At a recent news conference
with Department of Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman, the advocacy group
Bread for the World claimed that by the end of this year 36 million Americans
will suffer from hunger or be at risk of hunger. Bread for the World claimed
welfare reform exacerbated the problem of hunger in the United States.
Are tens of millions of Americans
really going hungry? Is welfare reform to blame? The short answer
is no, and Bread for the World should be ashamed of itself for making
claims that are contradicted by the very study they cite in support of
their position.
Lies, damn lies and hunger statistics
In a press release, Bread
for the World noted that, “one in ten U.S. households is still hungry
or at risk of hunger; 10.2% in 1998 and 10.3% in 1995 Â… 36 million people,
including more than 14 million children, live in these households.” These
claims are consistent with a recent USDA study, but Bread for the World
conveniently picks and chooses statistics from that study to make hunger
appear far worse a problem than it actually is.
The USDA study, “Household
Food Security in the United States 1995-1998,” surveyed 45,000 households
and asked people to answer yes or no to statements such as, “In the last
year I’ve worried that food would run out before I got money to buy more.”
The 1998 survey estimated that 89.8 percent of American households were
food secure, meaning they always had enough money to buy food.
That leaves 10.2 percent of
households food insecure, but a detailed look at those households doesn’t
reveal any pattern of widespread hunger. Of the households considered
food insecure, almost 65 percent reported no incidents of hunger whatsoever
in the previous year.
About 3.6 percent of the households
surveyed reported at least one incident of an adult skipping a meal because
of a lack of money to buy food. Only 1.3 percent of households reported
that an adult had not eaten for a whole day in the previous year, 0.9
percent reported an adult did not eat for a whole day in 3 or more months.
When looking at hunger in children,
the statistics were even more encouraging. Only 0.8 percent of households
reported a child skipping a meal at least once, only 0.5 percent reported
a child skipping a meal in 3 or more months, and only 0.2 percent reported
a child not eating for a whole day. Even these low percentages are probably
too high. As the USDA summarized the data on children, “the measure of
children in food-insecure households with hunger is not, as such, a valid
estimate of the number of children directly experiencing hunger, but a
rather wide upper-bound for this figure.” Of course Bread for the World
conveniently leaves out any mention of this caveat in its materials.
Poverty and welfare reform
A detailed look at the socioeconomic
makeup of the food insecure also gives reasons for questioning exactly
what the USDA study actually measures. The USDA researchers recorded the
income levels of those claiming to be hungry and the statistics are a
bit surprising. Based on its survey, for example, the USDA estimated that
1.2 million families whose income is only half the poverty level are food
insecure — which is to be expected. On the other hand it estimated that
almost 1.6 million families whose income is above 185 percent of
poverty were also food insecure.
Or to put it another way 4.8 million
families whose income is less than half the poverty level experience no
problem getting enough food, but 1.6 million families making almost four
times as much reported food insecurity (though only a little more than
half of those reported any actual hunger). What accounts for that odd
result? Part of the answer would be that some of those way above poverty
suffer from illnesses or similar situations which absorb large amounts
of their income, although it is interesting that only 2 percent of elderly
people living alone reported any incidents of hunger and they would be
most likely to have expensive medical bills. Part of the answer could
also be behavioral — some adults may be spending money unwisely on non-essential
non-food items rather than buying food.
Although the USDA study didn’t
ask about spending habits, another USDA study on low income households
provides an interesting look at how poor people spend their income. According
to the USDA study “The Effects of Food Stamps on Food Consumption:
A Review of the Literature,” an increase of one dollar in cash income
in low income households increases spending on food by only 5 to 11 cents,
whereas an additional increase in one dollar in food stamps (which in
most places can only be spent on food and related items) increases household
spending on food 23 to 29 cents. If given cash, then, low income families
generally prefer to spend most of the extra dollar on something other
than food, but if given food stamps (which are generally restricted only
for food purchases), they tended to reduce the amount of other income
spent on food (which is why the dollar food stamp only led to a 23 to
29 cent overall increase).
Either food was already so
abundant that the low income households didn’t need any additional food
or there were other items which took preference over buying food even
when additional food was needed.
This might explain a result
that directly contradicts Bread for the World’s rhetoric about the evils
of welfare reform — from 1995 to 1998 the level of hunger declined significantly.
In 1995, 4.7 percent of surveyed families said they cut the size of a
meal or skipped a meal altogether, while in 1998 only 4.2 percent reported
doing so. In 1995, 3.1 percent of families reported being hungry at some
point because they couldn’t afford food, while in 1998 only 2.6 percent
reported being hungry. Most importantly, in 1995 1.7 percent of families
reported that their children experience some hunger while in 1998 only
1.1 percent of families reported a hungry child. Hunger appears to be
declining in the short term, probably aided by the booming economy.
The bottom line – how serious a problem is hunger in America?
Taking into account other USDA
studies that demonstrate poor children and middle class children eat roughly
the same diet (not to mention widespread evidence that the primary health
problem among the poor is obesity rather than insufficient food intake)
it seems reasonable to conclude that for the most part there is no serious,
widespread hunger problem in the United States. Nonetheless there are
persistent pockets of hunger that include perhaps as many as half a million
households. So what, if anything, should be done about this problem? Ironically
the USDA and the Clinton administration in general talk from both sides
of their mouths on this point.
A close reading of the USDA
study reveals two factors that dramatically increase the risk of hunger
— not having a job and not having two parents in the household. While
only 2.6 percent of married couples reported hunger, 11.9 percent of female
headed single parent households and 4.8 percent of single parent male-headed
households reported hunger.
As might be expected the only
thing correlated more highly with hunger than single-parent households
was low incomes. Only one percent of people making over 185 percent of
the poverty level experienced hunger. Freed somewhat from the liberal
ideology of the past, even the USDA concedes that the best way to improve
income is to get people into steady jobs. At the same time, though, the
Clinton administration openly pursues policies that would make it more
difficult to create jobs for the poor while simultaneously making it more
expensive for them to live.
One of the policy recommendations
made by the USDA to increase food security, for example, is to go forward
with efforts to remediate the effects of global warming. Yet meeting any
of the carbon dioxide emissions set in the Kyoto Treaty would require
the sort of high taxes on fossil fuels that would slow (or even reverse)
job growth as well as hit the poor with much higher costs of living.
If the government and advocacy
groups want to help eliminate the last vestiges of hunger in America,
the best step would be to take off the regulatory shackles that hold back
growth rather than try to whip up hysterical and inaccurate fears about
welfare reform.