SNAP helps more than 2 million Pennsylvanians keep food on the table.
Pennsylvania is stronger when families facing food insecurity can access nutritious meals through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). But massive SNAP cuts threaten to undermine our most effective and important tool to fight hunger.
Children who receive SNAP have better health and educational outcomes.
- Across Pennsylvania, more than 769,000 young people under 21 receive SNAP.
- Between 2015 and 2019, SNAP lifted 109,000 kids in Pennsylvania out of poverty.
- Early access to SNAP during pregnancy and in early childhood improves birth outcomes and lifelong health.
- Children who receive SNAP do better in school and are more likely to graduate from high school. Adults who received SNAP as young children are less likely to live in poverty.
Because of SNAP, workers can afford groceries when wages fall short.
- Many hardworking Pennsylvanians who receive SNAP work important frontline jobs as cashiers, cooks, and home health aides.
- These jobs often lack family-sustaining wages, stable hours, and paid time off, which means that a worker’s own illness or an illness in the family can lead to loss of income or job loss.
- SNAP frees up earnings so workers can afford rent, utility bills, toiletries, and other household expenses.
Seniors who receive SNAP can stay healthy and access a better quality of life.
- More than 280,000 Pennsylvanians who receive SNAP are over age 65.
- Older SNAP participants are less likely to skip needed medication due to cost than similar non-participants.
- When Medicaid recipients with diabetes lose SNAP benefits, their health care costs rise by an average $242 per month.
SNAP boosts Pennsylvania’s economy.
- More than 10,000 retailers in Pennsylvania accept SNAP. Farmers and local businesses depend on SNAP for their success.
- Each dollar in SNAP benefits generates $1.54 in economic activity in a slowing economy.
- During the Great Recession, SNAP created one job per $10,000 in benefits redeemed in rural counties and 0.4 jobs per $10,000 in benefits redeemed in urban counties.
As grocery bills rise, devastating cuts to SNAP threaten to leave Pennsylvanians hungry and strain our state budget.
Additional work requirements would cause eligible Pennsylvanians to lose access to nutritious meals.
- SNAP already has harsh work requirements.
- In many states, people lose SNAP after three months if they cannot show that they are working or engaged in a qualifying work program for 20 hours or more a week or secure an exemption. But these rules do not increase employment.
- Work requirements create red tape that forces eligible workers, caregivers, and people with disabilities to lose benefits.
- Entire families, including children, will lose food assistance when people cannot navigate complicated paperwork or when overwhelmed county assistance offices (CAOs) make mistakes or do not process paperwork on time.
- Expanding work requirements will take food away from workers between jobs, older adults, veterans, people experiencing homelessness, and youth who have aged out of foster care.
Rolling back Thrifty Food Plan (TFP) updates would slash SNAP benefits for everyone.
- TFP is the basis for SNAP benefit levels. It is meant to represent the minimal cost of a healthy, realistic diet. Currently, SNAP benefits average only $6.20 per person per day.
- In 2021, the USDA updated the TFP to keep up with the cost and science of a healthy diet.
- Reversing this update and restricting future increases would slash benefits for all participants, including older adults and young children, with the cut growing deeper over time.
- Rolling back TFP adjustments for factors other than inflation would be the largest SNAP cut in 30 years.
Block-granting or other structural changes to SNAP will create a devastating shortfall in Pennsylvania’s budget.
- SNAP benefits are 100% federally funded, while PA shares 50% of administrative costs.
- Under a discretionary block grant, Pennsylvania would have to cover the full additional cost of benefits during times when more people lose income and need food assistance.
- If PA shared 10% of costs last year, the state would have been expected to pay $427 million for its share, which is about 1.5x what PA pays for its entire community college system.
- If the state came up with half that amount – $214 million, still a massive lift – PA would lose almost $2 billion in federal SNAP funds. With that loss, the Commonwealth would have to cut benefits in half or take away food assistance from half of Pennsylvanians currently receiving SNAP.
The charitable food system cannot compensate for cuts to SNAP.
- For every dollar of food that food banks provide, SNAP provides nine.
- If SNAP were cut by even 10%, the charitable food system would have to double to make up the difference. This would be impossible, leaving children and seniors hungry.
