MODELING A BETTER PLAN TO REDUCE HUNGER

New research using innovative simulation modelling techniques demonstrates that SNAP, WIC, and School Lunch Program are key components of a plan to reduce food insecurity. The research finds that:

• If SNAP benefits were increased by basing the calculation on the Low Cost Food Plan, SNAP-participant families with children would have an 8% increase in purchasing power for food. This would result in 5.3% of currently food-insecure people in families with children becoming food secure.
• If WIC age-eligibility were increased to age 6, 2.2% of newly eligible 5-year-olds’ families would increase their food purchasing power. This change would result in 1.5% of WIC-eligible food-insecure 5-year-olds and their families becoming food secure.
• Over 13% of all children whose family food purchasing power was increased by their participation in the National School Lunch and Breakfast programs shifted into a higher income-to-poverty-ratio category. This resulted in 1.7% of food-insecure families of students participating in school lunches and 1% of food-insecure families of students participating in school breakfasts to become fully food secure in 2014.

Source: Children’s Health Watch, 9/20/16, Modeling Change

STRENGTHENING FAMILY, EDUCATION & WORK TO REDUCE POVERTY

A bipartisan group of poverty experts says that changes in the US economy and family structure over the past 40 years necessitates new approaches to reducing poverty. Family, education, and work are now so closely linked that they must be studied and improved together if poverty is to be reduced. They cite the growing gap in educational achievement between poor kids and rich kids; the increase in single-parent families; the decline of work among men, especially young black men; unstable work and work hours; stagnating wages; and high rates of incarceration as the principal causes of poverty today. To address these challenges, the experts from organizations as disparate as the American Enterprise Institute and the Annie E. Casey Foundation recommend:

1. Promoting a new cultural norm surrounding parenthood and marriage.
2. Promoting delayed, responsible childbearing.
3. Increasing access to effective parenting education.
4. Helping less-educated young men and women prosper in work and family.

5.  Improving skills to get well-paying jobs.

6.  Making work pay more for less educated people.

7.  Raising work levels among hard-to-employ people, including the poorly       educated and those with criminal records.

8.  Ensuring that jobs are available.

9.  Increasing public investment in preschool and postsecondary education.

10. Educating the whole child to promote social-emotional and character           development as well as academic skills.

11. Modernizing the organization and accountability of education.

12. Closing resource gaps to reduce education gaps.

Source: American Enterprise Institute, 12/3/15, Reducing Poverty

ENDING HUNGER IN AMERICA

In its Action Plan to End Hunger in America, the Food Research Action Council looks at the current state of the US economy and the persistence of hunger within it.  It identifies eight essential strategies for decisively attacking hunger in America. They are:

1. Create jobs, raise wages, increase opportunity, and share prosperity;
2. Improve government income-support programs for struggling families;
3. Strengthen SNAP;
4. Strengthen Child Nutrition Programs;
5. Target supports to especially vulnerable populations;
6. Work with states, localities, and nonprofits to expand and improve participation in federal nutrition programs;
7. Make sure all families have convenient access to reasonably priced, healthy food; and
8. Build political will.

Source: Food Research Action Council, 10/7/15,End Hunger

Plan to end hunger released

The Food Research and Action Center (FRAC) has released a Plan of Action to End Hunger in America.

The strategies outlined in the plan offer concrete solutions, which can be achieved with renewed political will, for addressing hunger and its root cause, poverty, Federal nutrition programs alone cannot carry the burden. Unless employment levels and wages rise substantially, and wor-king schedules, benefits, and work supports improve, we cannot solve hunger.

From the plan:  “We have no excuses for leaving hungry Americans behind. There is a clear path to eliminate hunger in this country and create a much healthier, better educated, and more productive society with greater opportunity and commitment to our common ethical, moral, and religious aspirations.”

FRAC releases "Plan of Action to End Hunger in America" – FRAC, October 7, 2015