And while the largest percentage-point decline in these food insufficiency rates was among the lowest-income households—by far the hardest hit by the pandemic—even the rates for people with household incomes between $50,000 and $100,000 were roughly cut in half during that period, with the share in the $50,000-$75,000 bracket dropping from 11.1% to 5.5%, for example. (The share for several income brackets ticked back up slightly in May.) The federal government’s so-called stimulus checks—up to $600 per person in December and $1,400 per person in March—went to the vast majority of U.S. households. Every recipient of unemployment insurance, likewise, received the same federal supplement of $300 a week, regardless of income. The data, examined by a university-wide poverty research initiative called Poverty Solutions, is evidence that broad-based government support programs work, researchers wrote in a recent report. Suggesting that typical safety-net programs that target lower-income Americans come with stigmas and breed resentment, the group echoed many of the arguments for universal basic income.
