After cuts to food stamps, Trump administration ends government's annual report on hunger in America [View all]

Last edited Sun Sep 21, 2025, 02:57 PM - Edit history (1)

Source: AP

7h
The Trump administration is ending the federal government's annual report on hunger in America, stating that it had become "overly politicized" and "rife with inaccuracies."

The decision comes two and a half months after President Donald Trump signed legislation sharply reducing food aid to the poor. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the tax and spending cuts bill Republicans muscled through Congress in July means 3 million people would not qualify for food stamps, also known as SNAP benefits.

. . .
"The questions used to collect the data are entirely subjective and do not present an accurate picture of actual food security,'' the USDA said. "The data is rife with inaccuracies slanted to create a narrative that is not representative of what is actually happening in the countryside as we are currently experiencing lower poverty rates, increasing wages, and job growth under the Trump Administration.''

The Census Bureau reported earlier this month that the U.S. poverty rate dipped from 11% in 2023 to 10.6% last year, before Trump took office.

Read more: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/after-cuts-to-food-stamps-trump-administration-ends-government-s-annual-report-on-hunger-in-america/ar-AA1MYs6w

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The USDA says the 2024 report, to be released October 22, will be the last.



The last measurement of poverty rate was in 2024, so we don't know how it's been doing under tRump

Yes, there is job growth, a very weak 69.6k/month average in the last 7 months (February thru August), according to the BLS:
https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0000000001

And the above does not include the 911k downward revision for April 2024 thru March 2025 that was announced September 9 https://www.democraticunderground.com/10143526633 . While 10 of those months are Biden months, 2 are Trump months. If the 911k is evenly allotted over the 12 months, that's a 75.9k/month reduction in the 2 tRump months (February and March -- in this, I'm calling all of January as a Biden month, even though tRump was president for the last third of the month, mainly because the survey week for January, the week containing the 12th of January, was during Biden's presidency)

As for growing wages ...

Real (meaning inflation-adjusted) average hourly earnings of production and non-supervisory workers (about 80% of the private workforce)
http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0500000032
Here is January thru August
In 1982-1984 dollars
9.85, 9.87, 9.89, 9.90, 9.92, 9.93, 9.94, 9.94
Up 0.91% since January, tRump's first partial month, so I guess growing wages is technically correct, by this particular measure of wages anyway, but the rising inflation is creating a headwind, as can be seen by the stalling out of wages over the last 3 months ($9.93, $9.94, $9.94)

Inflation: The CPI (consumer price index) rise averaged 3.5% over the past 3 months on an annualized basis (core CPI: 3.6%)
The August one month increase annualized is: CPI: 4.7%, (core CPI: 4.2%)



More from where the graphs came from: https://www.democraticunderground.com/10143528031#post12

Yes Virginia, we have a rising inflation problem. It's not May anymore.

More data links: https://www.democraticunderground.com/10143524396#post11