The Trump administration has canceled a data collection program used to measure “food insecurity.” This program, managed by the Economic Research Service, an arm of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, was quietly shuttered shortly after the One Big Beautiful Bill was imposed, resulting in more discipline on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, colloquially known as “food stamps.”
The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced the termination of future Household Food Security Reports. These redundant, costly, politicized, and extraneous studies do nothing more than fear monger.
For 30 years, this study—initially created by the Clinton administration as a means to support the increase of SNAP eligibility and benefit allotments—failed to present anything more than subjective, liberal fodder. Trends in the prevalence of food insecurity have remained virtually unchanged, regardless of an over 87% increase in SNAP spending between 2019 – 2023.
USDA will continue to prioritize statutory requirements and where necessary, use the bevy of more timely and accurate data sets available to it.
People whose livelihoods rely on this survey reacted with alarm.
Employees inside the USDA as well as economists outside the agency who work closely with the data reacted with shock and anger as word spread about the cancellation.
“For the past 30 years, the USDA food insecurity measure has provided insight into the extent that American families have been able to cover their food needs,” said Colleen Heflin, a professor at Syracuse University, who has been studying the data since its inception and learned of its cancellation. “Not having this measure for 2025 is particularly troubling given the current rise in inflation and deterioration of labor market conditions, two conditions known to increase food insecurity.”
Interest groups and the media often use data from the food insecurity survey as a proxy for hunger. When you hear “x number of children go to bed hungry in America,” that data comes from the food insecurity survey. No one is quite sure that the survey matters, but what is definitive is that it doesn’t measure hunger. Let’s take a look at what it measures. Below is a sample of the questions.
Which of these statements best describes the food eaten in your household in the last 12 months: —enough of the kinds of food (I/we) want to eat; —enough, but not always the kinds of food (I/we) want; —sometimes not enough to eat; or, —often not enough to eat?
[1] Enough of the kinds of food we want to eat
[2] Enough but not always the kinds of food we want
[3] Sometimes not enough to eat
[4] Often not enough to eat
[ ] DK or Refused
The first statement is “(I/We) worried whether (my/our) food would run out before (I/we) got money to buy more.” Was that often true, sometimes true, or never true for (you/your household) in the last 12 months?
[ ] Often true
[ ] Sometimes true
[ ] Never true
[ ] DK or Refused
HH3. “The food that (I/we) bought just didn’t last, and (I/we) didn’t have money to get more.” Was that often, sometimes, or never true for (you/your household) in the last 12 months?
[ ] Often true
[ ] Sometimes true
[ ] Never true
[ ] DK or Refused
HH4. “(I/we) couldn’t afford to eat balanced meals.” Was that often, sometimes, or never true for (you/your household) in the last 12 months?
[ ] Often true
[ ] Sometimes true
[ ] Never true
[ ] DK or Refused
READ:
This Is How You Do It: Distribute Food, Not Junk – RedState
The results are reported like this: “The most recent report found that in 2023, 13.5 percent of households, with 47 million people, were food insecure, meaning that during some portion of the year, not every member of household had access to enough food for a healthy lifestyle.” As the level of “food insecurity” has remained essentially flat over the life of the report despite making SNAP more generous, the linkage of feelings to money doesn’t seem all that useful.
You can see that the survey doesn’t measure hunger. It measures, if anything, the fear of being hungry. More likely, it measures the fear of not having enough money to buy the foods you wish to purchase. It also cleverly links adequate food to adequate money. By linking food insecurity to cash, this survey crowds out the value of food banks, free meals-on-wheels services for seniors in many areas, and “soup kitchens.” Under this questionnaire, you can truthfully answer that “The food that (I/we) bought just didn’t last, and (I/we) didn’t have money to get more,” while using food banks and other resources to eat. The idea of asking random people about “balanced meals,” when even the federal government isn’t terribly sure how to define that, strikes me as both dysfunctional and structured to get a negative response.
Naturally, ending the survey is being used as an attack on the SNAP reforms imposed by the OBBB, including a work requirement for the able-bodied. For instance:
“Why would you not want to measure it?” [Lindsey Smith Taillie, professor in the nutrition department at the University of North Carolina Gillings School of Global Public Health] said. “I think the only reason why you wouldn’t measure it is if you were planning to cut food assistance, because it basically allows you to pretend like we don’t have this food insecurity problem.”
Quite honestly, food insecurity is not a problem. Hunger is a problem. The food insecurity survey is based on self-reported experiences and is framed in a way that encourages negative answers to provide ammunition for increasing spending on an already problematic program. Kudos to the Trump administration for having the guts to cut it.
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