Hunger Statistics

The data in this post was taken from the Food Research and Action Center (FRAC) website.

Sometimes it’s hard to take hunger in the United States seriously. We know in a sort of abstract way that there are probably hungry people in our neighborhood but it isn’t a topic that gets talked about all that often. And the United States is fortunate not to experience the kind of wide-spread famine that haunts many third-world countries and that results in heart-wrenching front-page photographs of sunken-eyed children with distended tummies.

Here in the US, hunger is a more subtle presence. However, it is a very real—and growing—problem for many families. The government uses the term “food insecure” to refer to people who struggle to obtain adequate nutrition. That umbrella term is often broken down further into:

Low Food Security: Due to restricted financial resources, people experiencing low food security are forced to cut back on the quality and/or quantity of the food they eat.

Very Low Food Security: People experiencing very low food security struggle to provide enough food for their households. They may cut back significantly on their food consumption or frequently skip meals to stretch their nutritional resources as far as possible.

How many people in this country are actually affected by hunger? The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) reported that in 2005, 35.1 million people lived in households deemed food insecure. This represents 10.4% of all adults and 16.9% of all children. In Pennsylvania, it is estimated that 10.2% of households (or 490,000 individuals) experience low food security and that 2.9% (or 141,000 individuals) experience very low food security.

According to the results of a 2006 Census Bureau survey, the households that run the greatest risk of food insecurity have some or all of the following characteristics:
They are headed by single women
They are minority – especially Black or Hispanic
They are living on incomes below the poverty line
They have children – overall, households with children experience food insecurity at almost double the rate for households without children.
They are located in a central city environment