“It’s Like Night and Day”: How Bureaucratic Encounters Vary across WIC, SNAP, and Medicaid

Research characterizes public assistance programs as stigmatizing and stressful (e.g., psychological costs) but obscures differences across programs or the features of policy design that contribute to varied bureaucratic encounters. Using 83 interviews with Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), and Medicaid beneficiaries, and 60 interviews with staff from those programs, we examine how people differentiate their experiences across programs. We find that WIC staff members describe the program as facilitating, rather than constraining, personal interactions with clients. In contrast, SNAP and Medicaid workers report pressure to process clients expeditiously and accurately, leading several caseworkers to express frustration and suspicion of the information provided by recipients. WIC participants in all three programs described positive, supportive interactions with WIC staff and viewed the program as a source of social support. In contrast, participants reported stigmatizing encounters with SNAP and Medicaid staff and inaccessible caseworkers.