Author ORCID Identifier

https://orcid.org/0009-0009-9227-1177

Date Available

2-7-2025

Year of Publication

2024

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Document Type

Doctoral Dissertation

College

Business and Economics

Department/School/Program

Economics

First Advisor

Dr. Charles Courtemanche

Abstract

This dissertation consists of three chapters that evaluate how a change in the redemption of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits impacted grocery purchasing behavior and food consumption to provide some of the first estimates of the impacts from the pilot. The SNAP Online Purchasing Pilot (OPP) allowed recipients to use their benefits online for participating retailers which was initially planned for 8 participating pilot states with a few participating retailers but massively expanded during the COVID-19 pandemic. The first two chapters evaluate how the SNAP OPP impacts grocery purchasing behavior with the first chapter evaluating before the COVID-19 pandemic and the second chapter evaluating during the COVID-19 pandemic. The third chapter studies how the SNAP OPP impacts the short-run food consumption known as food insufficiency.

The first chapter evaluates how the introduction of the SNAP OPP affects monthly grocery purchasing behavior of SNAP-eligible households using the NielsenIQ Consumer Panel Data, I evaluate the impacts of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program’s (SNAP) Online Purchasing Pilot (OPP) on monthly purchasing behaviors of SNAP-eligible households. The OPP allowed for SNAP benefits to be redeemed online and either delivered or picked up at the grocery store for certain retailers. New York was the first state to participate in the program and the only state in 2019, so I used a synthetic control approach to evaluate New York as a case study. I find evidence that SNAP-spending from participating retailers fell by 2%-6%. However, I find no evidence of individual purchases, trips per month, and the healthy eating index (HEI) of the purchases per month changing. Additionally, there is suggestive evidence that vegetables and dairy purchases decreased while the purchases of fruits, grains, and proteins do not for the average SNAP-eligible household. Lastly, there is some potential evidence that differences within New York state led to heterogeneous responses to OPP implementation with results moving in opposite directions.

The second chapter evaluates how the expansion of the SNAP OPP impacts monthly grocery purchasing behavior of SNAP-eligible households during the early period of the COVID-19 pandemic using the NielsenIQ Consumer Panel Data from 2019 to 2021. Due to the rapid but staggered expansion throughout 2020, I evaluate the impact on monthly spending, trips, monthly purchases totals, and the healthfulness of the purchase composition using a difference-in-differences method with multiple time periods. There is not much evidence that spending, trips, purchases, and overall healthfulness significantly changes. I find some evidence that fruit and vegetable purchases fell indicating a potential change in the proportion of some food group types.

The third chapter evaluates how the rapid expansion of the SNAP OPP during the first four months of the COVID-19 pandemic impacts food insufficiency for SNAP-eligible households. In early 2020, the OPP was rapidly expanded to address pandemic-induced barriers to food access among SNAP households in the United States. Using data from the Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey and a difference-in-difference framework (that exploits state variation in OPP implementation), we examine the effects of the rapid initial expansion of OPP on food sufficiency among low-income families. Results obtained indicate the OPP decreased food insufficiency among low-income adults by 2 percentage points (an 8 percent decrease relative to mean food insufficiency). Additional analyses suggest online benefit redemption improved food sufficiency by mitigating food access barriers, especially affecting racial minorities and married individuals.

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

https://doi.org/10.13023/etd.2024.312

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Available for download on Friday, February 07, 2025

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