Center on Budget and Policy Priorities

Food Assistance

Introduction to the Food Stamp Program

"The Food Stamp Program, the nation’s most important anti-hunger program, helps roughly 35 million low-income Americans to afford a nutritionally adequate diet...Food stamps respond quickly and effectively to support low-income families and communities during times of economic downturn and increased need. Enrollment expands automatically when the economy weakens and contracts when the economy recovers...In fact, food stamps are one of the fastest, most effective forms of economic stimulus."

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Topics

Basics

The Food Stamp Program, the nation’s most important anti-hunger program, helps roughly 35 million low-income Americans to afford a nutritionally adequate diet. WIC — short for the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children — provides nutritious foods, information on healthy eating, and health care referrals to about 8 million low-income pregnant and postpartum women, infants, and children under five. The School Lunch and School Breakfast programs provide free and reduced-price meals that meet federal nutritional standards to over 22 million school children from low-income families.

Policy Basics:
- Introduction to the Food Stamp Program

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Stacy Dean

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Zoë Neuberger

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Dottie Rosenbaum

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The Center designs and promotes polices to make the Food Stamp Program more adequate to help recipients afford an adequate diet, more accessible to eligible families and individuals, and easier for states to administer. We also help states design their own food stamp programs for persons ineligible for the federal program. Our work on the WIC program includes ensuring that sufficient federal funds are provided to serve all eligible applicants and on helping states contain WIC costs. Our work on child nutrition programs focuses on helping states and school districts implement recent changes in how they determine a child's eligibility for free or reduced-priced school meals.