These cuts are seven times more drastic than similar cuts made in the 1980s. Able-bodied childless people could receive food stamps for only three months in their lives. They could perform workfare, but there is no money to create workfare slots. The Senate proposal would give benefits for six months a year. Both the House and Senate bills give states the option to cut the food stamp program and take block grants that would likely be appealing to states facing shrinking federal grants.
States can move lots of money out of the program.
Now, states have to match federal Medicaid money. Under proposed plan, states would be allowed to spend less on Medicaid and have flexibility about what they did with the federal money. This would allow another infusion of funds into the states' budgets at a time when the amount of federal money to states is shrinking. States could provide merely a token effort to support those families, and still receive federal block grants. States are required to put people into massive work programs.