In Iowa, between 2019-2021:
- Food insecurity in Iowa averaged 7%.
- Iowa had the 2nd lowest food insecurity rate of all 50 states, 33% lower than the national average of 10.4%.
- The official poverty rate (which does not account for income from safety-net and tax-support programs such as SNAP, EITC, and others) in the state averaged 9.5%.
- But using the Supplemental Poverty Measure (which does include safety-net and tax-support income), the poverty rate falls to 6.0%. In other words, these programs reduced the poverty rate in Iowa by 37% and the number of people living in poverty by 110,000.
- SNAP, alone, lifted 57,000 people above the poverty line in Iowa, including 26,000 children, per year between 2013 and 2017, on average.
