What does social security support look like in the US’ highly fragmented welfare system? How do cash assistance and food stamps support families in need? What has the notion of ‘End Welfare as We Know It’ during the 1990s meant for families in need? And what is the role for charity and community-based food assistance in responding to hunger and deprivation?
In this episode, we speak with Beth DaPonte, an expert on issues of poverty and hunger in the US.
With a social sciences PhD from University of Chicago, Beth DaPonte helps non-profits improve performance and demonstrate value. She founded Social Science Consultants in 2012 and her book Evaluation Essentials was published by Wiley and Sons in 2025. As Chief of Section for the Office of Internal Oversight Services of the UN, and later graduate instructor at Yale University, Carnegie Mellon and the University of Pittsburgh, she has honed expertise in evaluation practices.
Beth has longstanding expertise in researching food assistance in the US. Recent writings on US welfare and how it fails to prevent hunger include an analysis of the importance of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) against the backdrop of the government shutdown at the end of 2025.
Listen to our conversation to learn more about how – over the past few decades – US support to families and individuals in need has become more restrictive and temporary, and how it has come to rely on charitable support, especially in terms of food assistance. Beth and I also discuss the lessons to be learned for other countries and the ‘silent tsunami’ of old age poverty that is looming large.
Photo credit: Sora Shimazaki at Pexels.com
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