Supplemental Nutrition Assistance in Regional Households with Elderly Present

Over the last decade, more and more households where at least one member was age 60 or older have received what used to be called "food stamps". It now goes by the name the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP.

Since 2005, our region has seen participation in this assistance program basically triple among households where the elderly reside. In 2005, about 5.4% of households where someone age 60 or older resided used food stamps; in 2014 nearly 15% of those households do. This represents an actual increase of some 4,600 households where an elderly person resides that now are participating in SNAP that hadn't been a decade ago.

Click on the chart below to enlarge it and see how this has changed over the last 10 years.

CLICK TO ENLARGE