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How Emergency Rental Assistance Might Protect Households With Children From Food Insufficiency

Year: 2024
Type: report
Study design: Observational Study
Abstract: 2research has explored the relationship between ERA and food insecurity: One study found that, relative to applicants still waiting for a decision from the program, ERA recipients had a 9 percentage point lower likelihood of food insufficiency, 27,28 and another study found this gap to be 7 percentage points.29 Our study builds on prior research by focusing on: (1) food insufficiency, a less studied potential outcome of rental assistance; (2) renter households with children and other key demographic subgroups that faced a heavier toll from the pandemic (i.e., households that lost employment income, households led by single females, and households led by non-Hispanic Black [hereafter, Black] persons and Hispanic persons); (3) subgroups of renter households with low incomes (i.e., households that received ERA, were waiting for a response from their ERA program, were denied ERA benefits, and who did not apply for ERA); (4) more recent data (i.e., from 2023) in analyses; and (5) qualitative data from families who received rental assistance to shed light on some of the statistical findings.Similar to prior research, we cannot differentiate between federal and local programs because the survey did not ask from which funding source households received ERA.However, given the scale of the federal ERA, it may have a substantial presence in our findings.This brief is organized as follows: First, we summarize key findings and their implications for research and policy.Second, we describe our data, sample, and methods.Third, we provide a detailed description of the characteristics of the full sample and subsamples, including how these characteristics vary by ERA status (receipt, waiting, benefit denial, and nonapplication).Next, we show how ERA status is associated with food and housing hardships based on multivariate regressions.Fourth, we summarize qualitative findings about the experiences of families who received rental assistance in Tulsa, Oklahoma.Finally, we discuss the broader implications of our research and acknowledge its limitations. Definitions of Key Terms• Food hardship is a generic term that refers to the lack of either quality or quantity in one's food, due to financial reasons, such that someone would be unable to live a healthy life.This concept can correspond to specific measures such as food insecurity, food insufficiency, hunger, and receipt of charitable food.30, 31• Food insecurity 32 typically refers to the measure developed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to capture a household's "limited or uncertain availability of nutritionally adequate and safe foods or limited or uncertain ability to acquire those foods in socially acceptable ways."• Food insufficiency 33 is a measure of a severe form of food insecurity in which a household sometimes or often does not have enough to eat due to financial constraints. Key FindingsRenter households with children and low incomes who applied for ERA experienced high levels of economic hardships.These households showed high rates of household food insufficiency (52%), being behind on rent payments (48%), and loss of employment income (41%).In contrast, a lower share of households that did not apply for ERA experienced these hardships (food insufficiency: 34%; being behind on rent payments: 20%; losing employment income: 25%). How Emergency Rental Assistance Might Protect Households With Children from Food Insufficiency 3Compared to those waiting for ERA, households that received ERA reported lower rates of hardships.Among renter households with low incomes and children, those that received ERA were statistically less likely to report household food insufficiency (46%), child food insufficiency (34%), and being behind on rent payments (28%), relative to households that applied for ERA and were waiting for a response from the program (49%, 37%, and 63%, respectively). ERA may have been especially consequential for households that recently lost employment income and those led by single females.Between households that received ERA and those that were denied it, households that had recently lost employment income had statistically larger reductions in their risk of household food insufficiency, relative to households that had not recently lost employment income (by 8 percentage points).Between households that received ERA and those that were waiting for ERA, the reduction in the risk of child food insufficiency was statistically larger for households led by single females than those who were not (also an 8 percentage point difference).In contrast, the reduction in food insufficiency associated with receipt of ERA was similar between Black and non-Black households, and between Hispanic and non-Hispanic households.Parents who used ERA benefits said that it had helped lessen their hardships when they most needed support.ERA benefits, designed to be an emergency response, helped families keep their utilities on and catch up with rent payments at various points during the pandemic.However, based on focus groups with past ERA recipients, longer-term economic sufficiency remained a challenge in the face of high housing costs. How Emergency Rental Assistance Might Protect Households With Children from Food Insufficiency 4Along with quantitative findings, we highlight the insights and perspectives of parents who received ERA and their material hardships, drawing from qualitative data collected from six focus groups with 23 total parent participants in Tulsa, Oklahoma.(A separate brief presents more findings on the economic and psychological well-being of those parents and their children during the pandemic).Finally, we conclude this brief with a discussion of findings and their policy implications.
DOI: 10.56417/452f2727n
Language: English
Open Access status: gold
OpenAlex ID: W4404319082
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Cited by: 1
Related to: 10