Study: Food Stamp Distribution and Recipients’ Body Weight

Female food-stamp recipients weigh more, By Steve Bushong, August 12, 2009, Columbus Dispatch: “Women who use food stamps weigh more than those who don’t, and that might have something to do with how the benefits are distributed. Ohio State University researcher Jay Zagorsky recently studied the issue using data from the university’s National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, which has surveyed about 10,000 people periodically since 1979. Zagorsky looked at 4,000 of those people who had received benefits through the U.S. Food Stamp Program at some point over the past 14 years. His research showed that women who used food stamps had a higher body-mass index than those who didn’t by 1.24 points on average. Body-mass index calculates a person’s body fat by using height and weight…”