The number of families struggling with food insecurity nearly tripled in last two years, survey finds.
Marcus Baram for Capital and Main
Military families are experiencing a sharp rise in food insecurity, driven largely by the rising cost of groceries, according to a survey conducted before the start of the Iran war in February and its inflationary impact.
The biennial report by the Military Family Advisory Network, a national nonprofit that supports military and veteran families, surveyed more than 10,000 families between October 2025 and January 2026. The report examines how economic security, health care access, spouse employment, community connection, family functioning and military life satisfaction shape family well-being and force readiness.
More than 41% of respondents said they were experiencing food insecurity. That’s a dramatic jump from 2023, when 16% reported food insecurity. Both surveys predate the war-related inflation that has since raised costs for many military families, as Capital & Main previously reported.
More than half of respondents (53.8%) identified food costs as a barrier to eating healthy, citing the high price of groceries and healthy options in particular. One of the most striking findings, the report said, was that many families reported skipping meals or portions of meals so that other family members could eat.
“People are struggling. Things have gotten a lot more expensive, especially with the gas prices,” said the spouse of a deployed service member living near Camp Pendleton in Southern California who asked to remain anonymous due to her fear of retaliation. Her family is receiving extra pay during her husband’s deployment. “But when he comes home, that will not be true anymore,” she said, noting that she knows other spouses who are being squeezed by rising inflation.
One of the most alarming developments, said Military Family Advisory Network chief executive Shannon Razsadin, is that military spouses are experiencing some of the survey’s most negative outcomes — from limited access to mental health care to unemployment.
“We’ve seen it consistently over time, but it became more acute this time, specifically as it relates to mental health,” she said. “Accessing mental health care and sometimes having to rely on emergency rooms for that support.”
One in four military households (25.1%) reported that a member had used the emergency room for mental health care because they could not secure a timely appointment, according to the report. The data also revealed what the report’s authors called a concerning prevalence of suicidal ideation within the military community, with military spouses emerging as the most vulnerable demographic.
An active-duty Navy spouse told the advisory network that mental health support is “severely lacking” for service members. The spouse added: “The military hospital is not taking active duty patients and referring them out in town. Very few people are taking patients and wait times are incredibly long. This leads to essentially no access for mental health care.”
“There are so many challenges that spouses are facing — unemployment, food insecurity, the challenges with frequent moves,” Razsadin said. “It’s not all that surprising that they are facing these mental health struggles.”
The Defense Department did not immediately respond to Capital & Main’s request for comment.
Financial Strains Push More to Predatory Lending
The job picture was equally striking. The share of spouses who were unemployed and actively seeking work jumped by nearly a third, to 29.9% in 2025 from 21.8% in 2023. Razsadin attributed much of that insecurity to the fact that military families must frequently move.
“The pattern of frequent moves that military families experience makes it really hard for military spouses to maintain a career, let alone a job,” she said. “So the career progression is hard for them. So many military spouses are underemployed even if they have a job.”
The financial strain has pushed more families toward predatory lending, including auto title loans (10.3%) and payday loans (5.5%), according to the report.
When service members move from station to station, they are reimbursed for many expenses, but the upfront costs fall squarely on them, according to the report — temporary housing, fuel, meals, rental deposits, utility deposits and the restocking of pantry items. The reimbursements often fall short. Between 58.9% and 63% of respondents reported paying more than $1,000 out of pocket beyond what they were reimbursed, up sharply from 44.6% in 2023.
Not every finding was grim. Reports of poor family health dropped by more than half since 2023. But the overall picture, Razsadin said, was of military families battered by inflation and thin support services — a problem, she argued, that demands action.
She wants the military to improve how it supports families and delivers resources, and to expand access to mental health and broader health care.
“This is truly a national security imperative,” she said, “that military spouses are able to be whole while they’re supporting the service member and raising a family in this life.”
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