Nearly half of all SNAP recipients are skipping meals to cope with inflation
Tiana Lowe Doescher
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Inflation is, by design, always regressive, but in a particularly painful demonstration of how this insidious inflationary cycle is specifically penalizing the poor, a new U.S. Census Bureau survey reported that a staggering 42% of households reliant on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program are skipping meals because they cannot afford enough food. The share of those who reported eating less out of financial necessity, 55%, more than doubled over the past year.
Further, a staggering 93% of SNAP recipients reported difficulty paying for usual household expenses, just a little more than those households earning between $25,000 to $35,000 annually. Compare that to the two-thirds of those earning $75,000 to $100,000 who report the same. By contrast, only one-quarter of those earning more than $200,000 reported financial difficulties.
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In general, inflation will always punish those with fewer alternatives. For example, a richer household that usually shops at Whole Foods can downgrade to Trader Joe’s and then Sam’s Club. But the household that is already shopping at Food4Less can’t find a cheaper alternative without resorting to charity.
Further, the inflation of this business cycle is predictably hitting the markets where consumers have the least elastic demand. Whereas luxury items and services, such as hospitality and higher-end goods, are patronized by consumers who are highly responsive to price, most households cannot simply eat less food or use less gas to fuel their way to school and work.
Hence, while the overall consumer price index has increased by 16% since President Joe Biden took office, food prices are up 19%, and electricity is up 23%. Gasoline is up nearly 54%. Considering that the prices of these essentials are increasing at a faster rate than nonessentials, and that these essentials comprise a greater proportion of the budgets of lower-income households than higher-income households, the poor face a much higher effective inflation rate than the wealthy.
Thomas Sowell was correct that inflation is the most universal tax of them all, but it doesn’t punish everyone equally. As evidenced by millions of SNAP parents going hungry to feed their children, the least privileged pay the highest price.