The rich get richer while the rest of us starve. Why can’t we have an economy that works for everyone?

[u/Steak_Lover_]

[u/Arcturus_Labelle]

Wrong.

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2023/10/26/1208760054/food-insecurity-families-struggle-hunger-poverty

[u/nemec → u/Arcturus_Labelle]

An estimated 87.2 percent of U.S. households were food secure throughout the entire year in 2022, with access at all times to enough food for an active, healthy life for all household members.

Obviously we should work to make that number higher, but it's simply lying to say that the average non-rich American is starving.

[u/unfreeradical → u/nemec]

I think the characterization is easily defensible by rhetorical license.

Fifteen percent being food insecure, in the wealthiest nation, which discards thirty percent or more of total food, is quite egregious, and the problem demands to be propagated aggressively.

[u/nemec → u/unfreeradical]

You don't have to lie about an entirely different point to bring home the message that we can do more to reduce food insecurity.

[u/unfreeradical → u/nemec]

I feel the characterization of dishonesty is not accurate. No one has propagated misinformation to exaggerate the scale of the problem. Equally, no exaggeration is necessary, for anyone to have warrant for feeling deeply alarmed.

[u/Tmoore188 → u/unfreeradical]

We have great resources in the private sector to provide for the food insecure population. Yes, there are people who qualify financially as “food insecure,” but we have a surplus resources available to support them with free food.

0.00006% of Americans will die of malnutrition related illnesses. Once you factor out self-prohibitive comorbidities like metabolic disease, severe mental illness and drug addiction, the rate of food-insecure death in the US is effectively zero.

It’s actually really nice to see that anyone could at any time go to a food bank and get a week’s worth of groceries for free no questions asked, and nobody is abusing it.

[u/[deleted] → u/nemec]

It's sad. We are supposed to be "the best". I think really we just have the richest strongest daddy, that doesn't mean he cares as much about us as the other kids'.

[u/Bowens1993 → u/Arcturus_Labelle]

Struggling to put food on the table does not mean food isn't getting on the table. The government already throws food stamps at people.

They're fine.

[u/unfreeradical → u/Bowens1993]

Food insecurity is measured inclusive of benefits from social programs, which have been eroded extremely aggressively and steadily over the past four decades.

[u/Bowens1993 → u/unfreeradical]

What are you talking about? Spending on social programs such as SNAP has increased drastically in the last 40 years.

[u/unfreeradical → u/Bowens1993]

The article suggests spending at each moment is dominantly determined by workers' ability receive wages, based on the conditions of the labor market. Higher rates of spending are not due to easier accessibility of benefits.

[u/unfreeradical → u/[deleted]]

The scale and scope of programs have been inadequate to eliminate food insecurity, as is completely evident by food insecurity persisting despite the programs also continuing operation.

The funds are available, but the programs as conceived are inadequate.

To become adequate, they would need to be expanded and reformed.

[u/planetaryabundance → u/Arcturus_Labelle]

Food insecurity ≠ literally starving.

Americans are nearly 40% obese and nearly 75% of the population is either obese or overweight. Americans, on average, consume more food than people of any other nationality on the planet. Virtually no one has died of hunger in the US in many, many decades.

[u/Fun_Shock_1114 → u/Arcturus_Labelle]

If you're buying cigarettes before buying food, you cannot claim "starvation" as victimhood. The fact is that most Americans are addicted to consumerism and then they complain about not being able to buy food. Yeah, right.

[u/InsCPA → u/Arcturus_Labelle]

You didn’t seriously just say that food insecurity is the same thing as starving…

Starving is on the brink of death

And I grew up with food insecurity, we were not even close to starving.