SNAP Faces $187 Billion in Cuts. Who Is Paying the Price?

BIANNA GOLODRYGA: Now, turning to an issue that affects people across the United States, access to food stamps. Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or SNAP benefits are a vital lifeline for many low-income families, helping them get the groceries they need to feed their households. But now millions have lost that lifeline and at a time where consumers are struggling with rising price of necessities like food and fuel, it’s just the latest cutback resulting from President Trump’s so-called Big Beautiful Bill Act. Professor of Public Health Policy at Harvard, Sara Naomi Bleich joins Hari Sreenivasan to break down what this means.

 

HARI REENIVASAN: Bianna, thanks. Sara Naomi Bleich, thanks so much for joining us. Just recently there have been a lot of headlines about people losing SNAP benefits and I guess to set the table for our audience a little bit. How significant are the changes and how does SNAP benefits work in the United States?

 

SARA NAOMI BLEICH: Yeah, thank you very much for having me. It’s great to be here. So the changes are very significant. Millions and millions of people are going to lose access to SNAP benefits. And before talking about some of the changes, just wanna set the table on how important this program is. So SNAP, which stands for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Programs – it used to be called Food Stamps – it’s the nation’s largest anti-hunger program. And so each month it serves about 42 million individuals, and that’s about one in eight Americans. Now, 70% of those individuals are children, older adults, or people with disabilities. And the vast majority of families that participate in SNAP have incomes below the poverty line, which is about $33,000 for a family of four. And there’s tons of evidence which shows that SNAP has positive impacts on the economy and it has positive impacts on individuals.

 

So when it comes to the economy, SNAP helps to stabilize it ’cause it’s designed to be countercyclical. So what does that mean? It means that as the economy worsens, enrollment goes up, and as the economy improves, enrollment goes down. And it’s been very effective at that during the Great Recession, during COVID. We also know that for local economies, SNAP is very effective. So for every dollar in SNAP benefits, that generates about $1.50 to $1.80 in economic activity. And then for individuals, SNAP does a lot of really important things. It helps to lift families out of poverty because it provides monthly money for food. So then families can then free up some of their income for other things they need, like rent and utilities. It also helps to reduce food insecurity by about 30% and it improves health and wellbeing. So for example, the annual medical costs for a SNAP participant are about 25% lower than someone who’s eligible for the program, but not participating.

 

SREENIVASAN: One of the rationales being offered by people in the administration and others is that, look, this was supposed to be temporary. That there isn’t any incentive for them to get off of SNAP, start working, be on their own anymore. What’s wrong with that thinking?

 

BLEICH: What’s wrong with that thinking is that SNAP has very clear requirements, which is based on your income, it’s based on your assets. And so families qualify because they fall into a category which suggests that they have need for this program. It’s also the case that while COVID has ended and a lot of the temporary programs that were in place during COVID have ended, food prices remain high. They’re about 30% higher than they were three years ago. So families on the program are really struggling. In fact, there was a study that was done, which found that if you look at the SNAP benefit, which is about $180 per person per month, that’s about $6 a day. What the analysis shows is that it is only sufficient to buy a moderately priced meal in 1% of US counties, which means that in 99% of US counties, the benefit is not adequate.

 

SREENIVASAN: I wonder also about the cost of living right now is something that people are complaining about. Obviously, you know, food prices are up and that’s what SNAP targets, but you look at your overall account because of all the other costs you have. So it’s just, it seems like this amount that you would get per month isn’t necessarily something that flexes and shrinks relative to the other costs that might be adding up.

 

BLEICH: That’s right, that’s right. It’s something that has, one of the reasons that SNAP benefits have been so successful is that they’re very steady. So if you’re receiving these benefits, that is then freeing up your resources for all these other costs that are increasing. 

 

The other thing that’s really important to understand is that it is not the case that the charitable food sector can come in and fix all of this. You might remember during COVID those very long lines that we saw at food banks and food pantries. While they are so important to helping families, they only cover about one meal out of nine that SNAP provides. So as families are losing access to the program because of the changes through HR1, it’s not as if they are these other parts of the charitable food system that can step in and really make families whole again.

 

SREENIVASAN: Okay. So let’s go through some of the changes that people are hearing about. I guess the first is the really large scale, the $187 billion in funding. Put that in perspective for us.

 

BLEICH: Yeah. So the law passed in July of 2025 and it makes major structural changes, and those structural changes are gonna mean that millions of people lose coverage. So you mentioned the cut to overall the overall size of the program. And so what will happen over the next 10 years, so between now and 2034, is that the overall size of the SNAP program will go down by $187 billion. That is a 20% cut and it’s the largest cut in the program’s history. So that’s one big structural change. 

 

Another big structural change is the law is expanding the number of adults that are subject to what are called three month time limits. And that means you can only receive SNAP for three months, within three years unless you work for 20 hours a week or 80 hours a month. And so those new rules are gonna apply to a bunch of different groups.  It’s gonna apply to adults that are ages 55 to 64 and they don’t have dependents and it used to be 18 to 54. So it’s expanded that group without dependents, it’s gonna apply to caregivers or parents that have children that are aged 14 or older. It used to be aged 18. And then previously exempt groups are being pulled in. So veterans, people experiencing homelessness, and youth aging out of foster care. So to make that more concrete, take a single mom, she has a 15-year-old child and she’s working part-time to take care of her child and she loses her eligibility. Her family’s overall monthly SNAP assistance will go from $546 a month to $298 a month. So that’s a huge shift for a family. 

 

And then the third thing that’s happening is that there’s gonna be a big shift in the cost of the program towards the states. And so historically SNAP and the federal government have split the administrative costs of the program. Now that’s a smaller amount of the overall pie of the program. And, but now what’s gonna happen beginning in fiscal year 2027 or this October, is that states are responsible for 75% of administrative costs. So that’s millions of dollars that states will have to start paying. The bigger change for states is gonna happen in the next fiscal year, fiscal year ‘28. For the very first time states will have to pay a share of the SNAP benefits, and that’s gonna range from 5% to 15% based on their payment error rates. And what payment error rates are referring to is the amount that a family is under or overpaid for their SNAP benefit. 

 

Now this is where states could face huge, huge amounts of money. And so just to give you an example, if a state has an error rate over 10%, then they will have to pay 15% of benefits when this goes into effect. 

 

SREENIVASAN: Wow. 

 

BLEICH: So in fiscal year – it’s huge. So in fiscal year ‘24, North Carolina’s error rate was 10.2%. The state received $2.9 billion in annual SNAP benefits for people in the state. Based on this new penalty, North Carolina would owe $440 million. And so states are really scrambling to try to work on their payment error rates right now.

 

SREENIVASAN: So if you suddenly have a new payment, if you’re a state, of $440 million that you didn’t plan for, what are your options? I mean, could states just say, you know what, how about I just turn SNAP off altogether?

 

BLEICH: They can. They can and it remains to be seen what will happen. But yes, states could choose to exit the program entirely, which would leave millions of families without a lifeline for food.

 

SREENIVASAN: When you look at the larger timeline here, why do you think that this is happening at this juncture now? I mean were there economic preconditions? Were there any kinds of, you know, fraud, waste and abuse? Were there red flags that were going up that said SNAP needs significant structural reform and these sorts of cuts are what’s necessary?

 

BLEICH: Yeah, that’s a great question. So it’s important that we separate fraud from payment error. So fraud is intentionally trying to remove money from the program. And actually fraud rates in SNAP are very low. They’re even low relative to other safety net programs that the government runs. So when it comes to fraud, SNAP is doing quite well. So another question then is, so what’s happening with payment error rates and why have they gone up? And the reality is they have gone up in recent years, but the question is, why? So one of the things that happened during COVID is that temporary measures were put in place with the goal of helping families to maintain or to create access to SNAP because the goal was, we need to control food insecurity. 

 

If you remember, I mentioned that when the great recession happened and there was a big upswing in the number of people on SNAP, there was also a big upswing in food insecurity because families just didn’t have enough. With the increases that happened with the enrollment into SNAP, food insecurity was actually kept very steady at about 10% during COVID, which was a huge achievement and a testament to how powerful the program could be. And so basically these temporary changes that were put in place by the federal government were basically designed to help states with this enormous caseload that they were having to deal with. And so states had a number of options and most of them took advantage of one of the three options. So they could waive the interview requirements during the application or recertification. They could extend the certification in periods to reduce the number of times you have to reapply. And you could even use telephone signatures to streamline remote application processing. 

 

Now one thing that’s important, important to know is that the payment error rates are really reflecting unintentional mistakes made by the state agency or the applicants. And so that could include you make a miscalculation or there’s incomplete information. Again, the priority during COVID was to keep the food assistance flowing. But it’s gonna be a real challenge for states to actually reign these payment error rates in by fiscal year 2028 in part because there’s this compressed timeline and there’s this been this big reduction in force by the Trump administration and so there are fewer people in place to do all of this administrative work.

 

SREENIVASAN: One of the things that people who are supporting these changes say is, look, it shouldn’t be that difficult for you to document that you’re working 20 hours a week. What’s wrong with that idea?

 

BLEICH: Yeah, well one thing that’s really important to know is that there is a misconception that people who are in SNAP are not working. What the vast majority of literature shows is that people who can work, do work. And so what this time limit requirement is, which again is expanding the number of people that have to respond to this stricter time limit. And if they don’t, they only get benefits for three months out of three years. It’s really just a paperwork requirement because here’s what has to happen in practice. Again, most people who can work, do work. Now you’re subject to this additional rule. You have to personally document it, you have to submit it to the state agency. The state agency then has to document the fact that you are still eligible to receive benefits. So it’s creating a massive amount of paperwork and there’s not enough people to process all this paperwork. And so it’s just gonna gum up the system.

 

SREENIVASAN: Okay. So what about a population that might be qualifying who have mixed immigrant households? Right? So the child might be born in the United States, US citizen, eligible for SNAP benefits, but maybe one of the parents is not. And I wonder if what we’ve been living through for the last year or so, the increased deportations, the focus on, you know, ICE raids in different parts of the country, whether that’s affecting who will bother to register and what happens to the child who’s eligible for the benefits in the first place?

 

BLEICH: Yeah, it’s an excellent point. So it is definitely the case that confusion about who is eligible for SNAP right now, particularly among mixed immigrant households, is very, very high. We’ve seen this in the past, we’re definitely seeing it now. So it’s very possible that individuals who could get benefits for their children but not for themselves are opting not to apply because there’s a fear that it will impact immigration status. Another change that happened through HR1 as well is that it ended eligibility for people with lawful immigration status, which adds to the confusion right now as to who or who is not eligible for SNAP benefits.

 

SREENIVASAN: Oftentimes we hear from teachers in classrooms that, you know, look, if if a kid’s not fed overnight, or if the school is literally the only place that they’re getting one meal a day and there is no SNAP benefits, there is no food stamp, et cetera at home that they don’t concentrate as well, et cetera. What are the other kinds of costs that we’re not thinking about that when these SNAP benefits disappear that we’re gonna eventually kind of collectively pay for in different ways?

 

BLEICH: So again, one of the main things that SNAP is doing, it’s protecting families from food insecurity. And food insecurity is not just the problem that households have limited or uncertain access to food or that they’re hungry. We also know from lots of literature that if a household or an individual has food insecurity, there are all sorts of negative health outcomes and academic health outcomes that are associated with that. So on the health outcome side, it’s things like heart disease and type two diabetes and hypertension. There’s even an increased risk of birth defects, greater risk for cognitive problems and even mental illness. And of course if you’re a child in school and your family receives SNAP benefits and those benefits go away, then you’re hungry. And if you’re hungry you’re not focused. And so then academic achievement becomes an issue. And when you wrap up all those costs together, when you look at food insecurity and its relationship to health and education, that costs the country about $179 billion annually.

 

SREENIVASAN: Right now there’s also this kind of political impetus to try to make America healthy again. Right? And you and your colleagues have kind of written about reframing this discussion about food insecurity and benefits. And I’m wondering is there some sort of political path here where these two ideologies could have some overlap and see the benefit in having people fed?

 

BLEICH: Yeah, so the, you know, the platform, the Make America Healthy Again platform is premised on the idea that chronic disease is high, which is true. And that those rates need to be brought down, especially among children, which is also true. The platform makes an enormous amount of sense, in theory. The challenge is that the way the platform is being implemented is that we are seeing these changes like these massive cat cuts to SNAP, which are completely undermining the ability of the MAHA platform. So I think that there is a lot of opportunity for MAHA to have impact, but the changes that we’re seeing as part of this administration are really working for counter purposes.

 

SREENIVASAN: You know, I’m speaking to you now as a professor at one of the most prestigious institutions in America, Harvard. Right? And in, I’ve read in your profile that as a child growing up in inner city Baltimore, that your family benefited from SNAP and WIC.

 

BLEICH: That’s exactly right. So growing up in – I grew up in inner city Baltimore in a low income working class neighborhood. And my parents were public school teachers. I have a twin sister, I have an older brother. When we were really little, my mom stepped out of the workforce to take care of us and we received SNAP benefits for a period. We received WIC benefits for a period. It was a critical lifeline for my family. And so it’s been a real honor to be able to work on these programs professionally and to be an alumni of these programs ’cause I know firsthand how impactful they can be.

 

SREENIVASAN: What are the impacts that we’re going to start seeing that, you know and is supported by the data in two years, five years when these populations of SNAP shrink?

 

BLEICH: Yeah. So one thing we’ve seen, just in terms of the shrinkage, the law was passed, HR1 was passed in July of 2025. 6 months later in February, so just a few months ago, SNAP enrollment had gone down by three and a half million or about 9%. So the reduction of the program is happening and it’s happening very quickly. 

It’s also important to understand that if someone loses SNAP benefits because of the changes that are happening through HR1, it can also disrupt their access to other federal safety net programs. So you lose Medicaid, you also lose SNAP, and then families are facing this tidal wave of impacts and they will not have resources to deal with them. 

 

A final point to mention as all these things are happening is that we are losing our ability to actually measure these impacts because the national monitoring system, which was the Household Food securities report, which comes out annually, that’s been eliminated. The last data came out in January, 2025. And it will not be going forward. And so without those metrics to understand what impact are all these changes having on food insecurity, what we’re likely to see is that we’re gonna start focusing on program costs. We’re gonna start focusing on error rates. We’re not gonna be focusing on the thing that SNAP is designed to address, which is food insecurity. And so that gives me a great, a great amount of concern in the coming five years.

 

SREENIVASAN: Professor of Public Health Policy at Harvard, Sara Naomi Bleich, thanks so much for joining us.

 

BLEICH: Thank you for having me.