USDA Food Plans in a Nutshell
Photo Credit © Oleg Magni on Pxhere.
When it comes to successful “adulting”, learning to budget, meal plan and prepare your own meals are three critical skills. Whether you’re cooking for yourself, you and a partner, or an entire family – it’s important to shop and meal plan effectively so you can minimize spending, maximize taste, optimize nutrition and, hopefully, spend less time in the kitchen!
Thankfully, this isn’t a new concept. In fact, the government has been publishing tools to help Americans plan and shop for nutritious meals for over 100 years.
The USDA published its first food guide in 1894, and then followed with its first meal plans in 1933. The original four plans, introduced by Hazel Stiebeling, were designed to help Americans shop smarter during the Great Depression. Each plan was tiered for a different level of income, but all of them similarly encouraged families to buy and use items from twelve major food groups to obtain adequate nutrition [FN1].
While the messaging, foods and prices have been revised over the years, Stiebeling’s basic concept remains in place. Today they’re called the USDA Meal Plans and, in order of increasing budget, referred to as: the Thrifty Plan, the Low-Cost Plan, the Moderate Cost Plan and the Liberal Plan.
Current Meal Plans are based on 2005 dietary guidelines, dietary reference intakes & food intake recommendations. Each plan is updated monthly to reflect jumps in food prices, and less frequently to account for changes in dietary guidelines and consumption trends [FN2-3].
Four USDA Food Plans
The USDA Meal Plans are designed to inform policy, guide education and help families eat healthier, so it makes sense that they’re also highly evidence based.
All plans are specific to both age and gender. This is because nutritional guidelines vary by the same: an 8-year-old should not eat the same amount of food as a 30-year-old or a 70-year-old. Likewise, a 17-year-old girl does not usually need as many calories as a 17-year-old boy, but does require more dietary iron. Different recommendations/allotments are rooted in biological differences in metabolism.
The USDA currently breaks each level of the Meal Plan into fifteen age- and gender-specific “baskets” and recommends items from 29 major food groups. All plans assume that every meal will be prepared at home and do not contain any money for alcohol or dietary supplements [FN3].
The Thrifty Plan
The Thrifty Meal Plan (TFP) is the lowest-price plan. It’s designed for families with the most limited resources, or those working to absolutely minimize food spending while still maintaining proper nutrition. This plan is used as a basis for SNAP allotments (formerly known as “food stamps”) and the foundation for meal planning tips/ideas provided alongside this governmental nutrition assistance.
Interestingly, the TFP is also used to set poverty income guidelines. A 1955 USDA study found that the average American family spent about one-third of their income on food, so the federal poverty line (FPL) was set at 3x the cost of the most frugal USDA meal plan [FN4]. However, this proves an outdated and inadequate measure for current-day Americans.
Since its creation, the FPL has been periodically increased based on inflation and the Consumer Price Index (CPI), but modifications do not reflect many necessary & ever-increasing costs of modern life like childcare or transportation [FN5]. As a result, current FPLs set at 3x the cost of TFP is much too low for most American families, who now spend an average of just 12% of their take-home pay on food [FN6]. Moreover, over the last 40 years, real wages have remained largely immobile among the bottom quartile of American earners [FN7]. As the cost of food and other necessities has skyrocketed, this wage stagnation has exacerbated wealth inequality in America and made CPI-based FPL adjustments even less representative of low-income Americans’ day-to-day reality.
To give you some perspective about the cost of each plan, the Thrifty Food Plan* budgets just [FN2]:
$92 per week ($400 per month) for a couple
$135-155 per week ($585-671 per month) for a family of four
The Low-Cost Plan
The Low-Cost Plan is for families willing or able to spend about 25-30% more on food. This plan is used by bankruptcy courts as a guide for how much to allocate for bankruptees’ food expenses. It’s also sometimes used in family court to determine appropriate alimony and child support payments [FN3-4].
On average, households who follow the Low-Cost Food Plan* spend [FN2]:
$118 per week ($513 per month) for a couple
$173-203 per week ($748-882 per month) for a family of four
The Moderate Cost Plan
The Moderate Cost Plan budgets around 50-60% more money for food each week than the Thrifty Food Plan. It, along with the Liberal Food Plan, is used to set the Basic Allowance for Subsistence (BAS) rate for millions of enlisted US service members [FN4].
Households who follow the Moderate Cost Food Plan* spend, on average [FN2].
$147 per week ($636 per month) for a couple
$213-254 per week ($922-1101 per month) for a family of four
The Liberal Plan
Finally, the Liberal Plan is the most flexible – and most expensive – meal plan published by the USDA. It budgets twice as much money for food as the Thrifty Food Plan and permits the widest selection of healthy foods. The Liberal Plan focuses less on budgeting and more on ensuring members of a household receive the appropriate variety of foods required to meet basic nutritional needs.
Households whose expenses align with the Liberal Food Plan* spend approximately [FN2]:
$183 per week ($793 per month) for a couple
$263-308 per week ($1138-1333 per month) for a family of four
If you’d like more information about how to eat nutritiously on a budget, check out the Choose MyPlate site here! They have great tips about how to shop healthier on a budget, low-cost recipe inspiration and even a two week sample menu for those following the Thrifty Meal Plan.
* These estimates apply to households with adults between 19-50 years old; older couples (51-70 years old) spend about $4-5 less per week ($12 less per week on the Liberal Plan) because they don’t need quite as much food. The USDA estimates for couples apply to adult heterosexual couples. In the family estimates are for an adult man, adult woman and two young children. The lower end of range applies to families with 2- to 5-year-olds, while the upper end of range is for families 6- to 11-year-olds.
References
1. https://www.ers.usda.gov/webdocs/publications/42215/5831_aib750b_1_.pdf
2. https://fns-prod.azureedge.net/sites/default/files/media/file/CostofFoodApr2020.pdf
4. https://books.google.com.pa/books?id=GqTYBAAAQBAJ&pg=PA83
6. https://howmuch.net/articles/breakdown-average-american-spending