The Effects of SNAP Sugary Drink Restrictions on Consumption and Welfare

We thank Charlie Rafkin, Jesse Shapiro, and Jintaek Song for helpful feedback. We thank Jingzhou (Ron) Huang, Taryn O’Connor, and Amanda Zeitlin for research assistance. This work was funded by the Food Policy Research Program at the University of Illinois Chicago, which is supported by a grant (2025-153247) from Bloomberg Philanthropies’ Food Policy Program (www.bloomberg.org). The contents of this publication do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of Bloomberg Philanthropies. Researchers’ own analyses calculated (or derived) based in part on data from Market Track, LLC dba Numerator and marketing databases provided through the Numerator Datasets at the Kilts Center for Marketing Data Center at The University of Chicago Booth School of Business. The conclusions drawn from the Numerator data are those of the researchers and do not reflect the views of Numerator. Numerator is not responsible for and had no role in analyzing or preparing the results reported herein. Researchers’ own analyses calculated (or derived) based in part on data from Nielsen Consumer LLC and marketing databases provided through the NielsenIQ Datasets at the Kilts Center for Marketing Data Center at The University of Chicago Booth School of Business. The conclusions drawn from the NielsenIQ data are those of the researchers and do not reflect the views of NielsenIQ. NielsenIQ is not responsible for, had no role in, and was not involved in analyzing and preparing the results reported herein. Our pre-analysis plan and data analysis code are available from osf.io/5nf3b. The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of Bloomberg Philanthropies or the National Bureau of Economic Research.

• August 21, 2026