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SNAP Receipt in SIPP: Using Administrative Records to Evaluate Data Quality

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Working Paper Number SEHSD-WP2022-22

The Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP) asks about Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) receipt at the monthly level in an event history calendar. Historically, SIPP has captured higher rates of annual SNAP receipt among households than other surveys such as the Current Population Survey Annual Social and Economic Supplement (CPS ASEC) or the American Community Survey (ACS). However, SIPP estimates still fall below aggregate estimates from administrative sources. Prior research matching the CPS ASEC and ACS to state-level SNAP records found 40-60 percent of survey respondents and 18-37 percent of households did not report receipt found in administrative records. Little work has linked recent SIPP data to state SNAP records. We link administrative records from select states to SIPP for 2013 to 2019. We evaluate annual receipt, comparing administrative records to survey reports, and discuss how results compare to other surveys. We also leverage the unique monthly data available in both SIPP and administrative records to assess accuracy of the monthly SIPP reports in multiple ways. Our results provide a descriptive overview of the accuracy of annual and monthly SNAP data in SIPP, which may inform data collection or editing strategies for SNAP as well as other data collected in a similar manner. These findings lay a foundation for future work to examine these topics in more detail.

Page Last Revised - November 15, 2022
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