The State Where People Don’t Get Enough To Eat

By Douglas A. McIntyre Published Jun 5, 8:34AM EDT

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The State Where People Don’t Get Enough To Eat — © arinahabich / iStock via Getty Images

The Census began a process to measure the effects of COVID-19 on American life slightly after the pandemic began. It was not clear how long the process would go on, but it continues until today. The reason for the study, called the Household Pulse Survey, is to see how the spread of the disease, which has already killed over 600,000 people in the U.S. would change food availability, income, telecommuting, foreclosures, and evictions, and health. Among these, one section of the survey is called “Food Scarcity.” The question is meant to measure the “percentage of adults in households where there was either sometimes or often not enough to eat in the last 7 days.”

The Census has released weekly results in three phases. The first began on April 23, 2020, and ended July 21, 2020. The second and third phases followed, with the current phase, 3.1, covers May 12 – May 24. This is “Week 30” of the process. The Household Pulse Survey was created by an effort across several government agencies. These include the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Bureau of Transportation Statistics, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Department of Defense, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Maternal and Child Health Bureau, the National Center for Education Statistics, the National Center for Health Statistics, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, the Social Security Administration, and the USDA Economic Research Service.

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The state with the highest level of Food Scarcity is Mississippi, based on Week 30 results. Its figure is 14.7%. This compares to a national figure of 9.1%. The state with the lowest percentage was Delaware at 3.1%. While the Census does not draw any comparisons to other demographics by state, Mississippi has the second-lowest median income among all states at just over $44,000. Delaware is the 17th highest at about $65,000.

The results are also ranked by metro area. The metro ranked the highest is Dallas at 14.4%. The lowest is Boston at 4.2%.

Click here to read 20 Groceries Driving Up Your Food Bill The Most

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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.