Event Recap: The Future of SNAP and the US Social Safety Net
Over the past two years, there has been renewed debate around how the US should provide economic support to the most vulnerable families and communities. Between 2020 and 2021, in response to the COVID crisis, we saw an unprecedented expansion of the US social safety net through changes to the Child Tax Credit (CTC), the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), and the Unemployment Insurance (UI) program. Collectively, this robust expansion of aid prevented over 50 million people from falling into poverty and reduced the child poverty rate to historical lows, all in the midst of a global pandemic.
While the evidence is clear that providing economic aid to families with children yields wide-ranging and long-lasting benefits, political debates persist at the federal level around who is deserving of support and how much our safety net should be conditional upon work.
On November 30th, the Opportunity Lab, in collaboration with the Berkeley Food Institute (BFI) and the Goldman School of Public Policy (GSPP), hosted a set of talks by Hilary Hoynes and Adam Leive on the state of the evidence surrounding these questions, and how research can inform policy and political debates moving forward. With a particular focus on SNAP, the speakers presented findings from their own research and then took part in a moderated discussion led by Sakeenah Shabazz, the Policy Director of BFI. David C. Wilson, Dean of GSPP, provided opening remarks.
Hilary provided a comprehensive view of the SNAP program in her presentation, calling it the “fundamental social safety net in America” due to its limited conditionality and broad base. She also described SNAP’s role as an automatic stabilizer, and reminded us that poverty declined from 2019 to 2020, thanks to expanded safety net programs like SNAP and the EITC.
In his research presentation, Adam discussed the impact of work requirements on SNAP recipients; his work finds no evidence that work requirements in North Carolina led to increases in employment or earnings eighteen months after they were implemented. He also discussed the flexibility that states have in designing these programs, hinting at future research: “States have various amounts of individual [work requirement] waivers that they can use on particular clients…I’m working now with Virginia to help them think about how to allocate those in a randomized fashion, so we can learn more things about this policy.”
Below, explore complete recordings of presentations and discussion from the event.