Applying for and Staying on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program in South Carolina

This study used administrative records for 50,067 applications and 34,914 benefit spells in South Carolina for the period October 1996-November 2007 to examine households’ applications to and participation in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). We modeled application resolutions where the possible outcomes were acceptance, denial due to income ineligibility, denial due to a failure to provide sufficient information, and denial for other reasons. For cases with successful applications, we modeled the durations of participation spells to distinguish among exits that result from missed recertifications, financial ineligibility, incomplete or missing information, and other reasons. The results indicate that a household’s application and participation history affect its subsequent application success and program tenure. Applicants with recent SNAP program experience are more likely to have their applications accepted than other applicants. Among the applicants with recent program experience, the way in which a previous spell ends helps to predict how their next application will be resolved and how their next participation spell will end. Households face an increased risk of having a SNAP participation spell end for financial ineligibility if an earlier participation spell ended for that reason. Similarly, households face an increased risk of having their applications denied or participation spells end for information deficiencies if an earlier spell ended that way.