Research co-authored by Jason Cook, an Assistant Professor in the Eccles School’s Division of Quantitative Analysis of Markets and Organizations as well as the Marriner S. Eccles Institute, was featured on an episode of the (HBO) Max news, politics, and current events show “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver.”

In a segment analyzing President Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill,” Oliver focuses on potential reductions to healthcare and food assistance that could occur as a result of the bill’s passage. The host notes that the bill would make targeted cuts to both Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) by introducing a significant expansion of work requirements.

“Study after study has shown that ‘work requirements do not increase work.’ What they do cause is ‘large drops in program participation,’ including, crucially, a lot of people who are actually still eligible to receive help,” Oliver said, quoting from and displaying excerpts of a Substack post by Chloe N. East (an Associate Professor in the University of Colorado Denver’s Department of Economics), headlined, “What AEI Gets Wrong about SNAP Work Requirements.”

In that post, East references her collaboration with Cook and their findings: “In new work of mine with my coauthor, Jason Cook, we use recent, high-quality data to study whether receipt of SNAP (in this century!) changes whether and how much people work among a large, representative group of working-aged people. We find very clear evidence that SNAP does not lead to large decreases in employment or earnings overall.”

The working paper referenced, “The Effect of Means-Tested Transfers on Work: Evidence from Quasi-Randomly Assigned SNAP Caseworkers,” was revised in May 2025, and concludes: “We find no evidence that receiving SNAP leads to long-term reductions in labor supply or dependency on government benefits. If anything, our results suggest the opposite — SNAP provides support for those who are unable to work and provides important insurance for workers experiencing a negative shock.”