and stable families and never imagined they'd be in this place today one of those people is christopher coke is a mid career journalist and he's had a tough time getting as much work as he needs to pay the bills so we've documented his struggles and his decision to apply for food stamps prez's also the author of diet for a dead planet big business and the coming food crisis we spoke earlier about his choice to turn to government assistance take a listen i will thanks for having me and. i have known for quite some time given my own personal situation that i was sliding closer and closer toward a very precarious situation financially. and this is again a more structural long term issue both for writers and journalists in america increasingly who are squeezed out of the industry not of the economy of course for a growing number of americans we now it's like forty six million plus americans on food stamps today. in my own case which is not unusual at all. you know you've and your income doesn't match your costs and costs down they always go up. income has remained. or gone down in real dollars f