Enrolment in the food stamp program has grown rapidly, with 45.8m Americans taking part in August 2011, up 8.1% on the previous year, and more than 75% higher than in 2006, when about 26m took part in the program.
SNAP is one of the largest safety net programs in the United States, and this latest study found that it reduced the poverty rate by nearly 8% in 2009, the most recent year included in the research.
“SNAP’s antipoverty effect peaked in 2009, when benefit increases were authorized by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act,” the researchers wrote. “Our analysis shows that SNAP significantly improves the welfare of low-income households.”
The prevalence of poverty in the United States over the ten-year period covered in the study (2000-2009) was reduced by an average of 4.4% a year due to SNAP benefits, they found. The effect was greatest in reducing child poverty, reducing its depth by an average of 15.5% and its severity by an average of 21.3% a year.
An average of just under 10,000 people a day signed up to the program from August 2010 to August 2011, but the rate of participation growth had slowed significantly by then, from about 20,000 a day in 2009 and 22,000 a day in 2010.
In order to qualify for the program, household income must be at less than 130% of the poverty threshold, roughly equivalent to $29,000 for a family of four.
A recent report from the Carsey Institute found that households receiving SNAP benefits in 2010 had a median household income of $17,912, compared with the national median of $50,046, although 76% of families receiving SNAP had at least one employed member.
The average benefit was $289.61 a month in 2010, it reported, totaling $3,475.32 a year.