disadvantaged Americans by substantially increasing hunger and food insecurity for those who rely on food assistance from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).

    The bill’s effects would be especially severe for those with disabilities and for older adults—

    both of whom disproportionately struggle in the labor market.

    just 31.6 percent of adults with disabilities ages 25 to 64 participate in the labor force—compared with 81.7 percent of their nondisabled peers—and this group is nearly three times more likely to be unemployed.

    labor market participation among adults ages 50 to 59 is 75.3 percent, nearly 7 percentage points lower than that of people ages 25 to 49.

    Furthermore, this demographic is disproportionately likely to experience long-term unemployment—that is, unemployment for six months or longer.

    And since the risk of disability
    rises precipitously with age, there is considerable overlap between these two populations.

    people with disabilities and older adults—will not lose benefits as a result of the Farm Bill’s provisions, the proposed bill is a recipe for disaster for people who rely on SNAP to afford groceries, particularly people with disabilities and older adults.

    the bill would greatly intensify SNAP’s so-called work requirements, which function as strict time limits on SNAP benefits for millions of unemployed and underemployed workers.

    In addition, the Farm Bill may also lead to an increase in illnesses linked to malnutrition, as has recently happened in
    the
    United Kingdom.

    disability status is a major predictor of whether a household faces food insecurity.
    Living with a disability often entails substantial extra costs, which may put a significant strain on household budgets and decrease the disposable income available to purchase food,

    at least a quarter of SNAP beneficiaries—roughly
    11 million individuals—have one or more disabilities, and many more individuals who participate in SNAP experience disabilities that are not officially recognized as such by the program’s rules.

    Harshens already strict time limits

    House Republicans’ draft 2018 Farm Bill attempts to harshen already strict time limits that restrict the amount of time during which certain adults can receive SNAP.

    This rule would thus penalize people with disabilities who, while theoretically exempt from the time limits, are still subject to them in practice. SNAP determines one’s disability status
    primarily based on whether that individual receives payments from Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) or Supplemental Security Income (SSI).

    However, it is notoriously difficult to qualify for these programs: Fewer than
    4 in 10 SSDI applicants are approved, even after multiple levels of appeal; and

    the waitlists for these programs number in the millions, with
    thousands of applicants dying before receiving benefits.

    The proposed legislation seeks to subject even more individuals to those rules,
    expandingthem to older adults ages 50 to 59 as well as adults caring for children ages 6 and older.

    By 2026, the proposed bill’s
    new ruleswould also require these individuals to work not 20 but 25 hours per week in order to avoid a lockout period that would cut off their SNAP eligibility for an entire year.

    Any individuals who are twice unable to meet the requirements under the proposed Farm Bill could face a lockout period of three full years.

    Both older adults and people with disabilities already face significant labor market disadvantages that make it difficult for them to find suitable jobs. For people over age 50, age discrimination poses significant workforce obstacles; not only are older job seekers
    less likely to be hired, they are also more likely to be laid off or even fired as a result of age discrimination and to experience long-term unemployment.


    Eliminates “heat and eat” for most families

    The draft Farm Bill threatens to cut benefits for certain SNAP households that pay out-of-pocket utility expenses—many of which have a member with a disability.

    Creates bureaucratic hurdles that are especially burdensome for people with disabilities

    The proposed Farm Bill would force SNAP recipients to fill out an onslaught of paperworkin order to track and report their work-related activity from month to month. Currently, most states request paperwork along these lines every six months. For individuals who fail to properly submit this monthly do entation, sanctions under the draft Farm Bill are particularly punitive: They may lose SNAP benefits for 12 to 36 months.

    Conclusion

    If the 2018 House Farm Bill becomes law, it would increase hunger for the more than two million individuals

    who would lose some or all of their SNAP benefits due to

    new punitive time limits,

    the elimination of administrative simplifications, and

    onerous paperwork requirements.


    People with disabilities and older adults would be particularly affected.

    https://www.americanprogress.org/iss...-older-adults/

    Trash's old, rural, white base is gonna love being screwed by the Repug 2018 Farm Bill



  2. #2
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    Big Business Rules American Agriculture—and Congress Doesn’t Seem to Care

    the 2018 House Farm Bill is silent on steps to enhance compe ion or protect fairness in markets. The bill does nothing to challenge, or even consider, the impacts of consolidation.

    Even worse, the bill has other provisions that inordinately benefit large agricultural firms.

    For example, despite agreement across the
    ideologicalspectrum about the urgent need to solve poorly targeted crop insurance and commodity programs—which are both important drivers of farm consolidation—the House bill does nothing to address it.

    https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/economy/news/2018/05/16/450990/big-business-rules-american-agriculture-congress-doesnt-seem-care/


    So BigAg oligarchy buys the Farm Bill to enrich/empower itself even more, while small/medium farms, iow Trash's base, get screwed.



  3. #3
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    Proposed SNAP Cuts Could Deny Food Assistance to 10,000 in Bexar County


    https://www.sacurrent.com/the-daily/...n-bexar-county

  4. #4
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    How the Farm Bill Could Erode Part of the Affordable Care Act

    is a provision that supporters say could help provide farmers with cheaper, but likely less comprehensive, health insurance than plans offered through the Affordable Care Act.

    It calls for $65 million in loans and grants administered by the Department of Agriculture to help organizations establish agricultural-related "association" type health plans.

    "I don't know that anyone at the Department of Agriculture, with all due respect, knows a darn thing about starting and maintaining a successful insurance company,"

    the Trump administration is soon to finalize new rules widely expected to broaden eligibility while loosening the rules on benefits these plans must include.

    Under that proposal, association plans would not have to offer coverage across 10 broad "essential" categories of care, including hospitalization, prescription drugs and emergency care. They could also spend less premium revenue on medical care.


    Under the farm bill, the secretary of Agriculture could grant up to 10 loans of no more than $15 million each, starting next year, to existing associations whose members are ranchers, farmers or other agribusinesses.

    the focus on association health plans won't go away.

    The plans -- coupled with another Trump administration move to make short-term insurance more widely available --

    could draw healthier people out of the ACA markets,

    leaving the pool of beneficiaries with higher percentages of people who need medical care.

    And that, some say, could drive up premiums for those who remain.

    association plans "threaten the stability of the small group market" and "provide inadequate benefits and insufficient protection to consumers."

    Actuaries
    have made similar arguments.


    Others are concerned about the idea of the government providing funding for such plans.


    "We have reams of experience with AHPs that have gone belly up … and the notion that we should put taxpayer money into them is irresponsible,"

    Of those who buy their own plan, some are facing astronomical premiums and are looking for relief.

    "I can't think of any sector that is affected more by the huge premium increases under Obamacare than farmers and ranchers,"

    http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/4...art-of-the-aca



  5. #5
    I am that guy RandomGuy's Avatar
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    Gotta pay for those tax cuts somehow.

    or, whatever borrow more money from the Chinese.

  6. #6
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    Gotta pay for those tax cuts somehow.

    or, whatever borrow more money from the Chinese.
    that's been the strategy for years. Enrich the rich with huge tax cuts, and cover the deficit by screwing the poor.

    2018 Farm Bill is apparently struggling, but I bet much of the screw-the-poor stuff will be included finally.
    Last edited by boutons_deux; 05-17-2018 at 12:49 PM.

  7. #7
    ( •_•)>⌐■-■ (⌐■_■) AaronY's Avatar
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    Goddamm your nicknames are awful boo

  8. #8
    Garnett > Duncan sickdsm's Avatar
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    Couple thoughts.
    Get the snap,a assistance, etc out of the farm bill. Too much rolled into one. It's been long overdue.

    Affordable Care act was a big You to the farm community. Not an issue because it's limited to mainly white rural folk. Cannot believe that healthy families are paying $15-$25k/year for bull coverage and it hasn't been a major political issue.


    Crop insurance should be over hauled. It's there for stability. Without it you'd have major price swings. But coupled with CRP it's wrecking the landscape. Marginal ground is either broke up and farmed or put into crop (welfare for hunters) instead of using it to what the free market would dictate, pasture, hay, etc.


    I need crop insurance to compete with the govt on renting land. Crp pays well above going rate.
    Many times, hunters buy a chunk of marginal farm ground. Put it into crp. Govt makes their land payment. Bring their buddy's out twice a year to hunt. It's a drain on the rural economy

  9. #9
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    In major embarrassment to GOP, House fails to pass massive Farm Bill in face of conservative Republican showdown

    GOP leaders who were unable to placate conservatives demanding commitments on immigration.

    The outcome exposed the intractable divisions within the GOP conference

    that have bedeviled House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) and will be certain to dog both the top lieutenants trying to replace him, Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.).

    House Democrats abandoned negotiations with Republicans over the food stamp changes

    the changes have little chance of becoming law even if the legislation does pass the House on Friday.

    Those changes are a non-starter in the Senate, which is writing its own farm bill.

    Any legislation that ultimately makes it to President Trump’s desk will have to look more like the Senate version,

    where bipartisan support will be necessary for anything to pass.

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...=.ff75f5dbd0f8

    So the oligarchy's hatchet men, Freedom Kock-us that got Boner to quit, is now kicking Ryan in the nuts as he quits.



  10. #10
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    A House revolt over immigration just killed the farm bill — for now

    Democrats and moderate Republicans dislike the
    harsher work requirements on food stamps in the bill, which experts estimate could amount to more than $20 billion in cuts to the program’s benefits and impact more than 1 million people.

    Conservatives don’t like it because they think those work requirements don’t go far enough.

    Conservative groups like the Heritage Foundation and the Koch-funded Americans for Prosperity came out against the bill ahead of the vote,

    calling it a “missed opportunity” and

    decrying its “wasteful subsidy programs.”

    In the end, it lost 30 Republican votes, killing it altogether.

    But outside the farm bill policy, support for the legislation has been on shaky ground for completely separate reasons: Lawmakers are demanding House leaders do something on immigration.

    Now the revolt over immigration has killed the farm bill.

    House Republicans raised the stakes with leadership over immigration negotiations, threatening the fate of the farm bill.

    conservatives in the Freedom Kock-us want a vote on an immigration proposal by Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-VA), which

    does not include a path to citizenship and

    imposes stricter immigration checks.

    That plan would be dead on arrival in the Senate and

    even unlikely to get enough Republican support in the House to pass.

    Ryan has tried to avoid an immigration debate from the start. In a heated midterm election cycle, the issue is a legislative fight Republican leaders would rather leave untouched.

    “They [would] much rather avoid immigration — it divides the party.”

    https://www.vox.com/2018/5/18/173681...ion-daca-house

    So the Freedom Kock-us wants a more racist, xenophobic immigration bill,

    while other conservatives want a more cruel -the-poor bill.



  11. #11
    I am that guy RandomGuy's Avatar
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    It’s impossible to respect the other side when the other side is comprised of a frothy mix of anti-intellectuals, torch-waving nationalists and witless workaday bumpkins all controlled by a handful of string-pullers at the very top who sit on their piles of money and convince the rest of the lot to march into the voting booth in Nowheresville, Craptucky and punch themselves in their own faces until they fall down dead.

  12. #12
    dangerous floater Winehole23's Avatar
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    even with control of all three branches, GOP can't get anything done unless Dems help.

    pitiful, tbh.

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