Mellman: Working poor face an assault as COVID-19 emergency ends
Jaqueline Benitez puts away groceries at her home in Bellflower, Calif., on Monday, Feb. 13, 2023. Benitez, 21, who works as a preschool teacher, depends on California's SNAP benefits to help pay for food, and starting in March she expects a significant cut, perhaps half, of the $250 in food benefits she has received since 2020.
The official end of the COVID-19 emergency seems almost like an afterthought to most of us. But the working poor, who always face grave difficulties, are being subjected to a whole series of serious blows as the emergency draws to a close.
Thirty-two states are slashing Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, affecting over 30 million people, as the “emergency allotments,” which increased food-stamp benefits at the start of the pandemic, are ended.
It’s not a red state/blue state issue. The two states with the largest affected populations are California and Texas.
And these are working families — nationally, according to a pre-pandemic census report, 79 percent of SNAP families had at least one worker.
Nearly half the public has either direct experience as a SNAP beneficiary or an indirect relationship through a family member or close friend who used the program, according to a YouGov survey this year.
And it’s popular: 68 percent view SNAP favorably, including 63 percent of Republicans, while just 17 percent of Americans harbor an unfavorable view of the program, with a mere 16 percent supporting cuts to these benefits.
Yet, average benefits are falling to just $6 per person, per day. A family of four could see their benefits reduced by over $300 per month — at a time when groceries cost 11 percent more than they did a year ago. Budgets will be pressed hard.
Not just food budgets. Health care is also on the chopping block for large numbers.
As many as 15 million people will lose Medicaid coverage with the end of the pandemic emergency. Nearly two-thirds of Medicaid recipients already work and another 10 percent can’t be employed due to illness or disability, according to a pre-pandemic Kaiser Family Foundation report.
One of the COVID-19 relief packages passed by Congress blocked states from kicking people off Medicaid during the public health emergency, in exchange for additional federal funds. Now, with the end of the emergency, states are beginning to cut the rolls.
An analysis by the Department of Health and Human Services in August found about 8.2 million people would no longer qualify for Medicaid, and 6.8 million would lose coverage despite continuing eligibility.
Medicaid too is widely used and highly regarded.
A Kaiser Family Foundation poll found 66 percent of Americans have benefited from Medicare either themselves or through a family member or close friend. Medicaid enjoys a favorable image among 76 percent, with only 22 percent holding an unfavorable view of the program.
In addition to the Medicaid disenrollments, lots of people will have to start paying for COVID-related care that’s been free until now.
Many Medicare beneficiaries will be billed for at-home testing and treatment. Individuals covered by private insurance could face charges for monoclonal anti-body treatments, as well as lab tests, even if they are ordered by a doctor.
Then there’s taxes, in particular the end of the enhanced child tax credit, which briefly lifted over 5 million people — including nearly 3 million children — out of poverty.
This tax season, many families with two children under 6 won’t receive the extra $3,200 in tax credits that helped them last year.
With rising taxes and cuts to SNAP and health care, the working poor are under financial assault. But the effects could be broader, impacting the whole economy.
Nearly 70 percent of the U.S. economy is based on consumer spending. Consumers’ balance sheets have been strong in large part because of pandemic aid— not just the aid described here, focused on the working poor, but also stimulus checks and other transfer payments. With all that coming to an abrupt halt, Americans’ savings rate has plummeted — 88 percent lower than 2020 when we were saving the most ever, and 61 percent below pre-pandemic savings rates.
As those savings are used up, consumers have less money to inject into the economy, and that increases the possibility of recession.
And who pays the biggest price in a recession? The working poor.
Mellman is president of The Mellman Group and has helped elect 30 U.S. senators, 12 governors and dozens of House members. Mellman served as pollster to Senate Democratic leaders for over 20 years, as president of the American Association of Political Consultants, and is president of Democratic Majority for Israel.