The Debt-Financed Diet: A Critical Analysis of the Unjustified Exclusion of Financial Liability from United States Food Security Measurement

The measurement of food security in the United States, as operationalized by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), stands as the nation’s principal barometer for social well-being and the efficacy of the safety net. Defined formally as "access by all people at all times to enough food for an active, healthy life," the concept is theoretically robust.1 However, the practical application of this definition, through the 18-item Household Food Security Survey Module (HFSSM), suffers from a critical epistemological and economic oversight: it measures the physiological and behavioral consequences of resource deprivation (e.g., skipping meals) while systematically ignoring the financial mechanisms employed to avert these consequences.