Impact of the End of Advanced Child Tax Credit Payments and Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Emergency Allotments on Food Insufficiency and Food Pantry Use.

Abstract

<b>Objectives.</b> To assess whether the impact of the end of the 2021 advanced Child Tax Credit (CTC) payments differed in US states that did and did not issue Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) emergency allotments. <b>Methods.</b> We used 2021-2022 Household Pulse Survey data and difference-in-differences analyses to compare changes in the prevalence of food insufficiency and food pantry use among households with and without children from during to after advanced CTC payments, overall and in states that did and did not issue SNAP emergency allotments. <b>Results.</b> From during to after advanced CTC payments, the prevalence of food insufficiency among households with children increased by 2.8 percentage points in states with SNAP emergency allotments (prevalence difference [PD] = 0.028; 95% confidence interval [CI]  = 0.015, 0.041) and by 7.2 percentage points in states without SNAP emergency allotments (PD = 0.072; 95% CI = 0.027, 0.177). The prevalence of food pantry use increased by 1.6 percentage points in states without SNAP emergency allotments (PD = 0.016; 95% CI = 0.000, 0.033). <b>Conclusions.</b> After the end of advanced CTC payments, the largest increases in food insufficiency and food pantry use occurred in states that did not concurrently issue SNAP emergency allotments. (<i>Am J Public Health</i>. Published online ahead of print July 23, 2026:e1-e9. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2026.308543).