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Data Sources for Fact Sheets

Senior Hunger Data

All data regarding senior hunger was derived from The State of Senior Hunger in America 2011:
An Annual Report from the National Foundation to End Senior Hunger (NFESH). Full report
available at: http://www.nfesh.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/State-of-Senior-Hunger-in-
America-2011.pdf

Older Americans Act Title III Program Data

All data regarding Older Americans Act (OAA) Title III Programs was derived from the AGing
Integrated Database (AGID) system, the AGID State Profiles, and the National Survey of OAA
Participants. Full reports available at: www.agidnet.acl.gov and www.agid.acl.gov/StateProfiles
and http://www.agid.acl.gov/CustomTables/NPS/Data/.

Federal Appropriations Data

All data regarding Federal Appropriations and State Allocations thereof was derived from the
Department of Health and Human Services Administration on Aging. Full report available at:
http://www.aoa.gov/AoARoot/AoA_Programs/OAA/Aging_Network/State_Allocations/index.aspx

Public Support for Meals on Wheels Funding Data

An October, 2013 study conducted by SSRS, an independent research company, among a
nationally representative sample of respondents age 18+, found that 71% of survey
respondents "believe the government should pay for Meals on Wheels."


Methods Used in Data Preparation

Seniors Struggling With Hunger

National figures are taken directly from The State of Senior Hunger in America 2011: An Annual
Report from the National Foundation to End Senior Hunger (NFESH).

To produce state-by-state breakdowns, we applied the Administration on Agings state-by-state
population estimates for persons over 60 (found on AGID State Profile, Part A: Population
Estimates, Line 2) to the state-level hunger percentage estimates included in the NFESH study.

Seniors Getting Our Help

All data on seniors being helped is taken directly from the AGID State Profiles. It represents
Persons Served for home-delivered Meals and congregate Meals (Found on AGID State
Profile, Part F: Persons Served/Service Units, Lines 7 and 15).

The percentage figure is simply the Seniors Getting Our Help divided by the Seniors
Struggling With Hunger figure.


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Leaving ##In Need

This is simply the Seniors Struggling figure subtracted by the Seniors Getting Our Help
figure.

In five states (Delaware, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Vermont, and Wyoming), there appear
to be more seniors being served by Title III Nutrition programs than are Struggling With Hunger,
according to our estimations.

This does not mean that Senior Hunger does not exist in these states or that Title III
Nutrition programs are solving the problem. Though Older Americans Act Title III programs
target populations that are more statistically likely to struggle with hunger, households do not
have to qualify as struggling with hunger as a condition to receive meals from Title III Nutrition
programs.

Yearly Cost of Meals

These costs are derived from the AGID State Profiles.
First, the individual cost of a meal is determined using the average cost of both home-
delivered and congregate meals for each state in the given year (Expenditure data found
on AGID State Profile, Part F: Expenditures, Lines 10, 11, 21, and 22).This figure was
derived for each state, since each state serves a different amount of meals with different
levels of expenditure.

For example, in the US in calendar year 2011, 227,733,144 meals were served through
Older Americans Act Title III Nutrition Programs. The Total Expenditures for these meals
(including Federal, state, and other sources) totaled $1,406,503,791. This means the
average cost per meal was $6.18.

Next, we estimated the cost of meals for a year based on 250 multiplied by the average
cost per meal for each state.
Though many home-delivered or congregate meals clients do not get meals year-round
for many reasons, we estimate that if a client were to receive meals year-round, they
would receive approximately 250 meals a year-- 5 meals a week for 50 weeks of the
year. Fifty weeks estimate is to account for Federal Holidays.





The figures presented on the fact sheet are rounded up to the next nearest dollar from the
calculations above.

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Federal Governments Contribution

This figure is publicly available for home-delivered and congregate meals individually, however
the figure used is a percentage of Federal expenditures for both programs. It combines Title III
Expenditures for both programs and divides it by Total Expenditures for both programs.

Investment

This figure is derived from figures sourced above. The formula for the vast majority of states and
the US as a whole is as follows:

Five states (Delaware, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Vermont, and Wyoming) use an
alternative formula which is similar to represent the cost of serving a quarter of the states
seniors based on the existing cost structure:

The figures presented on the fact sheet are presented in millions (and billions) and rounded to
one decimal point.

Savings

The claim that every dollar invested in Meals on Wheels saves up to $50 in Medicaid costs
alone is derived from Sequestering Meals on Wheels Could Cost the Nation $489 Million per
Year, released in April 2013 by the Center for Effective Government (accessible at
http://www.foreffectivegov.org/files/budget/sequestration-and-meals-on-wheels.pdf).

Using this ratio, we simply multiply the Investment Level calculated above by 50, and round so
that the figure is presented in billions and rounded to one decimal point.