The persistence of disadvantage across generations is a central concern for social policy in the United States. While an extensive literature has focused on income mobility, much less is known about the persistence of material hardship. Using the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, we estimate the intergenerational persistence of food insecurity. Childhood food insecurity is associated with at least 10 percentage points higher probability of food insecurity as an adult, with estimates varying by severity of childhood exposure, life-course timing, and accounting for endogeneity and underreporting. We explore potential mechanisms behind this persistence related to perceptions, behaviors, and human capital.
PSID
The University of Michigan's Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) is the longest continuously running longitudinal survey in the world. It began in 1968 as a survey of 4,802 American families and has followed the same parents, along with their children and grandchildren as they split off to form their own households, so that today there are more than 11,000 PSID families and 25,000 individuals. The topics in the survey span work, welfare, family structure, income, consumption, health, and wealth, making the PSID ideally suited for the study of household behaviors over time and across generations. The USDA sponsored the 18-item Household Food Security Module on the 1999, 2001, and 2003 survey years, along with the 1997 Child Development Supplement. The USDA Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) subsequently provided funding to include the food security module on the 2014 PSID Child Development Supplement (CDS) survey and starting with 2015 on the biennial core PSID surveys. This offers the first opportunity to answer key pressing scientific and policy issues such as the persistence of food insecurity within and across generations, and how changes in food security affect and are affected by the level and change in consumption, wealth, and broader measures of health.
UKCPR partnered with the USDA's Economic Research Service and the USDA Food and Nutrition Service to launch a competitively awarded grants program in 2017. The first round of projects were completed at the end of 2018.
2025
2021
Effects of welfare reform on household food insecurity across generations
This study estimated the effects of welfare reform in the 1990s, which permanently restructured and contracted the cash assistance system in the U.S., on food insecurity—a fundamental form of hardship—of the next generation of young adults. An implicit goal underlying welfare reform was the disruption of an assumed intergenerational transmission of disadvantage; however, little is known about the effects of welfare reform on the well-being of the next generation. Using intergenerational data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics and a variation on a difference in differences framework, this study exploits 3 key sources of variation in childhood exposure to welfare reform: (1) Risk of exposure across birth cohorts. (2) Variation of exposure within cohorts because different states implemented welfare reform in different years. (3) Variation between individuals with the same exposure who were more likely and less likely to rely on welfare. We found that longer exposure to welfare reform led to decreases in food insecurity of the next generation of households, by about 10% for a 5-year increase in exposure, with stronger effects for women, individuals exposed at least 13 years, individuals exposed at relatively young ages (0-5 years), and individuals whose mothers were not high school dropouts. We found no evidence that Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program benefits explained any of the observed effects.
Long-term impacts of college students' food insecurity on future socioeconomic status, wealth, and food insecurity
Food insecurity, a condition of limited access to nutritious food, is a critical issue for college students’ health and well-being. In this report, we present results from our project that examines the long-term effects of college students’ food insecurity on future socioeconomic status, wealth, and food insecurity using nationally representative data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. Our study population included 1,574 individuals who were enrolled in college between 1999-2003, aged 16-29 years old during college enrollment, and remained in the sample through 2015-17. We examined the associations of interest using a combination of linear, logistic, multinomial logistic, and fixed-effects regression models, adjusting for sociodemographic characteristics measured concurrent with college enrollment or during childhood. In the sample, the prevalence of food insecurity during college was 14.9%. College food insecurity was associated with lower odds of college completion and lower likelihood of obtaining a Bachelor’s degree or a graduate or professional degree. These associations were more pronounced among first-generation college students. College food insecurity was also associated with lower mean labor wage income and lower wealth accumulation (including home equity) across subsequent survey waves between 2005-2019. Finally, college food insecurity was associated with a higher prevalence of food insecurity in the later adult years (measured in 2015-17). Results suggest that college food insecurity has long-term implications for socioeconomic outcomes in adulthood. Future research should focus on the role of programs and policies that can break the cycle of chronic food insecurity and poverty over the life course.
Examination of food security dynamics in the presence of measurement error
We examine intra- and intergenerational food security dynamics in the United States using longitudinal data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) while accounting for measurement error. To proceed, we apply recently developed methods on the partial identification of transition matrices. We show that accounting for measurement error is crucial as even modest errors can dwarf the information contained in the data. Nonetheless, we find that much can be learned under fairly weak assumptions; the strongest and most informative being that measurement errors are serially uncorrelated. While the evidence of both intragenerational and intergenerational is consistent with significant mobility, we also find food security status to be persistent for at least some households in the tails of the distribution. Finally, we document some heterogeneities in the dynamics across households differentiated by race and education.
The impact of wealth and debt on children's risk of household food insecurity
In the United States, almost one in seven households with children have limited access to food. The problem of food insecurity is closely tied to a household’s financial circumstances. Yet, prior research has paid insufficient attention to the financial risk factors beyond poverty that impact food insecurity. Lack of liquid financial assets may compromise a household’s ability to smooth consumption during income shortfalls, while debt obligations, such as debt from credit cards or medical bills, may deplete financial resources and constrain food budgets. Using longitudinal data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) and mixed effects growth curve models, I estimate associations of household debt and liquid assets with food insecurity among households with children. Additionally, I disaggregate household debt by amount and type of debt incurred, including debt from housing, student loans, credit cards, medical bills, and other sources of unsecured debt. Results indicate significant heterogeneity in wealth and debt profiles based on food security status. Further, debt from unpaid medical bills, other sources of unsecured debt, and student loans increase the odds of household food insecurity net of income and other household characteristics. I also find that lack of liquid assets is an important determinant of food insecurity, independent of household income and debt. Considering the full spectrum of household finances, including lack of financial assets and specific debt obligations, is essential for identifying at-risk households and alleviating the problem of food insecurity.
Food security and policy effects by family size: How does quality of well-being depend on quantity of children?
We investigate the intersection of family size, food security, and the efficacy of public benefits, especially with respect to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). Food security literature pays scant attention to the role of number of children in a household – an important dimension for understanding family resource and food assistance adequacy in the context of child well-being. We exploit longitudinal food security data within the Panel Study of Income Dynamics to explore how food security status and family resources change when families change in size, particularly with the addition of children. Gundersen et al. (2018) flagged large families as a group for consideration in any future SNAP reform, which motivates the need for evidence on the dynamics of family size, program benefits, and child food security. We focus on the subsample of SNAP recipients to address the question of how well program benefits meet the needs of families of varying sizes, as defined by a geographically price-adjusted Thrifty Food Plan, as well as how an additional family member, or child, affects the probability of being food insecure and how family size intersects with the likelihood of being extramarginal (no food spending beyond SNAP assistance), the size of the average food resource gap between spending and needs, and the adequacy of SNAP benefits in meeting food needs. Our findings provide key insight on the responsiveness of food assistance programs to changes in family composition and needs. Importantly, this study supports future research and policy design with respect to child well-being in larger families.
Food security dynamics in the United States: Insights using a new measure
This paper introduces a new measure, the probability of food security (PFS), to study food security dynamics in the United States. PFS represents the estimated probability that a household's food expenditures equal or exceed the minimum cost of a healthful diet, as reflected in the United States Department of Agriculture's Thrifty Food Plan monthly cost estimates. PFS matches the official food security prevalence measure in a given period but enables richer study of the dynamics and severity of food insecurity. Applied to 2001-17 data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, we find that roughly half of households that become newly food insecure resume food security within two years. But the positive association of persistence with prior food insecurity means that half to two-thirds of food insecure households at any given time remain food insecure at least two years later. PFS varies dramatically with income and demographic characteristics, such that inter-group prevalence and severity measures differ by one or two orders of magnitude. Households headed by non-White women with low educational attainment disproportionately suffer persistent, chronic food insecurity, while White-headed households without a college degree account for most of the business cycle-associated variation in national food insecurity.
2019
Food insecurity in the PSID: A comparison with the levels, trends, and determinants in the CPS 1999-2017
Food insecurity, defined as a household-level economic and social condition of limited or uncertain access to adequate food, is a substantial threat to public health in the United States. In 2017, nearly 12% of households reported being food insecure, affecting over 40 million persons. Numerous studies have documented that food insecurity is associated with substantive negative health outcomes among children and families, and leads to excessive health care expenditures. In this paper we compare the levels, trends, and determinants of food insecurity in the University of Michigan’s Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) to those from the official source of food security statistics in the U.S.—the Food Security Supplement of the Current Population Survey—from 1999-2017. The PSID, which was begun in 1968, is the leading longitudinal household survey on work, welfare, family structure, consumption, health, and wealth. The survey added measures of food security in the 1999-2003 waves, and again in the 2015-2017 waves. This offers the first opportunity to answer key pressing scientific and policy issues such as the persistence of food insecurity within and across generations, and how changes in food security affect and are affected by the level and change in consumption, wealth, and broader measures of health. This paper aims to describe how well levels and trends in food insecurity in the PSID align with the CPS, and the sources of why they might differ. In addition, we examine the robustness of key model predictors of food insecurity—income, race, education, disability status, marital status—across the surveys. We find that, although the estimated food insecurity rates in the PSID are lower than those in the CPS, the trends over time in the two datasets are similar. Food insecurity rates in the PSID and CPS converge from the 1998-2002 period to the 2014-16 period when food insecurity rates closely match those in the CPS. Our findings, taken as a whole, lend credence to the use of the PSID for food insecurity research.
The long-term health consequences of childhood food insecurity
This study examined the long-term consequences of frequency, timing, and severity of food insecurity exposure in childhood on health and health care utilization in adulthood using nearly 20 years of data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. The findings provide evidence of the long-lasting health effects of childhood food insecurity. Young adults who experienced food insecurity as children have higher psychological distress, even when adjusting for childhood socioeconomic status, parent’s health, health during childhood, and food insecurity during adulthood. More severe and more frequent episodes of childhood food insecurity are related to worse psychological distress during adulthood, but even marginal food security and single episodes of food insecurity appear to be related to worse psychological distress during adulthood. Very low food security during childhood also appears to be related to worse physical health during adulthood. Using instrumental variables to adjust for selection into the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), this study also finds some evidence that receipt of SNAP during childhood appears to reduce the effects of childhood food insecurity on health during adulthood.
Does early food insecurity impede the educational access needed to become food secure?
This paper examines the role of educaitonal investment as a mechanism for the intergenerational transmission of food insecurity. Specifically, we examine how food insecurity during childhood may reduce post-secondary educational infestments, which, in turn, may increase food insecurity during adulthood. Recent work on families and teenagers suggests that teenage employment may contribute to increased food security of children in a household. Teenagers who choose work over educational engagement during high school may not be poised to make the educational ivnestments needed to achieve food security as adults.