THE DIGNITY TAX

Roman Vale analyzes how the SNAP enrollment system deliberately extracts humiliation as payment for food assistance. Processing data from three million applications, Vale reveals how the 37-page forms, impossible documentation requirements, and 41% first-time rejection rate aren't failures but features designed to exhaust applicants into surrender. As the shutdown threatens November benefits, the episode exposes how geographic discrimination, algorithmic bias, and bureaucratic friction create a system where proving you deserve food costs more in dignity, time, and money than many can afford to pay.

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