Food Security and Nutrition Assistance
ERS monitors the food security of U.S. households through an annual, nationally representative survey. While most U.S. households are food secure, a minority of U.S. households experience food insecurity at times during the year, meaning that their access to adequate food for active, healthy living is limited by lack of money and other resources. Some experience very low food security, a more severe range of food insecurity where food intake of one or more members is reduced and normal eating patterns are disrupted. Reliable monitoring of food security contributes to the effective operation of USDA’s food and nutrition assistance programs aimed at reducing food insecurity. USDA administers 16 domestic food and nutrition assistance programs that affect the lives of millions of people and account for roughly two-thirds of USDA’s annual budget. Over a typical year, about one in four people in the United States participates in at least one of these programs.
In fiscal year 2022, children accounted for about 40 percent of all Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) participants, down from about 43 percent in fiscal year 2019. Children younger than 5 made up nearly 12 percent of participants, while school-age children made up 28 percent. Adults ages 18–59 represented 42 percent of SNAP participants in fiscal year 2022, similar to fiscal year 2019. The share of the SNAP caseload age 60 and older grew from about 16 percent in fiscal year 2019 to 18 percent in fiscal year 2022.
In fiscal year 2023, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) served an average of 42.1 million people per month, or 12.6 percent of U.S. residents. The share of residents receiving SNAP benefits in each State ranged from as high as 23.1 percent in New Mexico to as low as 4.6 percent in Utah. In 34 States, the share was between 8 and 16 percent.