Food Stamp spending cut nationwide
but Illinois, thankfully, bucks the trend
On the campaign trail in early January, presidential candidate Jeb Bush called for an end to Food Stamps, replacing the federal program with “Right to Rise” grants awarded to states for programs they devise.
The problem with that proposal is it ignores sound economics and social science research. The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), commonly referred to as Food Stamps, is one of the best federal programs for stimulating the economy, and there is comparatively little fraud.
Mark Zandi of Moody’s Economy has calculated $1 in Food Stamp spending generates $1.73 in stimulus. He found that $1 invested in infrastructure spending generates a stimulus of $1.59 per dollar; $1 in temporary across-the-board tax cuts generates a stimulus of $1.02; making the dividend and capital gains tax cuts permanent generates 37 cents in stimulus per dollar; and corporate tax cuts generate 30 cents per dollar.
Yet, despite the research, the 2014 Farm Bill cut $8.6 billion from Food Stamps over 10 years. Some supporters of the program hailed a cut of $8.6 billion as a victory because a U.S. House version of the bill had called for cuts of $39 billion. While that same Farm Bill eliminated direct payments to farmers regardless of need, it also enhanced crop insurance subsidies and added a new program that insures against adverse price movements.
An editorial in the Washington Post said, “It is only a slight exaggeration to say that this legislative grotesquerie gives to the rich and takes from the poor.” (See Community Word, April 2015, “Government assistance or entitlement: County Board recipients see no hypocrisy” detailing how three Peoria County Board members who farm have received hundreds of thousands of dollars in government assistance over 18 years.)
Food Stamp payments vary by state. In Illinois, the average monthly benefit is $132. The number of people participating in the program in Illinois is down 5.2 percent from 2012 through 2014. In Wisconsin, 15,000 people lost eligibility for Food Stamps because of changes in state enrollment guidelines. Indiana cut 18,000; Maine cut 9,000.
In Illinois, we will be reversing course under legislation sponsored by Sen. Daniel Biss. SB 1847 was signed into law by the governor and went into effect Jan. 1. It expands income eligibility for food stamps to 40,000 additional households and is expected to bring $60 million more to Illinois in federal funds.
Prior to Biss’ legislation, the gross income limit for eligibility for Food Stamps in Illinois was 130 percent of the poverty level. SB 1847 raised the cap to 165 percent of the federal poverty level. For a family of three, that pushes the earnings ceiling from $25,737 to $32,653.
SB 1847 also expands eligibility for households with elderly, blind or disabled people up to 200 percent of the federal poverty level.
Food Stamps fight hunger and malnutrition. In 2013, 20.5 million children were on Food Stamps, the highest number since records began in 1980. Young children are extremely vulnerable to nutritional deficits. Scientists are learning the damage from malnutrition can be generational, passed on from one generation to the next.
Support for Food Stamps should be bipartisan: care about maintaining Food Stamps for reasons of compassion or care for economic reasons. Malnutrition costs U.S. healthcare billions of dollars a year and impacts learning and growth. It’s a burden that will cripple future generations far more than reasonable budget deficits.
Clare Howard