Food Stamps and The Economic State of the US

The Republicans want to reduce the funding to the food stamp program by $40 billion over the next decade. They also plan on ending waivers that allow extensions on the food stamp program. However these cuts would drastically effect the people that rely on food stamps. It is estimated that 15% of American's rely heavily on food stamps and another 4 million use waivers.

I believe that food stamps are a very important resource that have to be available for the low income citizens in America. Republicans may argue that people have been abusing the system and therefore funding needs to be cut. I think that the system should be policed more but funding shouldn't be cut. If people are in a rough spot in life, there should be a program in place to help them out.

Source:http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/27/opinion/food-stamp-regression-in-the-statehouse.html?_r=0

The Sharing Economy

In today's very connected society, a new form of economy is appearing. It's called the sharing economy. According to The Guardian, the sharing economy is set to become a major part of many people's lives. What does it mean to be a part of the sharing economy? On Airbnb, a peer to peer lodgings market has appeared. A person may rent a room, pool house or even a couch on Airbnb. Many of these places are nicer than a hotel and cheaper. Airbnb performs background checks on the people renting out the places for safety. In the UK, a site called TaskRabbit.com is gaining in popularity. Need someone to do your grocery shopping for you while you take care of other errands? If you've got $25-35 dollars to spare TaskRabbit can find someone to do your grocery shopping. TaskRabbit offers many other services such as cleaning, organizing and baking. Need to borrow a car for a few hours? BlaBlaCar.com connects people who have cars with people who want to borrow them. The sharing economy offers unconventional trades between people but it could be used to help the unemployed. Source: http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/aug/04/internet-technology-fon-taskrabbit-blablacar