Forecasting the Food Stamp caseload has become increasingly important. One reason is the sheer frequency and magnitude of recent fluctuations. Over a span of less than fifteen years, the FSP caseload has exhibited three prominent turning points. The caseload declined from 22.4 million...

The 1996 welfare reform legislation has spawned a multitude of studies of the experiences of welfare recipients and their families since the reforms have been implemented (e.g. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2000; Cancian, Haveman, Kaplan, Meyer and Wolfe, 1999; Harris, 1996; Coulton et al.,...

I use changes in immigrant eligibility for food stamps under the 1996 federal law and heterogeneous state responses to set up a natural experiment research design to study the effect of food stamps on Body Mass Index (BMI) of adults in immigrant families. I find that in the post-1996 period food...

The research presented examines household food spending relative to households need for food and the relationship between food expenditures and measures of food security. Using data from the Current Population Survey and the Consumer Expenditure Survey, we find that Food Stamp households that do...