Greetings—

In a new analysis, Urban Institute researchers find that the 2021 update to the Thrifty Food Plan (TFP), the model used to determine Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, kept 2.9 million people—including 1.3 million children—out of poverty. The TFP ensures that benefit amounts reflect current dietary guidelines, food costs, and household consumption patterns. The 2021 TFP update increased SNAP benefits by 21 percent.

As Congressional Republicans consider cuts to SNAP funding in their upcoming reconciliation bill, including a potential rollback of the 2021 update to the TFP, the researchers examine the impact the 2021 TFP has had on poverty and find that:

The number of people living in poverty was reduced by 4.6 percent in 2021. For children, there was a 7.6 percent reduction.
Higher SNAP benefits had the greatest antipoverty impact in Alabama, DC, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, and West Virginia, where increased benefits reduced the number of people living in poverty by over 8 percent.
Thirteen states saw reductions in the number of children in poverty between 10 and 14 percent: Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, North Carolina, New Mexico, Ohio, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, and West Virginia.
In DC, child poverty saw a reduction of over 35 percent—the largest decrease across the country. For adults, DC saw a 14 percent reduction in poverty.

“Eliminating the 2021 TFP reevaluation would result in millions of Americans having far fewer resources to purchase food and would likely contribute to an increase in poverty, food insecurity, and other hardships for families,” the researchers write.

Read the summary to learn more about how increased SNAP benefits reduced poverty in each state. To understand how SNAP benefit cuts would affect your state and county, explore the interactive map.

If you have questions for the research team, please reply to this email. We’re happy to connect you.

Thanks,