The continuing debate on SNAP restrictions
There has been a lot of discussion and debate lately about placing further restrictions on the types of food that SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, the new name for the food stamp program) participants can purchase. For example, alcohol is already not allowed. Here is a nice article from slate.com outlining the controversy.
The SNAP program issues pre-paid debit cards to participants, which they can use at grocery stores or convenience stores, and even some farmers’ markets (but not restaurants). So, what do you expect the impact of the SNAP program to be on the demand for food? What types of “food bundles” do you expect people to buy? What are some factors that will influence the foods that people buy? When you go to the store, how important is price versus taste?
This debate seems to have been ignited by the epidemiology of obesity and non-communicable diseases in the U.S. People started asking: since low-income people are more likely to be overweight, why do they need help buying food? Well, that brings us automatically to another interesting question: are healthy diets cheaper, or more expensive? Professor Adam Drewnowski of the University of Washington has done lots of research on this topic, if you’re interested to check it out.
Twitter (click photo for full profile)
- Very proud of @jkwallingford & @elenamartinez24 for new #FoodPricesForNutrition paper on price spikes during #COVID… https://t.co/Cl9KAvAzym about 4 months ago
Job listings
- Friedman careers center postings
- Friedman alumni group on LinkedIn
- Nutrition-related jobs (ASN)
- Devex (US and international)
- Economics-related jobs (search “food”)
- Policy-related jobs (APPAM)
- Boston-area intl. dev. jobs & news (BNID)
- Food policy jobs in the US (Daybook)
- Intl. ag and nutrition jobs+news (Ag2Nut)
- Intl. development jobs (search “food”)
- Global health & poverty (80,000 hrs)
Helpful newsletters
- Food Fix – insider scoops on US policy
- Boston Network for Intl. Dev.
- Solutions Journalism – stories of success
- Politico – US food & ag policy
- Ag2nut – international nutrition
- Chicago Council – global food & ag
- Farm Policy News – from Univ. of Illinois
- The Counter – ‘Fact and friction in American food’
- Food dive – specialist journalism about the food industry
- Food Safety News – nasty stuff to avoid
- Dani Nierenberg’s Food Tank
- Jeremy Cherfas – food culture
- Gro Intel – deep dives into data
- FERN’s ag insider news
- Econofact – US economic policy
- Rudd Center – obesity policy
- David Allison – obesity research
- ANH Academy – mostly Africa & Asia
Data & resources
- JPAL how-to research resources
- WB DIME data analysis handbook
- Grad school advice (for econ, but applicable to others)
- My list of resources (experimental)
- USDA Econ. Res. Service (ERS) data
- USDA Food & Nutr. program data
- NCCOR – all US food-health data
- World Bank data
- FAO Statistics (FAOSTAT)
- UNICEF statistics
- WHO – child heights and weights
- WHO – global obesity and BMI
- UN system data
- HDX – humanitarian crises
- The dataverse
- IHSN – household surveys
- IPUMS – accessible data (incl. IDHS)
- Euromonitor – branded foods (library subscription)
- Gro Intelligence data
- UNCTAD – international trade
Favorite blogs on ag, food & health etc.
- Noah Smith – economics of everything
- Ethan Mollick – AI in higher ed
- Ugo Gentilini – social protection
- Parke Wilde – food policy
- Econofact – US econ policy
- Jess Fanzo – food systems
- Marc Bellemare – ag & food econ
- Chris Blattman – dev econ
- Jayson Lusk – ag & food econ
- Diane Coyle – economics books
- Marion Nestle – food politics
- Tamar Haspel – food & ag
- World Bank – impact evaluation
- BITSS – research methods
- Susan Dynarski – education policy
Archives
- July 2023
- April 2023
- March 2022
- August 2021
- May 2021
- October 2020
- September 2020
- June 2020
- April 2020
- March 2020
- February 2020
- November 2019
- September 2019
- April 2019
- March 2019
- January 2019
- September 2018
- August 2018
- July 2018
- February 2018
- January 2018
- October 2017
- September 2017
- May 2017
- February 2017
- September 2016
- March 2016
- September 2015
- March 2015
- January 2015
- October 2014
- August 2014
- November 2013
- October 2013
- August 2013