Growing Trend in Food Stamp Use

This holiday season is a tough one for many folks.  This graph illustrates a quite steep curve in United States food stamp usage in the past few years. It compares participation to the US U6 unemployment rate at 16%, which includes short-term discouraged workers who have stopped looking. 

One in eight people use food stamps.

For example, the number of Americans signing up for food stamps on the Supplementary Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) has increased at an even faster rate in 2010 than in 2009, according to new USDA figures.

The number of people receiving food stamps in September 2010 stood at 42.9m, the newly released figures show, up by six million compared to a year ago, when 36.9m people were enrolled with the program – and a rise of more than 50 percent on 2008 numbers.

Last year, Americans were joining the food stamp program at an average rate of 20,000 a day; in 2010 the rate accelerated to 22,000 a day.

In order to qualify for the program, household income must be at less than 130 percent of the poverty threshold, roughly equivalent to $29,000 a year for a family of four.

The program cost $64.7bn in 2010, up from $34.6bn two years ago.

Participation levels have set new records for 22 straight months. According to White House estimates more than an eighth of the population will get food stamps each month in the year beginning October 1.

Graph from Agora Financial