Estimating Eligibility and Participation for the WIC Program Final Report (2003) / Chapter Skim
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8. Estimating WIC Participation Among Eligible People
8. Estimating WIC Participation Among Eligible People
Pages 113-132
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From page 113... ...
Or program rules ancl administrative practices can be set so that participants are encouraged or discouraged from participating for example, more convenient office locations or office hours could be set to encourage more eligible people to participate. This chapter presumes that part of the reason USDA estimates WIC eligibility ancl participation is to better understand the performance of the program (e.g., coverage rates)
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From page 114... ...
, but participation is not related to state-level measures of need, such as poverty and unemployment rates. 1 DATA SOURCES TO ESTIMATE WIC PARTICIPATION AMONG ELIGIBLE PEOPLE This section reviews data sources available to measure WIC participation.
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From page 115... ...
A second significant problem is that households are screened before they are asked about participation in food programs, so that only households with incomes below a certain level are asked the questions.3 Since the income screen depends on the number of persons in the household, the size of the household is critical to determining whether or 2This section draws from the 1995 CPS Food Security Supplement Interviewer Instructions (CPS Interviewer Memorandum no.
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From page 116... ...
By state, by month, Individual data All, women, children 1-4, infants; Y women by category 91-00 All, women by category, children, Y · r Intents Nationally representative sample of Y WIC recipients in the contiguous US certified in spring 1998 T1 ·r Ott lr pass income screen estimate: women, infants, children in household Women if pass income screen. Estimate: Y children, infants in family of women Any person last month y Acronyms: AFDC = Aid to Families with Dependent Children CPS = Current Population Survey FNS = Food and Nutrition Service PC = participant characteristics SIPP = Survey of Income and Program Participation TANF = Temporary Assistance for Needy Families USDA = U.S.
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From page 117... ...
AFDC/TANF N Food Stamps Medicaid AFDC/TANF Food Stamps Medicaid
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From page 118... ...
Second, other eligible WIC recipients will have incomes above the screen in the first month in which a household is surveyed, but below that level in subsequent months.4 Working in the other direction, the FSS's use of the broadest possible measure of the household may help to mitigate the undercounting caused by the income screen because the WIC household may not include all the unrelated members of a household, but only those deemed by a WIC eligibility worker to be "sharing resources." A second screen was added prior to the program participation questions in 1998 and 1999. In addition to asking WIC questions to all households passing the income screen (and all those responding "don't know" or "refuse")
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From page 119... ...
Thus, households with fewer than seven possibly unrelated persons were more likely to be asked the WIC questions in the March CPS than in the FSS, while those with more members would be less likely to be asked in the March CPS than in the FSS. We examined the importance of the different income screens by also imposing the narrower FSS screen onto the March CPS data.
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From page 120... ...
(2002) estimate that the more generous income screen in the March CPS adds 890,000 WIC recipients in 1999 and 970,000 in 2000, relative to what would have been obtained with the more restrictive FSS screens.
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From page 121... ...
One striking discrepancy between the survey data ancl the aclministrative data is that income for the total WIC population ancl across almost every subgroup is higher in SIPP ancl the March CPS than it is in the national WIC survey, even when using a family rather than a household measure of income in the CPS. The fact that WIC participants appear to have higher incomes on average than those that are reported to WIC aclministrators does not necessarily imply noncompliance with program rules, since the incomes reported to CPS ancl SIPP surveyors remain below WIC cutoffs.
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From page 122... ...
These comparisons suggest that estimates of WIC eligibility and participation based on the CPS could be improved with several modifications to the current methods used by the FSS and the March CPS to obtain information on WIC participation. RECOMMENDATION: The income screen used to determine whether a CPS Food Security Supplement respondent is asked survey questions about WIC participation should be modified or eliminated so that all people who are in fact eligible for WIC are asked the question about WIC participation.
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From page 123... ...
The SIPP data are used to make these estimates because the data set allows direct observation of pregnant and postpartum women, because it includes monthly income for modeling eligibility, and because it specifies which household members receive WIC benefits. In order to be income eligible for WIC, a categorically eligible person must have income less than or equal to 185 percent of federal poverty guidelines, or be enrolled in a program, for example Medicaid, which confers adjunctive eligibility.
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From page 124... ...
infants in SIPP in each month of 1998 into estimated eligibles and ineligibles and into those who do and do not receive WIC. For this portion of the analysis, an adjustment that increases the number of WIC recipients by the amount that the SIPP data undercounts recipients in a particular group is made, using the administrative data as the benchmark.
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From page 125... ...
Of the 16 million children in this age group, 57 percent are estimated to be eligible for WIC. Of the 9 million eligible children, 38 percent receive WIC benefits.
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From page 126... ...
CONCLUSION: WIC participation rates among eligible persons are substantially lower than the 80 percent rate assumed in the process of estimating the number of eligible people likely to participate in WIC. WIC participation rates also vary substantially across eligibility category.
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From page 127... ...
For the same year, coverages rates based on USDA estimates of eligibility were 127.7 percent for infants and 74.4 percent for children. We did not estimate participation rates for pregnant women separately from postpartum women and so cannot estimate new coverage rates for these groups.
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From page 128... ...
For example, current ENS methodology for estimating eligibility and participation assumes that WIC participation is closely linked to participation in the food stamp program but ignores the linkage between WIC and Medicaid. Second, personal characteristics may make people more or less likely to participate.
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From page 129... ...
individual-level differences in participation with individual-level data from the March CPS for years 1997-2000 and 1998 SIPP data. The state-level model is estimated to better understand how features of the administration of WIC programs (e.g., food package costs, timing of benefit issuance)
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From page 130... ...
Individual-Level Models Individual-level data from the March CPS and SIPP were used to examine individual characteristics associated with WIC participation among eligibles. Several findings are consistent across both data sets.
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From page 131... ...
Results from these analyses also suggest that changes in program rules or administrative practices are associated with changes in participation rates. Thus, another source of uncertainty in forecasted estimates of participation is introduced if states change the way they run their WIC programs or if changes in program rules are implemented.
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From page 132... ...
And neither the March CPS nor the FSS asks for monthly measures of WIC participation or collects information on which individuals in the household receive WIC. The panel recommends improvements to these data sources that will improve estimates of .
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