Illinois budget includes $200,000 to redefine ‘low-income’

The new budget focuses on semantics rather than ensuring the right people receive SNAP benefits.

The Illinois State Board of Education expects the state’s number of “low-income” students to drop over the next several years.

Instead of celebrating that, the board asked lawmakers for money to redefine “low income” so more students will qualify for benefits under the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP).

Lawmakers complied. The newly passed budget provides $200,000 to develop “an alternative low-income population count for Evidence-Based Funding calculations in response to” the federal One Big Beautiful Bill.

But the changes under that bill were meant to encourage work and ensure the food benefits go to the people who need them.

In April 2026, 1.65 million people in Illinois were receiving SNAP benefits, down from 1.94 million a year earlier. The decrease can be attributed largely to fewer overpayments and more people either working or losing benefits because they decided not to work.

In one major change to the program, states now must have a SNAP error rate below 6% or they will have to pay a portion of the costs of the program. The error rate measures over- and underpayments of benefits.

Overpayments are generally more common than underpayments. That’s particularly true in Illinois, where the vast majority of the 11.56% error rate was due to overpayments.

Illinois’ error rate was 13th-highest in the country in fiscal 2024. If that rate remains the same, the state would be required to contribute an additional $700 million to maintain recipients’ benefits at current levels.

About 176,000 recipients in Illinois got more in April than they should have based on their income. Those overpayments hurt others the SNAP program can help and the taxpayers who fund the benefits.

The other major change to SNAP was expanding work requirements to include all able-bodied adults 18 to 64 without dependents unless they qualify for an exemption. Those SNAP recipients now must work or volunteer an average of 20 hours per week.

Work requirements help ensure that low-income people are climbing the economic ladder. Work is the best pathway out of poverty: While the poverty rate in Illinois was 11.6% in 2024, it was only 1.9% for people who worked full-time.

Rather than create ways to count more students as low-income, the state should celebrate more people climbing onto and up the economic ladder and enhance incentives for them to do so.

The state also should reduce its SNAP error rate to ensure needy people receive the appropriate benefits.