The word hunger has several meanings—it can describe, for example, one’s desire for food; the painful sensation or state of weakness caused by the need for food; or famine. While severe hunger—manifesting as clinical malnutrition—is uncommon in this country, millions of children and adults who lack resources go without food and many are undernourished. The mental and physical changes that accompany inadequate food intake and even minor nutrient deficiencies can have negative effects on learning, development, productivity, physical and psychological health, and family life. In 1995 USDA’s Economic Research Service—through the nationally representative CPS Food Security Supplement—began tracking the number of households that are uncertain of having or unable to acquire enough food because they lack resources, and uses the term low food security or very low food security, not hunger, to describe these households. USDA adopted these terms in response to recommendations by a National Academies panel, which found the term hunger to be inappropriate when describing low-income households that lack enough food both because of the difficulties in measuring hunger and because hunger has physiological definitions that do not necessarily correspond to nutritional insufficiency. USDA monitors the food security status of U.S. households as part of its responsibility for administering most of the federal government’s food and nutrition assistance programs, many of which are intended to alleviate food insecurity and prevent the physical and psychological outcomes—such as low birth weights, chronic illnesses, and anxiety—associated with being undernourished. To be consistent with USDA, this report uses the terms low food security, very low food security, and food insecure. (See table 1 for definitions of these terms.) The annual CPS Food Security Supplement collects data on the prevalence and severity of food insecurity by asking one adult in each household a series of questions about experiences and behaviors of household members that indicate food insecurity. The food security status of the household is assessed based on the number of food-insecure conditions reported, such as being unable to afford balanced meals and being hungry because there was too little money for food. Food-insecure households are classified as having either low food security or very low food security (see table 1). In addition, the survey assesses the food security status of households with children. The federal government has been helping needy individuals and families access food for more than 60 years. The National School Lunch Program, for example, was authorized in 1946 and became one of the first large- scale food and nutrition assistance programs. Other federal programs followed, including the School Breakfast Program (founded by the Child Nutrition Act of 1966) and WIC, authorized in 1972. Over time, some programs have changed. For example, according to USDA, an early version of SNAP (formerly the Food Stamp Program) required eligible individuals to pay for a portion of their orange-colored stamps, which they could use for any kind of food. In addition, this early version provided eligible individuals with free blue stamps, equal to half the amount of the orange stamps, to buy designated surplus foods. Today, SNAP recipients now receive their benefits on electronic benefit transfer cards and no longer use actual stamps to purchase food. The federal government currently funds close to 70 programs that are permitted to provide at least some support for domestic food assistance. In our study, we identified the 18 programs that focus primarily on providing food and nutrition assistance to low-income individuals and households. (See table 2.) The 18 programs we studied vary by target population, size, types of benefits, and where these benefits are provided: Target population. While the 18 programs serve four broad populations— individuals and households, children, the elderly, and special groups—the specific target populations vary across programs. For example, SNAP helps low-income individuals and families; the National School Lunch Program assists school-aged children; the Elderly Nutrition Program serves individuals 60 years of age and older; and WIC provides assistance to low-income, nutritionally at-risk children up to age 5 and pregnant and postpartum women. Program size. The 18 programs also vary in size, ranging from the Food Distribution Program on Indian Reservations, which serves approximately 90,000 individuals per month, to SNAP, which serves more than 28 million people per month. Benefit type. In addition, the programs differ by the types of benefits they provide. Some programs—such as SNAP—were designed to help low- income individuals and families obtain a nutritious diet by supplementing their income with cash-like benefits to purchase food, such as meat, dairy products, fruits, and vegetables, but not items such as certain hot foods, tobacco, or alcohol. Other programs provide food directly to program participants. The Emergency Food Assistance Program supplies large quantities of food to governmental or nonprofit organizations to prepare meals for or distribute food to individuals and families. The National School Lunch Program reimburses school districts for the meals served and provides some commodities from USDA to offset the cost of food service. Other programs do not directly provide benefits to individuals. For example, the Community Food Projects Competitive Grants Program provides grants to organizations to plan or implement projects to improve access to food for low-income individuals and families. Program administration. USDA, DHS, and HHS fund all of the 18 programs through a decentralized service delivery structure of state and local agencies and nonprofit organizations. For example, WIC benefits are typically delivered through state agencies to state and county health departments; the Child and Adult Care Food Program works through state agencies to subsidize child care providers, day care homes, and adult day care facilities; and the Commodity Supplemental Food Program provides food to state agencies, which then distribute the food to local nonprofit organizations that provide it to recipients. Each federal food and nutrition assistance program has its own set of program goals that were generally established through legislation or regulation. These goals have a mix of underlying purposes, including: (1) raising the level of nutrition among low-income households, (2) safeguarding the health and wellbeing of the nation’s children, (3) improving the health of Americans, and (4) strengthening the agricultural economy. (See appendix III for a summary of program goals.) While few have specific goals to reduce or alleviate hunger, most of these programs share an overarching goal of providing individuals access to a nutritionally adequate diet to ensure the health of vulnerable Americans. In addition, the current administration set a national goal to end childhood hunger in the United States by 2015 and the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Recovery Act) expanded eligibility guidelines and increased benefits for SNAP, which may help the administration reach that goal. The prevalence of food insecurity (the percentage of households with low or very low food security) hovered between 10 and 12 percent from 1998 to 2007, before rising to 14.6 percent in 2008, according to USDA’s analysis of CPS data. Following a similar pattern, very low food security stayed between 3 and just more than 4 percent from 1998 to 2007, and reached 5.7 percent in 2008. (See figure 1.) USDA recently reported that about 17 million households in the United States (or 14.6 percent of all U.S. households) were food insecure at some point in 2008. Of these food-insecure households, USDA reported that 6.7 million (or 5.7 percent of all U.S. households) had very low food security. (See figure 2.) This increase in food insecurity coincided with the recent economic recession, which began in late 2007 and continued throughout 2008. Among households with incomes below the poverty line, those headed by single parents, and those headed by minorities, prevalence rates for food insecurity were higher than the national average rate of 14.6 percent. (See figure 3.) According to USDA’s analysis of the food security data, about 42 percent of households with incomes below the poverty line we food insecure in 2008. High levels of food insecurity were also found among single-parent households with children; for example, about 37 percent of households with children headed by single women were food re insecure, and about 28 percent of households with children headed by single men were food insecure. In contrast, among married couples with rried couples with children, 14.3 percent of households were food insecure. High levels of children, 14.3 percent of households were food insecure. High levels of food insecurity were also found among households headed by minorities food insecurity were also found among households headed by minorities for example, among households headed by Hispanics, nearly 27 percent for example, among households headed by Hispanics, nearly 27 percent were food insecure. were food insecure. Regardless of adults’ marital status, the prevalence of food insecurity was almost twice as high among households with children (21 percent) as among households without children (11.3 percent). In many families—just under half of the roughly 8.3 million food-insecure households with children—parents were able to maintain normal or near-normal diets and meal schedules for their children, limiting the effects of food insecurity to only the adults. However, in more than 4.3 million of these households, children—as well as adults—experienced food insecurity sometime during the year. Among households where children experienced food insecurity, most indicated low (but not very low) food security among children, reporting mainly reductions in the quality and variety of children’s meals. Of the households with children just more than 1 percent (about 506,000 households) had very low food security among children—food insecurity that was so severe that children’s eating patterns were disrupted and food intake was reduced below levels that caregivers considered sufficient. The federal government spent approximately $62.7 billion on 18 domestic food and nutrition assistance programs in fiscal year 2008, with the 5 largest programs accounting for 95 percent of total spending. Programs’ spending amounts ranged from approximately $4 million on the Community Food Projects Competitive Grants Program to more than $37 billion on SNAP. (See table 3.)