The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is not only the nation’s first defense against hunger, helping 42 million Americans buy food for their families, but also a strong antipoverty tool. In 2021, the Thrifty Food Plan, the model the USDA uses to determine SNAP benefit amounts, underwent a long-overdue adjustment that increased benefits by 21 percent. Research by Laura Wheaton estimates that this increase in SNAP benefits, without the influence of other pandemic-era supports, kept 2.9 million people out of poverty across the 48 contiguous states and the District of Columbia. In this summary, we highlight findings from this analysis and additional literature emphasizing why it is critical to ensure SNAP benefits remain robust in the face of potential cuts.

Why This Matters

Policymakers have called for at least $230 billion in spending reductions under the jurisdiction of the House and Senate agriculture committees, which could indicate deep cuts to the SNAP program. One of the proposed cuts includes a rollback of the 21 percent increase in SNAP benefits from the 2021 update. As inflation has strained household budgets over the past few years, the role of SNAP has been more important than ever. The benefit plays a critical role not only in reducing food insecurity, but also in improving health outcomes, reducing health expenditures, and stimulating the economy during downturns. As the majority of SNAP recipients live at or below the poverty level and many spend up to one-third of their income on food, any cuts to the program would significantly affect people’s ability to afford food.

What We Found

Nationally, Wheaton finds the following:

• The increase in SNAP benefits from the reevaluated TFP, without the influence of other pandemic-era supports, kept 2.9 million people out of poverty, reducing poverty by 6 percent in 2021.
• Higher SNAP benefits had the greatest antipoverty impact in Alabama, the District of Columbia, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, and West Virginia, where increased benefits reduced the number of people living in poverty by more than 8 percent.
• The higher benefits reduced the number of children living in poverty by 1.3 million or 6 percent nationally in 2021.

Eliminating the 2021 TFP update would greatly reduce millions of Americans’ ability to afford food for their families. Other Urban research shows that rolling back the update would mean SNAP benefits would not cover a modestly priced meal in any US county and would likely result in increased poverty, food insecurity, and hardship, as well as costly declines in health and food affordability.

How We Did It

Wheaton used the Urban Institute’s Analysis of Transfers, Taxes, and Income Security (ATTIS) microsimulation model to estimate the effect of higher SNAP benefits arising from the TFP reevaluation alone on poverty in the last quarter of 2021. Wheaton assessed poverty using the Supplemental Poverty Measure, which includes noncash benefits and supports. To model antipoverty impacts of increased SNAP benefits without the influence of other pandemic-era supports, the analysis excluded the advanced child tax credit payments distributed in 2021 and the temporary emergency allotments that increased SNAP benefits. For more information on the methodology, see the related materials below.