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US Households Struggle to Afford Food: Survey
WASHINGTON - Nearly one in five U.S. households ran out of money to buy enough food at least once during 2009, said an antihunger group on Tuesday, urging more federal action to help Americans get enough to eat.
"There are no hunger-free areas of America," said Jim Weill of the Food Research and Action Center. Weill said he hoped President Barack Obama would exempt public nutrition programs from a proposed three-year freeze on domestic spending. (photo by flickr user sara~) "There are no hunger-free areas of America," said Jim Weill of the Food Research and Action Center. Weill said he hoped President Barack Obama would exempt public nutrition programs from a proposed three-year freeze on domestic spending.
Obama has a goal to end childhood hunger by 2015. He backed a $1 billion a year increase in school lunch and other child nutrition programs a year ago.
Nationwide polling found 18.2 percent of households reported "food hardship" -- lacking money to buy enough food -- in 2009, according to the group. That is higher than the government's "food insecurity" rating of 14.6 percent of households, or 49 million people, for 2008.
Households with children had a "food hardship" rate of 24.1 percent for 2009 compared with 14.9 percent among households without children. Twenty states had rates of 20 percent or higher. Seven Southern states led the list.
The figures were based on responses to the question, "Have there been times in the past 12 months when you did not have enough money to buy the food that you or your family needed?" The question is similar to one asked by the Census Bureau in collecting data for the annual food-insecurity report.
(Reporting by Charles Abbott; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)
39 Comments so far
Show AllFirst, FEED THE BABIES. They are most vulnerable. Adults can, as we see in Haiti, go without food for a few days (but not water).
Second set up more -- no questions asked -- food banks instead of cutting funding to them.
Third find out if there is any way to start a garden -- even in the city vacant lots can be utilized.
Fourth pay workers a LIVING WAGE. Or is that number one?
Gary
"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way of life at all in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron."
-- Dwight D. Eisenhower, From a speech before the American Society of Newspaper Editors, April 16, 1953
First feed the Bankers
Second feed the Brokers
Third feed the Bandits with bayonets
...this is not living,,,this is survival...
Obama would do well to add Eisenhower to his reading list. But I guess it wouldn't do much good. I mean, he reads MLK and Ghandi and still doesn't get it -- or maybe he thinks they're just silly dreamers. Certainly sounded that way in his "war is peace" speech.
Starving Americans and no jobs for college graduates gives Obama a de facto draft that will assure the US military is never short of cannon fodder. This is a much easier recruitment strategy than a conscription draft would be.
And if you take this one obvious step further,
those troops are then ready trained for the
hungry masses which will in fact too late,
come.
That observation is right on.
First, the corporate state creates a reserve army of unemployed folks.
Then, using that army of the unemployed, it does three things:
1) it economically disciplines those who are employed by keeping their wages down;
2) it politically keeps folks in line by keeping their minds in fear and their lives destabilized;
3) it stokes the military with able bodies to conduct its imperialist occupation of the world (what Empire calls 'stabilizing' the world) and its wars of economic conquest.
Wow,no one has anything to say about this yet? Well, I do. Food prices have steadily gone up at a phenomenal rate for the last say 4 yrs or so, especially the last two.
MY husband and I get paid every two weeks and had finally decided last Sept or so that I had to go to 150 to 160 dollars a week for a family of four. BUT, the problem is always the same. I never get to go back to spend that or even close, for the second week. So, it was ending up to be that much and maybe a little more for two weeks. Then, at Chritmas, I said ok, that's it. So I spent 300 dollars for the two weeks, including christmas food, baking and for the dinner. We still ran out. So, now I have gone to 200 dollars plus mayb 215 or so. WE still run out. This is because 100 dollars a week for a family of four-with a dog and two cats, is just not quite enough. No, we are not starving. But, it's not like I can afford to buy lunch out either, although I end up doing so when the food gets low or I'm sick of another yogurt and peanut butter lunch for the third or fourth day in a row. Sometimes we'er even out of peanut butter or bread. So I make corn bread. The kids find it hardest. I can eat almost anything. But they of course are kids and are fussy(so is my husband). I usually only eat abagel for breakfast, which I try to bring from home. We donot stay stocked in fresh fruit or veggies, they run out the first week. Summer and fall we have our garden. We harvest our pears and are growing more fruit trees which aren't mature yet. We also have a grape vine.
There are days which I am hungry at work because I left the food that's left for the kids. \
What I am worried about is that considering the rate of increase in food lately, I will have to be spending so much more within another year, per week if this keeps up. I won't have it. (We even got chickens for the eggs)
hey, initiate...
you are doing exactly what I have decided is the only thing there is to do...grow food...
my wife and I re-allocated a fair amount of our 90x75 foot plot to our first gardening effort last year, and had a pretty successful go...we learned alot, as well...we also planted an apple and a nectarine tree, though they have yet to bear fruit...
this year, we are planning to expand our efforts and apply what we have learned...
the idea that food only comes from a farm or a store or a restaurant must perish...
the climate in the Seattle area has always been relatively mild, and is getting even, ahem, a bit 'nicer' recently, so we may be looking at being able to do a number of things year-round, especially with the greenhouse we put up last fall...we are still bringing up carrots that have grown right through the mellow winter, and taste great...
we are not what I would call 'gardeners' yet, as in experts, and we certainly do not yet get the larger portion of our food needs from our garden, but we are people trying to become 'gardeners', and I can't think of any better activity but to try to provide what it seems pretty clear to me we are all going to be needing in the very near future...
food...
I am sorry you are struggling and hungry...
I hope we will quickly reevaluate the way we allocate natural resources and housing, that we may all be able to do enough with less...
Global Start Date: September 22, 2012...the day of change...unanimous, united rejection of the modern propertied and industrialized world...local agrarian living...
Jeevee
Have you tried a good vegetarian diet??
From Reuters -- and I appreciate the real news coverage. I wonder, however, how widely this important information will hit US news media.
The Gipper declared ketchup a vegetable. I wonder how many calories are in a gram of mustard? Salt? Pepper?
Let 'em eat promises, right Mr. President?
I don't know about you but barely surviving on Social Security, watching drug prices along with food prices go up, I am so proud watching billions go to "defense" spending & wars of convenience.
I really enjoy wondering if we are going to make it month to month.
I have a small pension besides, but also a mortgage. This is very scary.
Yep. And every time I think about the inflation coming that hasn't hit yet, "scary" isn't the word.
With a fixed income where do I make an adjustment?
I too am living on Social Security. I found it outrageous that there was no COLA this year because the Consumer Price Index didn't show an increase in the cost of living. Funny thing, food prices and energy prices, both of which increased, are excluded from the CPI. Why is this one may ask? It is specifically to keep Social Secuurity payments down. They need the funds from Social Security to keep the debt appearing to be better than it actually is I suppose.
People should start looking into Permaculture. So far this is the only thing I've come across that offers real solutions to our problems. It’s basically a model to design human settlements that work WITH nature instead of against it (which means less work for us btw).
We don't seem to be getting anywhere by protesting and reforming, (I'm not saying that you should stop these things) so we need to start building our land base and our communities. We have to get back to the roots. Obama is throwing money at a problem that can never be solved under capitalism. It's important to stop suffering now, but we should also be preparing and building toward the future. Band-aid approaches are getting old.
Start a permaculture garden. Share your knowledge with your neighbors, family and friends. (Permaculture isn't only about gardening but a whole system of organizing human life. But I'm a newbie to this topic so research it yourself :0)).
I absolutely agree; my family and I found Permaculture about 5 years ago and I have since gotten my PDC. In N. CA we're fortunate for the long growing season but it's still hard to be even relatively self sufficient. The thing about Permaculture is the Culture part; we need to meet our neighbors and collaborate locally on food security issues. Neighborhood food banks, seed exchanges, and vegie swaps in conjunction with supporting local farmers markets will help. Find local Permaculturists; we're popping up everywhere! Try here to start: http://www.permacultureactivist.net/index.html
welcome to the third world! right here in the good ol' u.s.a. are people hungry or grossly overweight in england or france tonight? in canada or scotland? how 'bout belgium or norway? i don't think so! there the wealthy don't hide income. they have a sense of duty. life is more than a series of competitive markets. divorce, addiction, and teenage pregnancy rates are much lower, the educational attainment rates much higher. but, they're godless and socialistic. they don't go to church, and the government regulates their markets more closely. well, there must something to all this!
You say Europeans are godless because their socialistic, but the truth is we are godless because were capitalistic.
For capitalism is the ingreate idea that "All men are created equal" to the ingelligent rich, and we deserve an unregulated government that puts us on a fast track to having excessive wealth.
john ellis: we're in agreement, as i was merely being sarcastic. you're right. we've made a cult of capitalism, the same way stalin made a cult of totalitarian socialism. each is repressive in its own way. and, as my former history professor said, "'all men are created equal', said the elephants as they stomped amongst the chickens".
These statistics and studies find what poor folk have known for several years. So what? Will anything be done to fix the problem.
When one is hungry, all are starving.
We are a technologically advanced society. You are far richer than your grandfather's generation. Your computers are a million times faster. The robots down at the plant can stamp out ten times the appliances, cars and home building products that humans could produce in your grandfather's generation. With medical technology, you will live an average of 20 years longer than that generation.
Not seeing any of this wealth? Have you looked down at the yacht club?
Well, you've been robbed.
Demand what's yours and they'll laugh in your face and leave you hungry. Demand it with lots of other people, all organized, and they'll tap dance and give you a little tiny bit of the pie.
Its very simple, the supremely intelligent rich nobility give just enough people good income to have a well fed and self-absorbed voting majority.
Just look at what Obama is trying to accomplish:
(1) Cash-for-clunker only for the college level middleclass.
(2) Thousands for first time home buyers, just perfect for those with middle speed brains.
(3) Mortgage refinancing only for those to intelligent to be starving but to dumb to ever be rich.
(4) Healthcare reform that forces 50 thousand laboring class workers to buy insurance, all to subsidize health insurance for those with college level intelligence.
I have just heard back from the banksters on this.
It was a little hard to hear what they were saying since they were feeding noisily at the trough but I think it sounded something like "Let them eat cake"?
Now if you ask our self-absorbed voting majority, inquire of all those with quality homes and expensive healthcare, ask them if Queen Antoinette was giving an order for food distribution by that remark, most all would say, “Of course.”
Cake? Sheeeeiittt.
Al Jazeera News ---- Haiti riot ---- Hundreds of thousands starving
Latest news from Al Jazeera shows a mass riot, super excellent picture of what Empire USA is really trying to accomplish.
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2010/01/20101262336299208.html
John Ellis
I looked at the Al Jazeera report and I don't see what you are talking about.The only real reference was to the US was:
"Meanwhile on Tuesday, 14 days after the quake, US troops pulled a man alive from under a collapsed building in the capital."
US and UN troops, as well as aid workers, have widened and intensified the distribution of food and water.
The rest:
"Brazilian UN peacekeeping troops fired tear gas at a frenzied crowd of thousands crowding around a food-handout station. "They're not violent, just desperate. They just want to eat," Brazilian army Colonel Fernando Soares said. "The problem is there is not enough food for everyone."
"Al Jazeera's Gabriel Elizondo, also reporting from the capital, said the UN and different aid agencies were trying their best. "Distribution of food comes with enormous logistical problems and when it arrives at a camp, people rush to it and it gets out of hand," our correspondent said."
"The vast majority of distributions in Haiti are being carried out in an orderly manner. There are isolated, regrettable incidents but these are the exceptions and not the rule," the World Food Programme said."
All this report says is that there is a huge logistical problem getting the supplies to this many people, let alone shelter. That all concerned are trying as hard as they can but its a terrible problem. We knew all this.
Whats your point?
Dubet & Initiate: we, too, have begun gardening (and illegal chicken raising) in earnest. Even seeds are expensive, though. Add to that the expenses associated with raised beds, improving the dirt, water, and fertilizer. It's way healthier but not way cheaper. And it takes a lot of time.
We have a couple giant rabbits who, with our three chickens, supply good amounts of natural fertilizer, and we keep three 44 gallon trash cans for kitchen compost. We constantly battle hungry critters: squirrels, coons, armadillos, and opossums. And the stupid laws about not transporting have-a-heart captures is another battle. Snoop and snitch neighbors who keep clipboards are also a pain.
Nevertheless, our beautiful weather (one night of frost this year) has made us wealthy in citrus and papayas. The squirrels keep eating all our avocados. We built a big potting bench and have transferred our landscaping efforts from roses to vegetables & fruit.
So, if social security doesn't bomb, we'll still be able to pay the mortgage and eat, too.
"It's way healthier but not way cheaper."
Ah, and here it is. The government has so manipulated the cost of food production, most Americans have no idea of the REAL price of food. Organics reflect it to some extent because organic farmer's are not eligible for all the federal subsidies out there. Thankfully!
At any rate, kudos to you and yours. You're lucky to have the property and water to grow your own food. Inner-City dwellers, renters, etc. will fare far worse in the days to come. Commune anyone?????
Billions for the military but no food for citizens. It's hard to believe this is what the founding fathers had in mind.
Who is attacking us? Where is the threat except in the deranged brain of politicians?
Medicare not only will not be extended to everyone, is will be frozen.
Frozen---what an expression---how about hungried or homeless or helpless.
I entirely second Nietzsche's sentiments as expressed in his post.
Yes, of course. But it would have been better had these Founding Fathers practiced their "Christianity" in Europe and had their Revolution there where it really belonged and not cross the ocean to perpetrate injustice upon injustice upon the Natives of this land and then compounding it by dragging Africans away from their lands and communities in chains, piled like sardines in a can on slave ships. Shall we forget this?
As a warning: "The past is not dead. It isn't even past" William Faulkner.
"Seven Southern states led the list."--and yet we witness such crass meanness of spirit from the likes of Lt. Gov. Bauer (SC) who attacks free school lunches and poor single-parent mothers. And it may also be that we have a black president. Trying to argue with those of his ilk may be quite impossible and I suspect that it is because some really do lack a conscience. Yet they talk incessantly about "freedom" as if it only means "personal" responsibility (and maybe they do not even link it to this) --a society can create horrific historic wrongs to Native Americans and Black people, for example, and yet this society is not collectively responsible? Too many whites--way too many and even so-called "progressives"--do not acknowledge this.
Yep, there's nothing worse than a racist. And they are easy to spot, aren't they?
"Too many whites ... "
Intentionally taking a phrase out of context, I have to say that there really are too many whites in the world. Most of the world's ills can be blamed on caucasians. Caucasians are in the minority in the world, yet they start most of the wars, initiate the most occupations, and generally make life miserable for the vast majority of non-caucasians worldwide. White people are a really vicious, nasty component of humanity. It wouldn't hurt my feelings to see the caucasian race die off.