Rising Food Prices Take a Bite Out of Food Stamp Benefits

The Food Stamp Program is designed to provide low-income families with increased food purchasing power to obtain a nutritionally adequate diet. As in most other Federal Government assistance programs, benefits are adjusted in response to rising prices—in this case, rising food prices. The current method of adjustment results in a shortfall between the maximum food stamp benefit and the cost of a nutritionally adequate diet as specified by USDA’s Thrifty Food Plan. During fiscal year (FY) 2007, the food purchasing shortfall in the caseload-weighted maximum benefit for the program grew from $7 in October 2006 to$19 in September 2007. In FY 2008, the amount grew from almost $8 in October 2007 to$34 in July 2008 and to $38 in September 2008. In an average month, food stamp households faced shortfalls of over$2 in FY 2003, $12 in FY 2007, and$22 in FY 2008. These losses in food purchasing power account for 1 percent, 4 percent, and 7 percent of the maximum benefit in each respective year. Alternative adjustment methods can reduce the shortfall but will raise program costs.Rising food prices, food price inflation, food stamp benefits, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, Food Stamp Program, food purchasing power, cost of the Thrifty Food Plan., Consumer/Household Economics, Financial Economics,

Food Stamp Benefits Adjust to Earnings with and without Cross-Program Effects from TANF and SSI Cash Assistance

As households participating in the Food Stamp Program and other public assistance programs work more, the additional earnings are partially offset by a reduction in food stamp benefits and cash assistance from Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) or Supplemental Security Income (SSI). The rate at which food stamp benefits and TANF or SSI cash assistance are reduced with an increase in earnings is referred to as the programs effective benefit reduction rate (EBRR). This report derives FSP EBRRs for earnings with and without cross-program effects from adjustments to TANF or SSI cash assistance due to the additional earnings. The estimated FSP EBRRs are combined with TANF EBRRs and SSI EBRRs to estimate an effective tax rate on earnings in terms of these program benefits. With the authority for TANF programs devolved to States in 1996 Welfare Reform Law, FSP and TANF EBRRs as well as effective tax rates on earnings will vary by State. This report illustrates the treatment of earnings among these programs and the variation in treatment across states.Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety,

AN ANALYSIS OF THE EFFECT OF PRICE ON RESIDENTIAL WATER DEMAND: METROPOLITAN MIAMI, FLORIDA

Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

Future power: The Control of corporate strategy

Illustrations not included in Web versio

Corporate Governance Eludes the Legal Mind

Professor Andrews argues that the American Law Institute\u27s Principles of Corporate Governance and Structure: Restatement and Recommendations fails to consider the recent evolution of the large publicly held corporation and the relationship among shareholders, the board, and management. He suggests that the legal and management communities work together to solve the problems in corporate governance

Corporate Governance Eludes the Legal Mind

Professor Andrews argues that the American Law Institute\u27s Principles of Corporate Governance and Structure: Restatement and Recommendations fails to consider the recent evolution of the large publicly held corporation and the relationship among shareholders, the board, and management. He suggests that the legal and management communities work together to solve the problems in corporate governance

Civic Associations That Work: The Contributions of Leadership to Organizational Effectiveness

Why are some civic associations more effective at advancing their public agendas, engaging members, and developing leaders? We introduce a multi-dimensional framework for analyzing the comparative effectiveness of member-based civic associations in terms of public influence, member engagement, and leader development. Theoretical expectations in organization studies, sociology, political science, and industrial relations hold that organizations benefiting from either a favorable environment or abundant resources will be most effective. Using systematic data on the Sierra Clubs 400 local organizations, we assess these factors alongside an alternative approach focusing on the role of leaders, how they work together, and the activities they carry out to build capacity and conduct programs. While we find modest support for the importance of an organizations available resources and external environment, we find strong evidence for each of our three outcomes supporting our claim that effectiveness in civic associations depends to a large degree on internal organizational practices.This publication is Hauser Center Working Paper No. 36. The Hauser Center Working Paper Series was launched during the summer of 2000. The Series enables the Hauser Center to share with a broad audience important works-in-progress written by Hauser Center scholars and researchers

A conceptual approach to gene expression analysis enhanced by visual analytics

The analysis of gene expression data is a complex task for biologists wishing to understand the role of genes in the formation of diseases such as cancer. Biologists need greater support when trying to discover, and comprehend, new relationships within their data. In this paper, we describe an approach to the analysis of gene expression data where overlapping groupings are generated by Formal Concept Analysis and interactively analyzed in a tool called CUBIST. The CUBIST workflow involves querying a semantic database and converting the result into a formal context, which can be simplified to make it manageable, before it is visualized as a concept lattice and associated charts