Small Area Income & Poverty Estimates

SAIPE - Model Input Data

SNAP Benefits data

Note that the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program is the new name for the federal Food Stamp Program, as of October 1, 2008.

The SNAP benefits data represent the number of participants in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) for each state, county, and the District of Columbia from 1981 to 2006.

The state level files contain the number of SNAP benefits recipients by month, and the county level files contain the number of recipients in July of each year.

Outliers of the food stamp data at the state level are smoothed on the basis of time series analysis. Outliers are smoothed starting in January of 1981 except for NE, NJ, NM, RI and TN, where smoothing starts in January of 1992; FL and WV, where smoothing starts in January of 1993; WA, where smoothing starts in January of 1995; and WY, where smoothing starts in March of 1997.

The number of SNAP benefits recipients in Alaska and Hawaii are adjusted downward because the income eligibility thresholds for these states are higher than they are for states in the continental U.S.

The county SNAP benefits totals are raked to the state totals which are also provided in the data files. These values may not match those in the state files (except for the most recent years) because these data are used in the actual production for the specified year. Also note, for the 1995 poverty estimates and onward, the state totals in the county SNAP benefits files are based on the average number of SNAP benefits recipients over twelve consecutive months. For example, the 2000 model uses an average over the period July 2000 through June 2001.

More information on how the SAIPE program uses SNAP benefits data in the models can be found at SNAP benefits recipients.