In a move that will please taxpayers and infuriate the usual hand-wringers, the Trump administration quietly pulled the plug on an Economic Research Service program that tracked “food insecurity” — a data stream long used by advocates to gin up headlines and pressure for endless welfare expansions.
The timing wasn’t accidental: the program was shuttered after the One Big Beautiful Bill tightened up SNAP rules, bringing much-needed discipline to a program that had ballooned without consequence:
The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced the termination of future Household Food Security Reports. These redundant, costly, politicized, and extraneous studies do nothing more than fear monger.
For 30 years, this study—initially created by the Clinton administration as a means to support the increase of SNAP eligibility and benefit allotments—failed to present anything more than subjective, liberal fodder. Trends in the prevalence of food insecurity have remained virtually unchanged, regardless of an over 87% increase in SNAP spending between 2019 – 2023.
USDA will continue to prioritize statutory requirements and where necessary, use the bevy of more timely and accurate data sets available to it.
Needless to say, people who rely on this scam reacted with the usual hand-wringing, per the WSJ:
Employees inside the USDA as well as economists outside the agency who work closely with the data reacted with shock and anger as word spread about the cancellation.
“For the past 30 years, the USDA food insecurity measure has provided insight into the extent that American families have been able to cover their food needs,” said Colleen Heflin, a professor at Syracuse University, who has been studying the data since its inception and learned of its cancellation. “Not having this measure for 2025 is particularly troubling given the current rise in inflation and deterioration of labor market conditions, two conditions known to increase food insecurity.”
They love the scary soundbite — “X children go to bed hungry in America” — because it gets clicks, donations and marching orders. But that headline? It almost always comes from the USDA’s food-insecurity survey — a household questionnaire that’s been repackaged by interest groups and sympathetic reporters as a direct count of “hunger.”
Here’s a sample of what the survey actually asked:
Which of these statements best describes the food eaten in your household in the last 12 months: —enough of the kinds of food (I/we) want to eat; —enough, but not always the kinds of food (I/we) want; —sometimes not enough to eat; or, —often not enough to eat?
[1] Enough of the kinds of food we want to eat
[2] Enough but not always the kinds of food we want
[3] Sometimes not enough to eat
[4] Often not enough to eat
[ ] DK or Refused
The first statement is “(I/We) worried whether (my/our) food would run out before (I/we) got money to buy more.” Was that often true, sometimes true, or never true for (you/your household) in the last 12 months?
[ ] Often true
[ ] Sometimes true
[ ] Never true
[ ] DK or Refused
HH3. “The food that (I/we) bought just didn’t last, and (I/we) didn’t have money to get more.” Was that often, sometimes, or never true for (you/your household) in the last 12 months?
[ ] Often true
[ ] Sometimes true
[ ] Never true
[ ] DK or Refused
HH4. “(I/we) couldn’t afford to eat balanced meals.” Was that often, sometimes, or never true for (you/your household) in the last 12 months?
[ ] Often true
[ ] Sometimes true
[ ] Never true
[ ] DK or Refused
Let’s be blunt: that survey is a proxy, not a hunger meter. It asks people whether they worried about running out of food or cut meals because of money. It does not measure calories, clinical malnutrition, or the literal number of children going to bed hungry. So before we start rewriting policy based on a sound bite, we ought to ask what the questions actually capture — and stop treating every alarmist estimate as gospel.