Dec 11 2010

Food stamp use and cost up sharply since 2008

The USDA has just posted shocking increases in the use and cost of food stamps (now called the Supplementary Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP just within the last two years.  The USDA data & statistics web pages provide data for SNAP participation and costs from 1969-2010.

Here’s what’s happened in the last three years:

  • 2008: 28.2 million participants received an average benefit of $102 per month for a total cost of $37.6 billion.
  • 2009: 33.5 million participants received an average benefit of $125 per month for a total cost of $53.6 billion.
  • 2010: 40.3 million participants received an average benefit of $134 per month for a total cost of $68.2 billion.

Caroline Scott-Thomas of FoodNavigator.com points out that in 2009 eligible people were signing up for SNAP benefits at an average rate of 20,000 a day.  This year, the rate increased to 22,000 a day.

What, she asked, did I think of all this?

Nutrition professor Dr. Marion Nestle told FoodNavigator-USA.com: “Pretty obviously, this is a sign that the economy is still in bad shape, especially at the lower income ends. Wall Street may still be giving bonuses, but more and more Americans don’t have places to live or food to eat”….Nestle added that funding for this level of food stamp use could prove unsustainable in the current economy. “Some funding has already been cannibalized to fund the Child Nutrition Reauthorization,” she said. “The more expensive it gets, the more the program will be a target for lawmakers looking for moveable cash.”

With an estimated one-eighth of the population on food stamps each month, and no improvement to the economy in sight, it seems like there is plenty to worry about.

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[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Marion Nestle, Barry A. Martin, fadsandfancies.com, Jonathan Chiu, Cold Mud and others. Cold Mud said: Food stamp use and cost up sharply since 2008 http://coldmud.com/red.cfm?type=e&id=81734 [...]

  • Anthro
  • December 11, 2010
  • 10:56 pm

This is so scary in the “greatest nation on earth”–not that I ever paid much heed to that little snipped of nationalism.

But we are a rich nation, rapidly becoming a banana republic, it seems.

Can you tell us if anything else significant happened to the program in the last two years? Did the parameters change, such as the income level required to be a part of the program? Or a restructuring of the program? The name did change, obviously someone was working on this… You are absolutely right, the numbers are shocking. So shocking in fact (a 43% increase) that the analyst in me wonders if something else might be going on. That is absolutely not to downplay the results, economy is the main reason for the increase, I am sure. But it would be worthwhile to look at all changes in the last 2 years.

  • Jeb
  • December 13, 2010
  • 3:27 am

Of course it’s going to increase, these are long term effects we’re seeing of a well-known trend in the economy. People are giving up on looking for work and food stamps is an easy way to put some food on the table while the rest of us, ‘figure it out’.

There needs to be some kind of incentive to get off food stamps. With increasing mobility of data and communication, maybe we could set up some kind of program where people are offered jobs to get them off food stamps.

[...] has increased dramatically. According to new USDA statistics just out (thank you Marion Nestle for pointing me to these), the number of people receiving SNAP benefits rose from 28.2M in 2008 to 40.3M in2010. [...]

Last year all the states increased their SNAP to 200, before that we were getting 100 in MI, so there is a lot of it, the program adjusted to meet the needs of the failing economy and high price of food.

  • Sheila
  • December 16, 2010
  • 3:45 pm

All the more reason to try to sharpen the use of this assistance program for foods with high nutrient density, so when the dollars are spent, it is for food that nourishes.

[...] Food stamp use and cost up sharply since 2008, Food Politics, December 12, 2010                                                                                                                                                           The USDA has just posted shocking increases in the use and cost of food stamps just within the last two years.  In 2010, 40.3 million participants received an average benefit of $134 per month, compared to 28.2 million participants in 2008.  Caroline Scott-Thomas of FoodNavigator.com points out that in 2009 eligible people were signing up for SNAP benefits at an average rate of 20,000 a day.  This year, the rate increased to 22,000 a day. [...]

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