Are gingerbread houses covered on food stamps

If you have been approved for an EBT Card and want to know what can you buy with EBT at Walmart, we have the information you need, including a complete list of the items approved for purchase with your food stamps card.

As you may be aware, your EBT card can only be used to buy food that you are going to take home and prepare. Walmart has a lot of items they stock that are approved on the food stamps list, and we are not just talking about the Walmart Superstores. Even the regular Walmart Stores have items that are approved for SNAP EBT Card holders.

Continue reading to get the complete list at what you can buy at Walmart with your EBT Card.

What can you buy with EBT at Walmart?

You can buy the following items with your EBT Card at Walmart:

Breads and cereals
Fruits and vegetables
Meats, fish and poultry
Dairy products
Seeds and plants (that produce food for the household to eat)

In addition. a lot of our readers have questions about other items they are allowed to buy with their EBT Card.

To help clarify the items eligible to be purchased with your SNAP EBT benefits, we have listed the items that you CANNOT buy with your EBT Card.

Currently, the US Department of Agriculture prohibits SNAP EBT Cardholders from buying the following items with their food stamps card:

Beer, wine, liquor
Cigarettes or tobacco
Pet foods
Soaps, paper products and household supplies
Vitamins and medicine
Hot and prepared food items

As you can see, there are a lot of items that Walmart carries that you can buy using your EBT card. We also get emails all the time from our readers about a whole list of items they want to know if are covered under EBT.

That’s why we put together a list of the most frequently asked questions about EBT card and what can and cannot be purchased with the SNAP Food Stamps card.

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Reductions in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), otherwise known as food stamps, automatically kick in today as a result of the expiration of provisions the 2009 stimulus bill. Meanwhile, Congressional leaders are debating what further cuts will be made to the program as part of negotiations over the farm bill. Republicans are pushing to make benefits less generous and to increase work requirements; Democrats disagree.

An issue that hasn’t gotten as much attention during these debates is what food-stamp recipients are able to buy with their benefits. Public health advocates like Michele Simon have long argued that the lack of restrictions on the types of food aid-recipients can buy has helped fuel an American health crisis caused by unhealthy eating. Writes Simon:

“Much attention has focused on how agricultural subsidies fuel our cheap, unhealthy food supply. In reality, the largest and most overlooked taxpayer subsidy to Big Food in the farm bill is SNAP, which now represents more than ten percent of all grocery spending.”

So what exactly can SNAP recipients buy with their benefits? There are a few restrictions, against alcohol, and tobacco for instance. But curiously, most junk food is fair game, calling into question whether the “nutrition” in SNAP means much to lawmakers at all. Here are just a few of the items one can buy:

Red Bull
Sugary Soda
Candy
Mixes for alcoholic beverages
Artificial sweetener

Of course, big agribusiness is complicit in the structure of the food stamp program. Simon gives the example of New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s effort to bar food-stamp recipients from buying sugary soft drinks with SNAP dollars. Big companies like Pepsi and Coca-Cola fought back against the measure, which was ultimately vetoed by the Department of Agriculture, saying that the measure would be unworkable.

But take a look at the current restrictions the Agriculture Department places on food stamp use, and it’s difficult to understand why proscribing junk food purchases would be all that difficult. The list of items that one can’t buy with food stamps but that are also commonly found in supermarkets is extensive, including the aforementioned alcohol, but also pet food, ornamental gourds, and prepared foods. Why would barring junk food be functionally different than barring alcohol?

Hunger advocates have pushed back against food-stamp restrictions. But as Simon points out, Walmart and other corporate beneficiaries of SNAP spend millions of dollars each year funding anti-poverty groups. This is laudable, but it is also perhaps a way to fund advocacy initiatives that dovetail with these corporations profit motive as well.