[69LM1]

Here's a real life one for ya.

I own a computer company, and make a nice salary. But, we still watch what we spend, and cut where we can and save for travel, kids education etc.

When Hurricane Katrina hit and we wound up first in little rock and then houston, I really thought we lost it all. No New Orleans meant no more computer company. Most of my employees found new jobs in the towns they evacuated to.

In short, we were offered food stamps, which I at first declined as we had savings and I was doing some tech work still. Then I thought about how much I pay in taxes, and said finally, shoot yea, give em too me.

As a family of four, we got so much in food stamps that we could NOT spend it all every month, even if we bought name brand everything! We only took em for two months as by then I started getting calls from customers who wanted to come back to New Orleans and realized that at least 50% of my customers and employees would be coming back.

At the end of the two months, we told the state that we no longer needed the food stamp system. We still had hundreds left on the credit card thing unspent, and they said we HAD to spend it, it could not be returned. We went out and bought steak every night just to get rid of the money on the card!

No wonder some people on food stamps "trade" em for crack. There's no way you can spend all that every month. They eat better than we do.........