- The federal government administers nearly 80 different overlapping federal means-tested welfare programs. Social Security and Medicare are not part of this category and not included in the figures in this chart.
- This data from the U.S. Census’s Survey of Income and Program Participation shows that nearly 110,000 million individuals received a welfare benefit in 2011. (These figures do not include other means-tested benefits such as the Earned Income Tax Credit or the health insurance premium subsidies included in the President’s health care law. CBO estimates that the premium subsidies, scheduled to begin in 2014, will cover at least 25 million individuals by the end of the decade.)
- Among the major means tested welfare programs, since 2000 Medicaid has increased from 34 million people to 54 million in 2011 and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, or food stamps) from 17 million to 45 million in 2011. Spending on food stamps alone is projected to reach nearly $800 billion over the next decade.
- These figures include not only citizens, but non-citizens as well. For instance, USDA has acknowledged a formal partnership with Mexico to boost food stamp enrollment amongst non-citizens, migrant workers and foreign nationals. In a ‘radio novela’ USDA even depicted an individual who resisted food stamp enrollment (saying her husband earned enough to take care of them) but who was successfully pressured into enrollment. To view Ranking Member Sessions’ letter to USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack asking for documents and information pertaining to the Department’s partnership with the Mexican government and other efforts to boost food stamp enrollment, please click here.
- The ranking members of the Senate Budget, Judiciary, Finance and Agriculture committees wrote a letter to Secretary Clinton and Napolitano concerning DHS/DOS regulations that undermine the in-law requirement that those seeking US citizenship cannot be welfare-reliant (the ‘public charge’ rule). The letter points out that “guidance from your agencies specifically prevents consular and DHS officials from considering the likelihood that an alien will receive SNAP benefits, WIC payments, Medicaid, child-care benefits, foster care, energy assistance, educational assistance, other medical and health benefits, and assistance from at least fifteen different nutritional welfare programs… an able-bodied immigrant of working age could receive the bulk of his or her income in the form of federal welfare and still not be deemed a ‘public charge’.”
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