Location: 360 Heady Hall

Description: Katie Harris-Lagoudakis
"The Effect of SNAP on Supermarket Purchases: Evidence from SNAP Adoption & the SNAP Benefit Cycle"

Abstract:This paper analyzes what households utilize their Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP or food stamp) benefits to purchase and relates these purchasing patterns to existing research that has explored the impact of SNAP on food spending, non-food spending and health outcomes. I utilize two sources of variation in SNAP benefits: first, I compare the purchasing patterns of a household immediately prior to SNAP adoption to the purchasing patterns of the same household immediately following SNAP adoption and second, I evaluate purchases of the same household over the course of the SNAP benefit cycle. I find that SNAP almost exclusively increases spending on SNAP eligible items with the product categories of meat and prepared foods experiencing the biggest growth in food expenditure. I also find that SNAP is correlated with increased spending over baby products, while spending over alcohol and tobacco products exhibits almost no change.

Contact Person: John V. Winters