In the United States, hunger is often perceived as a foreign problem, reserved for destitute villages in the developing world. But the national recession has brought into focus the magnitude of food insecurity on our own soil.  And Illinois is no exception.

Last year, Gallup surveyed over 500,000 people about their access to food. According to this unprecedented pool of data, analyzed by the Food Research and Action Center (FRAC), a growing percentage of Illinois households are struggling to put decent meals on the table.

In 2009, 17.2 percent of Illinois households qualified as "food insecure," meaning that at one point in the year, the family did not have enough money to purchase food. That rate is up from 16.3 percent in 2008. Because it's costlier to feed additional mouths, the rate for households with children (23.2 percent) is even higher.

FRAC usefully broke down the data by congressional district and we've thrown the figures into a spreadsheet below. Notice the extreme discrepancies throughout the state. The 4th and 2nd Districts -- which cover wide swaths of the West and South Side of Chicago -- are among the 21 least secure districts nationwide. The north suburban 10th District, by comparison, is the second most secure district in the entire country:

It's worth considering how much higher these numbers would be without the stimulus package. Illinois saw an uptick in food insecurity in 2009, the result of the state's extremely high unemployment rate.  But in most other parts of the country, the rate flattened out or even dipped slightly last year.  FRAC attributes this trend to falling food prices and ARRA, which broadened food stamp eligibility and boosted the size of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits. The data proves again that the spending package is working as designed, despite the public's impression of it.

That's not to say that more can't be done at the federal and state level to support struggling households. First and foremost, Illinois needs to boost (not cut) human service outreach so that eligible families take advantage of SNAP. Remember that in 2007, the last year data was available from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, at least 141,843 eligible households failed to enroll in the program in Cook County alone, costing the state an estimated $85 million in federal food stamp funding. (For those who think they might qualify, click here for some helpful links.)

Furthermore, if food insecurity is still high when the stimulus spending runs out at the end of the year, Congress should re-up its expanded support for the program. After all, it's both cost-effective and humane.