© Provided by Washington Examiner Dealer Plate - We accept SNAP IVIn the coming months, Congress is expected to reauthorize the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), the nation's largest food assistance program that helps poor families buy groceries. Amid ongoing debt ceiling talks, Republicans have focused on SNAP's employment provisions, proposing expansions of work requirements and making employment a goal of the program. These efforts are critical: encouraging more work among SNAP recipients offers a real path out of poverty.
But these efforts also highlight an uncomfortable truth: Many adult SNAP participants don't feel comfortable working. This is a special irony. SNAP is designed to provide low-income families with the resources to eat well, but recipients have an incredibly high incidence of diet-related diseases. And there is little evidence that participating in SNAP makes things better.
DOZENS OF SCHOOL PRINCIPALS TAKE 'FAIR GRADING' TO PREPARE STUDENTS FOR FAILURE
Congress can help revise SNAP's approach to nutrition.
SNAP provides food benefits to 40 million people each month and provides the average member with about $200 per month. One of SNAP's main goals is to "empower low-income families to eat more nutrition." However, in a new report, we show that SNAP members face serious health problems, with disproportionately high levels of physical and mental health problems compared to other groups of Americans.
Many factors explain why this group suffers from particularly poor health. However, a big part of the story is that SNAP recipients have particularly unhealthy diets, with most of the benefits being spent on sugary drinks and ultra-processed foods.
Worse, according to our analysis, the fastest-growing group of SNAP recipients over the past two decades (ages 50-64 now make up 28% of SNAP households) have the highest rates of health problems (the elderly, except for adults). ) In recent years, nearly 70 percent of SNAP households in this age group reported a diagnosis of a diet-related disease, such as diabetes or heart disease, and more than 40 percent were obese.
Additionally, half of this group described their health as fair or poor, four times higher than higher-income Americans in the same age group. There were also mental health issues, with nearly 40% of older SNAP recipients reporting feeling worthless or hopeless in the past month. Unfortunately, these physical and mental health outcomes were not much better for younger cohorts of older SNAP participants.
Our analysis is not the first to suggest that there is something unusual about SNAP's approach to nutrition.
A 2016 USDA report found that SNAP recipients spent most of their benefits on seemingly unhealthy foods, such as sugary drinks, ready-made desserts, and frozen meals. Another study found that SNAP recipients ate less vegetables than other low-income families and had a higher risk of disease than other Americans. A USDA study found that adults who received SNAP had less healthy diets, were more likely to be obese, and had higher blood pressure.
Some argue that these differences are because unhealthy foods are more expensive than healthy foods and SNAP benefits are too small to support a healthy diet. But that ignores the evidence.
Measured correctly (by weight or by portion), it appears that healthy foods are cheaper than unhealthy foods. In fact, research shows that people who eat ultra-processed foods (common in SNAP members' diets) burn an average of 500 more calories per day than people who eat unprocessed foods like fruits and vegetables, increasing their overall food budget. a diet full of processed foods.
We have long known that Americans are malnourished and in poorer health than their peers. But we cannot attribute our findings to American culture alone. Adult SNAP participants performed particularly poorly compared to non-participants. This gives policymakers a unique opportunity to use SNAP to improve the health of millions of low-income Americans. The upcoming SNAP reauthorization gives them that option.
To be clear, our study does not conclude that SNAP necessarily causes health problems. But at the very least, the program promotes unhealthy lifestyles and poor diets. And as health problems hinder work, SNAP's shift in nutrition focus will expand economic opportunity and advance the careers of millions of low-income families.
A crucial first step is to address SNAP nutritional deficiencies. Congress could begin making nutrition improvement a primary goal of SNAP and require the USDA to report annually on nutrition quality. Another important step is to establish nutrition standards in the SNAP program, as has been done in other federal nutrition programs. Members must use their SNAP benefits on foods that meet America's Dietary Guidelines, not on foods like sugary drinks.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE ABOUT AMERICA'S RECOVERY
Achieving these small, common-sense policy goals can pay big dividends for low-income Americans by stimulating a virtuous cycle of healthy lifestyles and paid work.
Angela Rachidi is a Senior Fellow and Rowe Fellow of Opportunity and Mobility Studies at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), where she studies poverty and the impact of government welfare programs on low-income people in the United States.
Tags: Opinion , Beltway Confidential , Polls , Opinion , SNAP , Poverty , Diet
Original author: Angela Rachidi
Starting point: SNAP needs major innovation