Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site gargoyle.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ihnp4!gargoyle!carnes From: carnes@gargoyle.UUCP (Richard Carnes) Newsgroups: net.politics.theory Subject: Extent of hunger in America Message-ID: <200@gargoyle.UUCP> Date: Tue, 24-Sep-85 17:16:57 EDT Article-I.D.: gargoyle.200 Posted: Tue Sep 24 17:16:57 1985 Date-Received: Thu, 26-Sep-85 06:34:27 EDT Reply-To: carnes@gargoyle.UUCP (Richard Carnes) Organization: U. of Chicago, Computer Science Dept. Lines: 114 Rick McGeer writes: >Mike, if there is widespread hunger in America, I'll concede your >case and give you better evidence: my cats eat well, and my parent's >dogs (in Canada) are bloated....but I don't think that there is. >Meese two years ago called the hunger problem "largely anecdotal", >and there was an outcry, and a study -- but I haven't seen numbers. >What percentage of Americans go hungry, and of those, how many go >hungry because of lack of resources and how many because they simply >don't eat well, even though they have the means to do so? According to the Chicago Tribune, around 20% of Americans suffer "periodically" from some degree of hunger or malnutrition or are under the constant threat thereof. (Not counting those on diets. :-) I don't know the source for this figure, but the Trib ran a series last fall on the subject in which they reported the results of their own investigation. It is hard to be precise because there are different definitions of hunger, and it also depends on whether you are counting before or after the receipt of private charity or welfare benefits. Obviously the problem is not as bad as it is in Africa, but the significant fact is that there is a hunger problem at all in a nation that produces huge food surpluses. I think it was the President's Commission itself that termed the problem "largely anecdotal." In this context "anecdotal" means that people such as newspaper reporters have gone out and seen with their own eyes that the problem exists. Rick can find some evidence for himself across the bay in SF, if he will look for the soup kitchens and talk to the people there. Or drive down to the highly productive agricultural area south of San Jose, around Castroville and Salinas. I'm not sure what Rick means about people going hungry "because they simply don't eat well, even though they have the means to do so." I don't think there are many people, besides ascetics, who knowingly choose to be chronically hungry. If people don't eat well because they are ignorant or don't know how to budget, that is clearly a part of the problem. Some poor people buy name brands instead of generic foods because they can't read the English labels and have seen the name brands advertised on TV. Here are one or two anecdotes that appeared in the Tribune series (article by Christopher Drew): ________________ In many ways, Katherine, a 28-year-old black woman living on [Chicago's] South Side, is a typical welfare mother. She grew up in a public housing project and now depends solely on public aid to support herself and her 8-year-old daughter. Never married, she tried to break out of this cycle of dependency by working when she was in her early 20s. But she gave up hope for employment after her other child, a baby boy, crawled into a refrigerator and suffocated while in the care of a sitter. These days, Katherine isn't as worried about her daughter's safety as she is about putting enough bread on the table to feed her. While the general cost of living has jumped 25 percent in the last four years, Katherine's food stamp and welfare benefits have risen only half as much, from $336 a month to $378. As a result, she said, even sticking to a limited diet such as hot cereal for breakfast and turkey wings and potatoes for dinner isn't enough to keep her cupboards from running bare. ... Katherine's problems illustrate how sharp cuts in the nation's aid programs have forced many of the poor to scrounge more than ever for a square meal. Few are starving, but many clearly are seeing less balance in their diets, and medical researchers say this is contributing to an alarming increase in malnutrition-related diseases in some parts of the country. ... The Tribune, in interviews with social workers and welfare recipients, found clear evidence of greater suffering because of the food-assistance cutbacks and of a need for more training and counseling to help people get out of the welfare rut. But it was also clear that private sources are easing some of the worst problems -- though many charities insist they can't get enough food to meet the demand -- and that the poor don't always make the wisest budget choices. In places such as Chicago and New Orleans, a typical Southern city with a large poor population, most of the welfare recipients interviewed reported running low on food much more often than they used to. And their descriptions of their diets -- long on starches and fatty cuts of meat and short on fruits and vegetables -- would have made any nutritionist cringe. "Everything's gone up so much, and we have not got much of an increase" in benefits, Donna London said as she stood in line at Hope House, a Catholic Charity in New Orleans, late last month for a bag of canned and dried goods for herself and her 11-year-old son. "So my food runs out before the end of the month, and I got to come here to survive." "I eat neckbones and pig tails and, once a week, a cheap cut of chicken or turkey legs with macaroni or potatoes," said Thelma Boyd, 67, who is confined to a wheelchair and lives alone in New Orleans in a tin-roofed shack... "The doctor said I'm supposed to drink fruit juice, but I can't afford it, so I drink Kool-Aid instead." Doctors in both cities have linked such dietary deficiencies to increased health problems, such as last year's 24% increase in pediatric admissions at Cook County Hospital for stunted growth, dehydration and weight loss. ... Food bank officials confirm that they have been reaching many of the people in need, especially since Congress authorized the Agriculture Department three years ago to temporarily distribute surplus milk and cheese to the pantries. But they said they don't have the resources to help many of the worst cases, including an increasing number of homeless people who can't get food stamps because they don't have a permanent address. [Chicago Tribune, 11/25/84] -- Richard Carnes, ihnp4!gargoyle!carnes