Say No to Free School
Lunches for All
Do you like free lunch? In the U.S, lunches are being served free to everyone this year, no matter their socioeconomic status. Although this might be wonderful news, you are probably not seeing the full picture.
Like all
programs, the NSLP sought to have improper payments by distressing financial
burdens. The Heritage Foundation states, “According to the Office of Management
and Budget, the National School Lunch Program lost nearly $800 million, owing to improper payments in fiscal
year 2018, while the School Breakfast Program lost $300 million. The Office of
Management and Budget calls these programs ‘high-priority’ programs because of
the misspending.” Compared to the amount of money Congress gives the NSLP
annually (13.8 billion,) that is a small amount if you divide it up evenly with
every school participating; more than a hundred thousand schools participate in
the program.
Although schools in the
U.S. are required by Michelle Obama’s Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010,
this doesn’t mean dietary restrictions have changed. According to a 2021 NIH
article, “On average, school lunches provided 75
calories from added sugars, which accounted for 11% of calories in school
lunches. This average was close to the DGA limit; however, more than two-thirds
of schools (69%) prepared lunches that exceeded the DGA limit.”
School lunches will keep
being brought up in today’s society. It would be best to address and not push
it under the rug. Ask yourself, would school lunches be best if they were free
for everyone?
I totally agree with your opinion on school lunches. I agree because the free lunches this year have made many people's hard work equal no money. Me, myself, have had school lunch and it is not good, and a thing to make it better would be to have it cost money. If it did cost money, a better supply of food would be given, the food wouldn't be half bad, and everyone wouldn’t be eating raw burgers. Like you said in your story, “On average, school lunches provided 75 calories from added sugars, which accounted for 11% of calories in school lunches. This average was close to the DGA limit; however, more than two-thirds of schools (69%) prepared lunches that exceeded the DGA limit.” Good job on your editorial!
ReplyDeleteI disagree with you on this in a select few opinions. In this you talk about how no one should have free lunch since most of the people taking advantage of it are not the ones who need it, but you say 130% of the people getting free lunch are below the poverty line and I think that warrants the fact that lunches should be free. I think that the kids should be getting lunches for free.
ReplyDeleteThe stand in this editorial is that school lunch should not be free for all people. I agree with this because people should have access to a free lunch if they cannot afford it but people who are economically fine should still have to pay for it. The editorial says, “The National School Lunch Program lost nearly $800 million, owing to improper payments in fiscal year 2018, while the School Breakfast Program lost $300 million.” This means that if people stop paying, those who are economically fine might lose the school lunch altogether and then kids who need the lunch won’t be able to have it.
ReplyDeleteI agree with your opinion that only people who need food should have free lunch available to them because like you said, schools do lose more money like 300 million dollars due to all the kids who do not struggle with money buying free lunch compared to if only poor people bought it.
ReplyDelete