SNAP helps support retail sector

The purpose of government is a much more essential question than the framing we more often use to describe it, much less the criteria we use to select our leaders. But a new study from an interdisciplinary team of UGA researchers sheds some light on the positive effects of a supplemental program as much more broad than typically considered:

Increased enrollment in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program in Georgia contributed to the growth of grocery retailers at all levels from 2007 to 2014.

A new paper from University of Georgia researchers used U. S. Department of Agriculture and Georgia Division of Family and Children Services data sets to track the increase in retailers accepting SNAP benefits during what is known as the Great Recession.

The publicly available data suggest that increased enrollment in the program improves access to food for SNAP beneficiaries by acting as an indirect subsidy to retailers.

The study, "Growth in SNAP Retailers Was Associated With Increased Client Enrollment in Georgia During the Great Recession," was published in the November issue of Health Affairs. The paper connects enrollment increases with the growth in the number of food retailers.

The researchers divided food stores into four categories: large, midsize, small and specialty retailers. Between 2008 and 2011, the number of SNAP enrollees increased by 87 percent; between 2007 and 2014, the number of SNAP retailers in Georgia increased by 82 percent, primarily due to growth in the number of small retailers.

Though often lumped in with so-called 'entitlement' programs (which it technically is not, at any rate), SNAP is just as deliberately designed to support retailers during tough economic times. It's another measure of what we choose to do with resources that has a major positive impact on the economic health of the country. Great work by Shannon and colleagues from sociology, the College of Public Health, and the College of Family and Consumer Sciences.