>Reminds me of a friend who lives in southern California ( not by choice ) and works for the Border Patrol. Get this, as a federal employee making around $50,000 a year he qualified for food stamps because of the "poverty line". Pretty sad that government employees can't even make it. I can't see $11 and hour going far down there.

Does he have a very large family? Or some other odd circumstances? I ask because one of the very big issues here in New York is that many people are not considered to be in the food-stamp (and other benefit-) eligible pool because they are not below the *federal* poverty line -- even though, clearly, that line should be adjusted geographically. Your friend's story sounds at odds with the ongoing arguments here.