All Research
Commentary
What To Do About Benefit Cliffs?
Everyone wants poor families to work their way off welfare and ascend the income ladder….
Commentary
The Welfare Program You Never Heard About During the Shutdown
Americans have heard plenty about how, effective November 1, the federal government shutdown suspended regular…
Commentary
Why the USDA Is Justified in Ending the Food Security Survey
The USDA announced plans to discontinue future Household Food Security reports, ending the annual supplemental…
Commentary
Perspective on the OBBBA’s SNAP Cuts
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimated that the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA) will reduce federal spending for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) by $186.7 billion over the next 10 years. While these reductions are substantial, they require important context.
Commentary
The Share of Medicaid Recipients in Compliance with the House Bill’s Community Engagement Requirement
The reconciliation proposal approved by the House Committee on Energy and Commerce in 2025 would impose community engagement requirements on nondisabled, working-age Medicaid recipients without dependent children, requiring at least 80 hours per month of work, training, education, or community service during a specified number of months to maintain eligibility. Analysis using Survey of Income and Program Participation data indicates that, as of December 2022, 44–60 percent of the 18.2 million recipients subject to the requirement would already be in compliance, depending on how many months of participation states require. As a result, 7.3 million–10.3 million recipients would need to increase their work or other qualifying activities to retain Medicaid coverage.
Commentary
The Case for Shifting More Welfare Costs to States
As part of Congressional Republicans’ drive to craft “one big beautiful bill” reflecting Donald Trump’s…
Commentary
SNAP is About Nutrition: My Response to Zycher
In a recent blog post, my AEI colleague Benjamin Zycher took issue with a letter…
Commentary
In Case of Emergency, Open Block Grant: Part 2
Congress’s efforts to produce “one big, beautiful bill” that reflects President Donald Trump’s tax and…
Commentary
In Case of Emergency, Open Block Grant: Part 1
Congress’s efforts to produce “one big, beautiful bill” that reflects President Donald Trump’s tax and…
Commentary
A Model for Effective and Reasonable Work Requirements
As Congress considers instituting work requirements to maintain eligibility for Medicaid, it is illustrative to…
Commentary
What Do You Call an Automatic Stabilizer that Doesn’t Shrink When Conditions Improve? The Biden Food Stamps Blowout
Last month the Wall Street Journal editorial board (“The Great Biden Welfare Blowout”) reviewed the…
Commentary
President Trump’s USDA Should Fix Food Stamp Work Requirement Waivers
A 2019 regulation would tighten the criteria states use to waive Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program work requirements for able-bodied adults without dependents. Under existing policy, states can qualify for waivers using several broad criteria and can group contiguous areas together, allowing many counties to receive waivers even when unemployment rates are relatively low. Using county-level data from 1997 to 2023, simulations show that the 2019 rule would substantially reduce waiver eligibility, increase the responsiveness of waivers to changes in local unemployment, and better target waivers to areas with the weakest labor markets.