Study: Most Black Kids Know About Food Stamps

Dr. Mark Rank, a sociologist at George Warren Brown School of Social Work at Washington University in St. Louis was the lead author in a new research study that found nearly half of all children in the U.S. and 90 percent of African-American children (compared to 37 percent of Whites) have been on food stamps at some point during their childhood, according to YahooNews.com.

"Estimating the Risk of Food Stamp Use and Impoverishment During Childhood" took analysis from 30 years of national data and predicts that this is now a medical issue because children on food stamps traditionally have illnesses linked to malnutrition and poverty. To qualify for the food stamps, a family of four cannot have an annual take-home pay exceeding $22,000. But as the recession looms and unemployment continues, more families are finding themselves in need of participating in the program.

Other study findings include:

• Nearly one-quarter of all American children will be in households that use food stamps for five or more years during childhood.
• 91 percent of children with single parents will be in a household receiving food stamps, compared to 37 percent of children in married households.
• Looking at race, marital status and education simultaneously, children who are Black and whose head of household is not married with less than 12 years of education have a cumulative percentage of residing in a food stamp household of 97 percent by age 10.

"Food stamp use is a clear sign of poverty and food insecurity, two of the most detrimental economic conditions affecting a child's health," said Rank. "Even limited exposure to poverty can have detrimental effects upon a child's overall quality of health and well-being."--WLW