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Primary Submission Category: Policy
SNAP Policies Matter: Food Insufficiency Among U.S. Children
Authors: Tasnim Tabassum, Benjamin Walker,
Presenting Author: Tasnim Tabassum*
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is a federal program to address food insecurity; however, it varies across states in terms of policy generosity. We examined whether state SNAP policy generosity is associated with children’s household food situation after accounting for child and household characteristics, and whether state policy modifies the relationship between household poverty, SNAP receipt, and food insufficiency.
We analyzed data from 2017-2018 National Survey of Children’s Health (NSCH), where children were nested within states. The outcome measures household food situation during the past 12 months using a four-level ordered scale. We estimated mixed-effects ordered logistic regression (multilevel) models with random intercepts for states. The model identifies how individual, household, and state-level factors are related to food situation. State-level exposure was the SNAP Policy Index 2014, collected from USDA. This index measures 10 policies related to SNAP eligibility, transaction costs, stigma, and outreach.
Greater state SNAP generosity was modestly associated with lower odds of child food hardship, with significant but small state-level variation (ICC=0.3%), indicating contextual policy influences. A 0.1-point increase in the SNAP generosity index was associated with approximately 1% lower odds of being in a worse food sufficiency category. Parental health emerged as a strong determinant of child food sufficiency. Children whose mothers were not in good health had 146% higher odds of worse food situations (OR = 2.46), while father absence was associated with 73% higher odds (OR = 1.73). Interaction analysis showed that the policy environment of states is not disproportionately protecting SNAP recipients compared to eligible non-recipients, and the effect appears uniform across income depth. The findings show the importance of translating the benefits of SNAP-related policies to improve children’s food security.