America’s “Thrifty Food Plan”: Hunger, Mathematics, and the Valuation of Nutrition Assistance

Abstract

The Thrifty Food Plan (TFP) determines maximum entitlements (i.e., food stamp allotments) for participants of the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP); it was last modified in 2006 by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion (CNPP). The TFP is a low-cost diet generated from a geometric program that incorporates data on current consumption patterns, federal nutritional and dietary guidelines, nutrient profiles of food groups, food prices, and predetermined budgets for seventeen age–sex groups. Scholars have previously critiqued the TFP for excluding labor time, underestimating household food waste, and ignoring geographical variation in food prices. In this article, I apply literatures from critical food studies and political economy of food to further deconstruct the TFP data and geometric program. I argue that the TFP reifies an industrial neoliberal capitalist valuation of food via federal dietary guidelines and relative price data. Moreover, the CNPP’s use of current consumption data as a proxy for palatability works to naturalize and depoliticize the structural and social inequalities of national and global food systems. Finally, a critical evaluation of the TFP mathematics reveals an unstable geometric program that requires multiple subjective manipulations to solve. This analysis shows that the TFP calculation reproduces a food budget insufficient for SNAP households to procure nutritious, culturally appropriate diets, essentially doing work to perpetuate hunger and poverty in the United States. I offer recommendations for changing this national valuation of food and nutrition assistance. Key Words: EBT, food justice, food security, food stamps, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.

节俭食品计划（“TFP”）明确了联邦补充营养援助计划（SNAP）参与者所享有的最大权利（即食品券分配）。该计划上一次修改是在 2006 年，由美国农业部营养政策和促进中心（CNPP）进行。TFP 作为一个低成本饮食方案，其几何程式的依据涵盖了当前消费模式、联邦营养和饮食指南、食物种类营养特征、食品价格以及对十七个年龄性别组的预算数据。此前曾有学者批评TFP未考虑劳动时间，低估了家庭食物浪费问题，忽视了食品价格的地理差异。在本文中，我根据批判性食品研究和食品政治经济学的文献，进一步解读TFP数据和几何程式依据。我认为，TFP 通过联邦饮食指南和相对价格数据，具体体现了食品工业新自由主义的资本化估价。此外，CNPP 利用当前消费数据作为适口性的替代指标，有助于对国家和全球粮食系统的结构以及社会不平等现象，进行归化和去政治化。最后，对 TFP 数学的批判性评估也揭示这是一个不稳定的几何程式，需要多种主观判断来解决。这一分析表明，TFP 计算所再现的是预算，不足以让 SNAP 计划的家庭购买足够营养、符合文化的食物，它的作品在根本上仍然无法解决美国的饥饿和贫穷问题。此外，本人还为改变国家对食品和营养援助的评估提出了建议。关键词：EBT、食物正义、食品安全、食品券、补充营养援助计划。

El Plan de Ahorro Alimentario (TFP, sigla en inglés) determina los máximos derechos de subsidio (esto es, reparto de estampillas de alimentos) para los participantes en el Programa Suplementario de Ayuda para la Nutrición (SNAP), un programa federal; éste fue modificado en 2006 por el Centro para las Políticas y Promoción de la Nutrición (CNPP) del Departamento de Agricultura de los EE.UU. El TFP es una dieta de bajo costo generada desde un programa geométrico que incorpora datos sobre los actuales patrones de consumo, guías federales de nutrición y dieta, perfiles nutricionales de grupos de alimentos, precios de los alimentos y presupuestos predeterminados para grupos por sexo de los diecisiete años de edad. Los estudiosos de estos temas ya han criticado al TFP por excluir tiempo de trabajo y por subestimar el desperdicio de alimentos en el hogar e ignorar la variación geográfica de los precios de los alimentos. En este artículo, utilizamos literaturas relacionadas con estudios críticos sobre los alimentos y trabajos de economía política de los alimentos, para deconstruir aún más los datos del TFP y del programa geométrico. Yo sostengo que el TFP reifica una valoración industrial neoliberal capitalista de los alimentos vía las guías dietéticas federales y los datos de precios relativos. Más todavía, el uso de datos actuales sobre consumo del CNPP a manera de un proxy de comida apetitosa se orienta a naturalizar y despolitizar las desigualdades estructurales y sociales de los sistemas alimentarios nacionales y globales. Por último, una evaluación crítica de las matemáticas del TFP revela el problema de un programa geométrico inestable que exige para solucionarlo múltiples manipulaciones subjetivas. Este análisis muestra que el cálculo del TFP reproduce un presupuesto alimentario insuficiente para procurar dietas nutritivas y culturalmente apropiadas a los hogares del SNAP, esencialmente acometiendo esfuerzos para perpetuar el hambre y la pobreza en los Estados Unidos. Presento unas recomendaciones para cambiar la valoración nacional de la ayuda alimentaria y nutricional. Palabras clave: EBT, justicia alimentaria, seguridad alimentaria, estampillas de alimentos, Programa Suplementario de Ayuda para la Nutrición.

Acknowledgments

Many thanks to Dan Knudsen, Rebecca Lave, and James Farmer for their mentorship and guidance on this research project. I am furthermore grateful for many insightful conversations with colleagues from the Indiana University Department of Geography, as well as the constructive feedback from three anonymous reviewers that improved this article.

Notes

  1 Nutrition assistance programs account for 79 percent of funds allocated by the 2014 U.S. Farm Bill, which allocates almost $100 billion total in federal spending every year. An analysis of C-SPAN videos over the last thirty years revealed that the TFP has been mentioned just twelve times and discussed for a total 51.5 minutes.

  2 “Food groups” in the TFP are fifty-eight food groups specified by the CNPP, distilled from more than 6,000 food groups captured in the NHANES.

  3 Current consumption patterns were taken from NHANES, and a price data set was constructed by A. C. Nielsen to reflect the average prices paid by the lowest income quartile of Americans.

  4 IOM caloric standards for the TFP were based on 2002 estimated energy requirements at three physical activity levels: sedentary, moderately active, and active. Caloric standards used in the TFP represent a mix of physical activity levels across age–sex groups. Specific standards were 1,000 calories for children aged one; 1,200 calories for children aged two and three; 1,400 calories for children aged four and five; 1,600 calories for children aged six to eight; 2,000 calories for children aged nine to eleven; 2,400 calories for males aged twelve and thirteen; 3,000 calories for males aged fourteen to eighteen; 2,800 calories for males aged nineteen to fifty; 2,600 calories for males aged fifty-one to seventy; 2,200 calories for males aged seventy-one and older; 2,200 calories for females aged twelve to seventy; and 1,800 calories for females aged seventy-one and older.

  5 Whereas the DGAs specify nutrient recommendations (e.g., calcium, iron, potassium), the MyPyramid Guidelines specify food group recommendations (e.g., fruit, dairy, grains)

  6 “The 2001–2002 Food Price Database was created by CNPP with assistance from USDA’s Economic Research Service and USDA’s Food and Nutrition Service by merging information about food from NHANES with national data on food prices from the 2001–2002 A.C. Nielsen Homescan™ Panel (2005). This panel contains the prices paid for food items by 16,821 households, selected and weighted to reflect the U.S. population, in the 48 coterminous States. Foods purchased at supermarkets, convenience stores, warehouse clubs, mass merchandisers, and drug stores are included” (Carlson et al. 2007, 4).

  7 This approach is in response to a mid-twentieth-century argument that an economical food budget calculation cannot reasonably include cultural appropriateness or palatability (Stigler 1946).

  8 Current consumption data are from the NHANES conducted biannually by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The survey includes a twenty-four-hour dietary recall and longer form food consumption interview. For the official 2006 TFP calculation, the USDA used 2001–2002 NHANES consumption data for the lowest income quartile of Americans.

  9 Current consumption from NHANES is reduced to fifteen age–gender groups, and then four of these groups are used to make up a “representative” household, composed of one female aged nineteen to fifty, one male aged nineteen to fifty, one child aged nine to eleven, and one child aged six to eight. The majority represented is the nuclear heteronormative white family, and all others are symbolically left out.

10 NHANES includes two twenty-four-hour dietary recalls in a longer form survey. Although capturing what people are eating, the NHANES data do not distinguish by source of food, which can include socially unacceptable sources such as food pantries and charity.

11 Low-cost red meat regular fat, regular-cost red meat regular fat, low-cost red meat lean, regular-cost red meat lean, low-cost fish regular fat, regular-cost fish regular fat, low-cost fish lean, regular-cost fish lean, low-cost poultry regular fat, regular-cost poultry regular fat, low-cost poultry lean, regular-cost poultry lean, lunch meat regular fat, lunch meat lean, eggs and egg mixtures, meat poultry and fish mixtures regular fat, meat poultry and fish mixtures lean, legumes, and nut and seeds

12 These calculations have been separated from each other such that accountability and understanding are lost in the process. One of my interviewees was shocked to find out that SNAP households did not receive at least the TFP budget—it was misperceived as a minimal allotment rather than the maximum. There are assumptions that limitations are worked out in the next set of calculations but there is no understanding of what those calculations actually are.

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Notes on contributors

Angela M. Babb

ANGELA M. BABB is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Ostrom Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis at Indiana University, Bloomington, IN 47405. E-mail: [email protected]. Her research interests include political economy of hunger and federal valuations of food, poverty, and nutrition assistance.