Congressman Ryan Takes Food Stamp Challenge

(ht Jill at WLST)

$21 to live on for a week. Check out the blog for the items he was able to get and a copy of the receipt. The thing I think we can get out of this is to be able to mentally put ourselves in others shoes in order to understand the challenges they face and come up with solutions based on that understanding. Too often we just consider our positions and don’t stop to consider that everyone is not like us, yet in the end they are us.

Day 2 Post

As some commentors have said I think the Congressman could have made some different choices like not as many PB&J sandwiches and cooking a chicken and making soup out of the leftovers and casseroles and all, but keep in mind most people struggling this hard probably don’t have as much time to cook as most. The Catch 22 is that prepared foods are convenient, while eating fresh and healthy generally takes more time.

It’d be interesting to see a group of bloggers take the challenge as well to build awareness of poverty and hunger.

WaPo article on the challenge.

Congressman McGovern’s blog – he’s the guy that started the challenge. Only two others took him up on it, our own Congressman Ryan and Janice Schakowsky from Illinois.