IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jfpoli/v124y2024ics0306919224000174.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The effect of universal free school meals on children’s food hardship

Author

Listed:
  • Toossi, Saied

Abstract

In the United States, the federal government subsidized universal free school meals (UFSM) nationwide during the COVID-19 pandemic. This policy ended in June 2022. In response, several state governments subsidized extensions of UFSM statewide into the 2022–2023 school year. I leverage variation in state extensions of UFSM to examine the policy’s impact on school meal participation and rates of food insufficiency. Using data from the Household Pulse Survey and a difference-in-differences approach, I find that children in states that did not extend UFSM were 12.6 percentage points less likely (38.3% reduction over the sample mean) to participate in school meal programs and 1.5 percentage points more likely (9.8% increase over the sample mean) to experience food insufficiency relative to those in states that did.

Suggested Citation

  • Toossi, Saied, 2024. "The effect of universal free school meals on children’s food hardship," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 124(C).
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:jfpoli:v:124:y:2024:i:c:s0306919224000174
    DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2024.102606
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306919224000174
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.foodpol.2024.102606?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Toossi, Saied, 2023. "Cost of School Meals and Households’ Difficulty Paying for Expenses: Evidence from the Household Pulse Survey," Economic Brief 340805, United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service.
    2. Marcus, Michelle & Yewell, Katherine G., 2022. "The Effect of Free School Meals on Household Food Purchases: Evidence from the Community Eligibility Provision," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(C).
    3. Valizadeh, Pourya & Ng, Shu Wen, 2020. "The New school food standards and nutrition of school children: Direct and Indirect Effect Analysis," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 39(C).
    4. Amy Ellen Schwartz & Michah W. Rothbart, 2020. "Let Them Eat Lunch: The Impact of Universal Free Meals on Student Performance," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 39(2), pages 376-410, March.
    5. Travis A. Smith & Eliza M. Mojduszka & Shun Chen, 2021. "Did the New School Meal Standards Improve the Overall Quality of Children's Diets?," Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 43(4), pages 1366-1384, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Bonomo, Therese & Schanzenbach, Diane Whitmore, 2024. "Trends in the school lunch program: Changes in selection, nutrition & health," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 124(C).
    2. Toossi, Saied & Todd, Jessica E. & Guthrie, Joanne & Ollinger, Michael, 2024. "The National School Lunch Program: Background, Trends, and Issues, 2024 Edition," Economic Information Bulletin 347312, United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service.
    3. Ollinger, Michael & Guthrie, Joanne, 2022. "Trends in USDA Foods Ordered for Child Nutrition Programs Before and After Updated Nutrition Standards," Amber Waves:The Economics of Food, Farming, Natural Resources, and Rural America, United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service, vol. 2022(Economic ), September.
    4. Thompson, Paul N., 2021. "Is four less than five? Effects of four-day school weeks on student achievement in Oregon," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 193(C).
    5. Kurtz, Michael D. & Conway, Karen Smith & Mohr, Robert D., 2020. "Weekend feeding (“BackPack”) programs and student outcomes," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    6. Davis, Will & Kreisman, Daniel & Musaddiq, Tareena, 2023. "The Effect of Universal Free School Meals on Child BMI," IZA Discussion Papers 16387, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    7. repec:ags:aaea22:335700 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Sofía Collante Zárate & Catherine Rodríguez & Fabio Sanchez, 2022. "El poder de un refrigerio. La alimentación escolar y sus efectos educativos en Colombia," Documentos CEDE 20223, Universidad de los Andes, Facultad de Economía, CEDE.
    9. Brown, Alyssa, 2024. "Who takes up a free lunch? Summer Food Service Program availability and household grocery food spending," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 123(C).
    10. Marcus, Michelle & Yewell, Katherine G., 2022. "The Effect of Free School Meals on Household Food Purchases: Evidence from the Community Eligibility Provision," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(C).
    11. Cory Koedel & Eric Parsons, 2020. "The Effect of the Community Eligibility Provision on the Ability of Free and Reduced-Price Meal Data to Identify Disadvantaged Students," Working Papers 2005, Department of Economics, University of Missouri.
    12. Rothbart, Michah W. & Heflin, Colleen, 2023. "Inequality in literacy skills at kindergarten entry at the intersections of social programs and race," Children and Youth Services Review, Elsevier, vol. 145(C).
    13. Xhiselda Demaj, 2024. "Expanding Benefits: The Impact of a Universal Free School Meal Policy on Non-Cognitive Skills," Working Papers 2024: 11, Department of Economics, University of Venice "Ca' Foscari".
    14. Agustina Laurito & Amy Ellen Schwartz, 2019. "Does School Lunch Fill the “SNAP Gap” at the End of the Month?," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 86(1), pages 49-82, July.
    15. Krista Ruffini, 2022. "Universal Access to Free School Meals and Student Achievement: Evidence from the Community Eligibility Provision," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 57(3), pages 776-820.
    16. Michah W. Rothbart & David J. Schwegman & Iuliia Shybalkina, 2022. "The impact of pork‐barrel capital funding in schools: Evidence from participatory budgeting in NYC," Public Budgeting & Finance, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 42(2), pages 148-170, June.
    17. Sarah Forrestal & Elizabeth Potamites & Joanne Guthrie & Nora Paxton, "undated". "Associations among Food Security, School Meal Participation, and Students’ Diet Quality in the First School Nutrition and Meal Cost Study," Mathematica Policy Research Reports 34ded49c2a464d57857a407d4, Mathematica Policy Research.
    18. Michah W. Rothbart & Amy Ellen Schwartz & Emily Gutierrez, 2023. "Paying for Free Lunch: The Impact of CEP Universal Free Meals on Revenues, Spending, and Student Health," Education Finance and Policy, MIT Press, vol. 18(4), pages 708-737, Fall.
    19. Travis A. Smith & Pourya Valizadeh, 2024. "Aging out of WIC and child nutrition: Evidence from a regression discontinuity design," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 106(2), pages 904-924, March.
    20. Melissa Pflugh Prescott & Judith A. Gilbride & Sean P. Corcoran & Brian Elbel & Kathleen Woolf & Roland O. Ofori & Amy Ellen Schwartz, 2022. "The Relationship between School Infrastructure and School Nutrition Program Participation and Policies in New York City," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(15), pages 1-12, August.
    21. Dirk Bethmann & Jae Il Cho, 2021. "Free-School-Lunch Policies: Impact Evaluation on Student BMI and Mental Health," Discussion Paper Series 2107, Institute of Economic Research, Korea University.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:jfpoli:v:124:y:2024:i:c:s0306919224000174. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/foodpol .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.