A change buried in last year’s sweeping budget law is now reaching people in their late 50s and early 60s who had never faced a work test to keep their food benefits. Under the revised rules, able-bodied adults up to age 64 must work, volunteer, or train at least 80 hours a month to keep receiving SNAP, the program still widely known as food stamps. The old cutoff was 54. That single change pulls a decade of older adults — many close to retirement but not yet eligible for it — into a requirement that can end benefits within months if it goes unmet. Caregivers of young children remain exempt, but several long-standing exemptions did not survive.
How the age ceiling jumped from 54 to 64
The requirement applies to a category the program calls able-bodied adults without dependents, or ABAWDs. For years, the rules covered adults aged 18 to 54. The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, signed into law on July 4, 2025, raised that ceiling to 64, extending the work test to millions of older adults for the first time. The practical effect lands hardest on people between 55 and 64, a group that often includes early retirees, workers pushed out of physically demanding jobs, and those caring for aging spouses or parents.
The scale is significant. SNAP serves tens of millions of Americans, and older adults are among its fastest-growing recipients as living costs climb faster than fixed incomes. Extending the work test to age 64 means a population that increasingly relies on the program to afford groceries now has to prove monthly work activity to keep it, at an age when steady employment is often hardest to secure.
The change did not take effect everywhere at once. States began phasing in the new rules between November 2025 and June 2026, so the date a household first faces the test depends on its state and on when its case comes up for recertification. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which administers SNAP through its food and nutrition arm, the underlying federal standard now applies to adults 18 through 64 who do not qualify for an exemption.
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The 80-hour rule and the three-month clock
For older adults, the timing collides with a difficult stretch of life. Someone at 60 who loses a job may struggle to find 80 hours of monthly work, yet is still years away from Social Security’s earliest claiming age of 62 and further still from Medicare at 65. The requirement can be met several ways, not only through a traditional job: paid work, self-employment, volunteering, an approved employment and training program, or a combination reaching 80 hours in a month all satisfy the rule. That works out to roughly 20 hours a week.
The countdown is the enforcement mechanism. An adult subject to the rule who does not meet the 80-hour threshold or qualify for an exemption can receive SNAP for only three months in any 36-month period. Once those three months are used, benefits stop until the person either meets the requirement again or the three-year window resets. The Agriculture Department still allows states to seek waivers in areas with high unemployment, but the law sharply limited how broadly those waivers can be granted.
The three-month limit is what makes the rule consequential rather than merely bureaucratic. For a 58-year-old between jobs, a stretch of unemployment that once had no bearing on food assistance can now exhaust eligibility in a single quarter. Reporting requirements add another trap, because benefits can lapse not only from failing to work but from failing to document work that was actually performed.
Which exemptions survived and which were cut
The headline’s caveat is accurate: caregivers remain exempt, but the definition narrowed. Previously, a parent or caregiver of any child under 18 was excused from the work test. The new law lowered that to children under 14, meaning caregivers of teenagers aged 14 to 17 must now meet the requirement. People who are medically unable to work, pregnant, or caring for an incapacitated household member also remain exempt.
Other exemptions were eliminated outright. As NPR reported, the law removed the blanket protections that had covered veterans, people experiencing homelessness, and young adults aging out of foster care. Those groups, previously shielded regardless of work status, now face the same 80-hour test as everyone else in the age range unless they qualify under one of the remaining categories.
The combined effect is a work rule that reaches deeper into older age and forgives fewer hard circumstances than before. For adults in the 55-to-64 band, the safest course is to confirm with a state SNAP office when the rule takes effect locally, whether an exemption applies, and how to report qualifying hours — because under the new structure, the difference between keeping food assistance and losing it can come down to a single unreported month.
This article was produced with AI assistance and reviewed against primary sources by The Money Overview editorial team.
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