SNAP, WIC, and the Cost of Inaction: Why This Is a Justice Issue, Not a Charity One

Tomorrow, millions of families may lose access to SNAP and WIC benefits because of the government shutdown. For some, these programs are statistics.

For others, they are survival.

And yet, much of what I see online right now are nostalgic posts — people sharing how they “once” used WIC or SNAP, how it “helped them when they were a kid.” These stories are heartfelt, but they risk turning a systemic failure into poverty nostalgia. Gratitude narratives can unintentionally obscure the truth: this is not about personal stories of resilience. This is about structural inequity — and about a government that is choosing, yet again, to make hunger political.

SNAP and WIC Are Not Charity — They’re Infrastructure

As someone who has spent years working in educational equity and school finance, I know that programs like SNAP and WIC are not extras — they’re essential components of how we ensure students can learn. Hunger doesn’t clock out when the school bell rings.

When a child doesn’t have enough to eat, their brain chemistry changes. Their ability to focus, self-regulate, and retain information declines. Teachers end up managing the fallout of hunger: distraction, fatigue, frustration, and behavioral challenges. Schools respond with interventions, specialists, and expanded meal programs — all of which require funding that’s already stretched thin.

In other words, when the federal safety net frays, the educational system has to step up and step in -- so our kids don't pay the price.

Cutting or delaying SNAP and WIC isn’t just a family issue; it’s an equity issue. Because when students come to school hungry, public schools are forced to absorb the costs of unmet social needs — without the resources to do so.

The Myth of the “Voiceless” Poor

The communities most affected by these cuts are not voiceless — they are unheard. Families have been testifying, advocating, and organizing around food insecurity for decades. They’ve told policymakers what they need: stability, not shutdowns. Investment, not charity.

When we reduce this moment to personal stories of gratitude — “WIC helped me when I was little” — we center the storyteller, not the people who are currently hungry. We make poverty palatable, even sentimental. And we let systems off the hook for their ongoing neglect. We inadvertently add to the ideology of poverty porn.

The truth is that hunger is policy-made. And when we treat food access as conditional, we reproduce the same inequities that show up in our schools, our budgets, and our politics.

Food Policy Is Education Policy

Every budget is a moral document. When federal food programs are disrupted, the moral failure cascades through classrooms, cafeterias, and communities.

• Attendance drops when children are hungry.

• Health outcomes worsen, increasing school nurse visits and absenteeism.

• Teachers spend their own money to feed students, because someone has to.

• Learning gaps widen, because hunger is an equity issue long before it’s an academic one.

If we truly care about closing opportunity gaps, then we must recognize SNAP and WIC as integral to the same public investment conversation as teacher pay, special education funding, and equitable state formulas.

This Is About Justice, Not Proximity

We should not have to know someone who uses SNAP or WIC to care about this. We should care because no one in a country as wealthy as ours should go hungry — especially not infants and children.

This is not about empathy through proximity; it’s about responsibility through justice.

If our national priorities can allow for tax cuts, subsidies, and corporate bailouts but cannot guarantee nutrition for families during a political stalemate, then the problem is not scarcity — it’s values.

Closing: The Real Work of Equity

Equity work demands that we name the systems that perpetuate harm — even when those systems are bureaucratic, quiet, and cloaked in policy jargon.

SNAP and WIC are not stories of “helping the poor.” They are testaments to the idea that collective care is a shared obligation. When those programs fail, we don’t just fail families — we fail our schools, our communities, and our children’s futures.

So yes, let’s tell stories — but not to make poverty digestible. Let’s tell them to make injustice undeniable.

Because this is not a moment for nostalgia. It’s a moment for accountability.