SNAP and Diet Quality: An Instrumental Variables Approach

Christian Gregory, Michele Ver Ploeg (), Margaret Andrews and Alisha Coleman-Jensen ()

No 124757, 2012 Annual Meeting, August 12-14, 2012, Seattle, Washington from Agricultural and Applied Economics Association

Abstract: Recent research has shown that the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is effective in reducing food insecurity. Questions remain, however, about whether SNAP also has any effects on the quality of low-income households’ diets. These questions have surfaced in the context of the increasing public costs of diet-related illnesses like diabetes, dyslipidemia, and heart disease. Policy recommendations to restrict what can be purchased with SNAP benefits are evidence of these concerns. We use a unique data set that matches state-level SNAP policy variables to individual level data in three waves of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES). We examine Healthy Eating Index (HEI) scores and intakes of macro-nutrients for low-income households that do and do not participate in SNAP. We find that, after controlling for observed and unobserved factors, SNAP recipients had overall diet quality comparable to their counterparts, although most differences are in the favor of non-participants. While SNAP purchase restrictions could improve diet outcomes, they might do so at the cost of impairing the effectiveness of SNAP at reducing food insecurity.

Keywords: Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety; Food Security and Poverty (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 24
Date: 2012
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/124757/files/Gregory2.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ags:aaea12:124757

DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.124757

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in 2012 Annual Meeting, August 12-14, 2012, Seattle, Washington from Agricultural and Applied Economics Association Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by AgEcon Search ().