How to Calculate Food Stamp Allottment
- 1). Add up your monthly earned and unearned income. Earned income is money that you receive from a job, while unearned income includes child support and unemployment assistance.
- 2). Multiply your gross income by 0.2 and then subtract this value from your Step 1 value to deduct your Earned Income Tax Credit. If your gross income is $1,000 per month, you would first multiply $1,000 by 0.2 to get 200, and then subtract 200 from $1,000 to get 800.
- 3). Deduct any child support and farm losses from the value you calculated in Step 2. If you have to pay $250 per month in child support and your gross income after deducting the Earned Income credit is $800, you would end up with $550.
- 4). Subtract the standard deduction from your Step 3 value. The deduction is $141 for one to three people, $153 for four people, $179 for five people, and $205 for six or more people. If you have three people in your home, your final number is 550-141 = 409.
- 5). Deduct your medical expenses by subtracting all but $35 of your monthly medical expenses from the number that you got in the previous step. For example, if you spent $50 on medical bills, you are only allowed to deduct 50-35= $15 in this step. To deduct your medical expenses, subtract 15 from 409 to get 394.
- 6). Subtract any childcare costs from the value that you got in Step 5. There is no limit on the amount that you can deduct for childcare. The final value that you get in this step is your adjusted income.
- 7). Divide your adjusted income by two. In this case, you would divide 394 by two to get 197.
- 8). Subtract your rent or other shelter expenses from the value that you got in Step 7 to determine the Possible Excess Shelter. If your monthly rent is $500, then you can subtract this expense from your Step 7 value, 197, to get -303.
- 9). Subtract the value that you got for Step 8 from your total adjusted income, if you got a negative value in Step 8. In this case, you should subtract 303 from 394 to get $91. This is the final value for your net income.
- 10
Look up your net income on the table provided by the Department of Social Services and use the table and the number of people in your household to find out the benefits you are eligible for. Since your net income is $91 in this example and you have three people at home, your benefit according to the table would be $498.
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