Moving Beyond the Debate Over Restricting Sugary Drinks in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program

AbstractObjectiveTo determine public attitudes towards federal spending on nutrition assistance programmes and support for policies to improve the nutritional impact of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).DesignParticipants answered survey questions by telephone assessing support for SNAP spending and proposed programme policy changes.SettingUSA.SubjectsSurvey of 3024 adults selected by random digit dialling conducted in April 2012, including 418 SNAP participants.ResultsA majority (77 %; 95 % CI 75, 79 %) of all respondents supported maintaining or increasing SNAP benefits, with higher support among Democrats (88 %; 95 % CI 86, 90 %) than Republicans (61 %; 95 % CI 58, 65 %). The public supported policies to improve the nutritional impact of SNAP. Eighty-two per cent (95 % CI 80, 84 %) of respondents supported providing additional benefits to programme participants that can only be used on healthful foods. Sixty-nine per cent (95 % CI 67, 71 %) of respondents supported removing SNAP benefits for sugary drinks. A majority of SNAP participants (54 %; 95 % CI 48, 60 %) supported removing SNAP benefits for sugary drinks. Of the 46 % (95 % CI 40, 52 %) of SNAP participants who initially opposed removing sugary drinks, 45 % (95 % CI 36, 54 %) supported removing SNAP benefits for sugary drinks if the policy also included additional benefits to purchase healthful foods.ConclusionsThe US public broadly supports increasing or maintaining spending on SNAP. The majority of respondents, including SNAP participants, supported policies to improve the nutritional impact of SNAP by restricting the purchase of sugary drinks and incentivizing purchase of healthful foods with SNAP benefits.

Download Full-text

Does Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Reduce Food Insecurity among Households with Children? Evidence from the Current Population Survey

International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health ◽

10.3390/ijerph18063178 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 18 (6) ◽

pp. 3178

Author(s):

Jun Zhang ◽

Yanghao Wang ◽

Steven T. Yen

Keyword(s):

Food Security ◽

Food Insecurity ◽

Current Population Survey ◽

Population Survey ◽

Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program ◽

Supplemental Nutrition ◽

Assistance Program ◽

Current Population ◽

Households With Children ◽

Nutrition Assistance

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is designed to improve household diet and food security—a pressing problem confronting low-income families in the United States. Previous studies on the issue often ignored the methodological issue of endogenous program participation. We revisit this important issue by estimating a simultaneous equation system with ordinal household food insecurity. Data are drawn from the 2009–2011 Current Population Survey Food Security Supplement (CPS-FSS), restricted to SNAP-eligible households with children. Our results add to the stocks of empirical findings that SNAP participation ameliorates food insecurity among adults only, but increases the probabilities of low and very low food security among children. These contradictory results indicate that our selection approach with a single cross section is only partially successful, and that additional efforts are needed in further analyses of this complicated issue, perhaps with longitudinal data. Socio-demographic variables are found to affect food-secure households and food-insecure households differently, but affect SNAP nonparticipants and participants in the same direction. The state policy tools, such as broad-based categorical eligibility (BBCE) and simplified reporting, can encourage SNAP participation and thus ameliorate food insecurity. Our findings can inform policy deliberations.

Download Full-text