This report uses Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) quality control data from FY 2009 to examine the size and impact of payment errors on income and poverty status and to compare the characteristics of households with payment errors to those of households without payment errors.

For each state, presents estimates that measure the need for the Food Stamp Program and the program's effectiveness in reaching its target population in each of the three years from 1998 to 2000. The estimates were derived using empirical Bayes shrinkage estimation methods, which are described...

This report documents the methodology used to derive the previously published estimates of food stamp participation rates for all eligible people and the working poor.

Although there is a large literature on the effects of U.S. transfer programs on labor supply, this is the first such study of the Food Stamp Program.

Shows that over half of all food stamp participants are children; over 80 percent of food stamp benefits go to households with children; and almost 90 percent of food stamp households have income below the poverty line.