The federal government actually is less involved than the corporate government in these situations.
RE: Christmas versus Politics
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Christmas versus Politics
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Corporate government is involved in the sense that they set the policies they do in order to avoid lawsuits and prosecution. State health laws are the biggest driving factors in setting those policies. The other thing that is sometimes an issue is the fact that food banks often won't accept such donations for a variety of reasons (logistics, not enough volume, etc.). Again, this isn't because of corporate greed or some sort of conspiracy against the poor. Assuming the law didn't make it difficult or impossible and there was a place to accept such donations, what would be the downside for the corporation? It would be good press and a tax write-off.
There are in fact federal (and in some cases state) laws that protect businesses from liability in the case of donations but these come with strings attached. Certain labeling and food treatment requirements that vary from state to state and may not be practical for a business to follow in the case of leftover food.
Having said that, there are many large corporate restaurants that donate vast amounts of food every year, including Pizza Hut, Starbucks, Panera, Olive Garden, LongHorn, Chipotle, The Cheesecake Factory, Kentucky Fried Chicken, and others. But even in these cases they are often doing this only in limited markets because of the legal and logistics issues already mentioned.
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So you're saying that there being enough food to feed the entire human population several times over isn't a conspiracy against poor people?
Just because a few companies do something good doesn't mean that it makes it okay. Of course our government is complicit, as they are bought and paid for by the rich.
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It isn't a conspiracy against the poor, it's the result of a byzantine legal system, and the fact that often the surplus and the need are not geographically coincident. You can't fix either through legislation or election. Logistics can't be hand-waved away, and there is no incentive for politicians to streamline and clarify the legal system.
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So you're saying that there are no starving people in America? No homeless people begging for sandwiches in a city? Really?
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Where do you get that? Why are you working so hard to read things I did not type? It is impossible to have a civil discussion with someone so intent on building straw men and non sequiturs.
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Because I do not see a universe that you describe, and I cut through most of the shit you post and get straight to the points. You say food distribution problems are due to space and travel, but if a homeless man is waiting in an alley way next to the dumpster, why don't people give them the food? Because of selfish corporate greed (both in and out of "The State")
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english please
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A government bought and paid for by the rich is what you get when the government is constantly granted more power. But a conspiracy against the poor? No, I don't think there are people sitting in a room somewhere figuring out how they can starve people. And generally speaking, people are NOT starving in this country and I would venture to say that in most cases there are factors involved other than the unavailability of food.
Every year, about a hundred people starve to death in this country. That is a microscopic number of people. Yes, 1 is too many but even this small number includes people like the neglected elderly. It isn't lack of food or affordable food that is usually the problem. It's making sure the food gets to those who need it or those who need it get to the food. Restaurants can donate food all day long but they don't necessarily have the ability to locate the people who need it or serve it to the needy themselves.
No doubt the number of malnourished is much higher that the number that actually starve to death, but again, free food is available in many places often including from churches, homeless shelters, food banks, etc. Making it convenient for those that need food to get it is another problem of course but I venture to say no matter how convenient and plentiful food is, it will be hard to get the number who starve to death each year below the approximate 0.000025% that it is today.
You can't really blame corporations for the laws that decide where and how food for the needy is distributed. Those are more due to individuals who bitch about it being done near their neighborhood. There was a story not too long ago about how a planned project to feed the homeless in a park in Orlando was prevented because the police said so. At the other end of the spectrum you have people shitting all over the streets in San Francisco because they have nowhere to live. Why? Because housing prices are artificially through the roof. Why? Because of stupid government laws and regulations that prevent more housing from being built. Instead, they try ignorant solutions like rent/price controls which of course doesn't solve the problem of shortages. This kind of centralized control of the economy always makes things worse.
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Power is a zero-sum game. When people hoard wealth, using any means neccessary, it fundamentally and definitionaly requires people at the opposite end of the food-chain to suffer.
A conspiracy to rig society to create billionaires is simultaneously a conspiracy to hurt the poorest in our society.
I've been to food banks. It does not nearly come close to alleviating food problems, and most things there are near expiry, and not remotely healthy.
Malnourishment leads to death, and leads to suffering. You do not need to die before things are a problem.
Googling the term yields the following result:
So, tell me again how poor people are all doing things wrong and how things aren't ungodly difficult on purpose. Please, go on about how stupid and dumb the poor are and how smart and hard-working the rich are!
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I didn't say anything about smart or dumb people (except in relation to the government). What are you talking about?
Power is not a zero sum game because wealth is not a zero sum game. Regardless of who has a bigger share of the pie, the pie is growing most of the time.
And since you bring it up, generally speaking the rich ARE (or were at some point) hard working. Not ALWAYS but USUALLY, particularly in the case of those who have become billionaire's. Hard work doesn't guarantee wealth but it is usually a prerequisite for obtaining or keeping it. You mentioned something about whether or not Bill Gates earned what he got in a previous comment somewhere. Personally, yes, I think he did. He worked his ass off for a long time. He worked 16 hour days every day of the week and slept in his office for many years. Eventually he didn't have to anymore because his work paid off. As of two years ago, Bill Gates has given $34 billion to charity and has pledged (along with Larry Ellison, Mark Zuckerberg, Tim Cook, Elon Musk and probably others) to give at least half of their wealth to charity. I would bet good money that what they give to charity does far more good that what the government would do with the same amount if it stole it from them. I would much rather they decide what to do with that money than have the government decide. The wealth of most billionaire's exists in the form of stock ownership in whatever company they created. You can only liquidate so much at a time and if you really want to keep control of your company then you have to maintain ownership of 51% of the stock no matter how valuable it becomes. Billionaire's don't really have billions in spendable money. Oh, for sure they aren't hurting for money but being a billionaire usually means that you own a company that is worth a lot and you can't really give your company to the poor in a practical sense nor would it make sense for the government to seize it.
If society is rigged to create billionaire's then whoever is doing the rigging hasn't done a particularly good job. There aren't all that many billionaires. Few (if any) of those are "hoarding" it. Bill Gates certainly isn't.
...
"Are poverty and obesity associated? Poverty rates and obesity were reviewed across 3,139 counties in the U.S. (2,6). In contrast to international trends, people in America who live in the most poverty-dense counties are those most prone to obesity (Fig. 1A). Counties with poverty rates of >35% have obesity rates 145% greater than wealthy counties."
https://diabetes.diabetesjournals.org/content/60/11/2667
Tell me again how LACK of food is the problem?
I'm not denying that some are malnourished, I just think most of the problem comes from the logistics of identifying and making sure that the people who need the food, get the food and other issues unrelated to food availability. The elderly who can't get around very well, the children whose parents don't do a good enough job making sure they get the proper nutrition (not always or even most commonly because of lack of available food), others with physical or mental impairments, etc. Just because someone is malnourished doesn't mean that there is not food available for them.
Then there's the fact that many who are malnourished aren't malnourished because they are poor but because they have a crappy diet because it is convenient. Many children are malnourished because they have a pop-tart or a bowl of sugar for breakfast which isn't just a problem among the poor. Taking the 200,000 number at face value, how many of those are actually poor? How many actually can't obtain more or more nutritious food? I'm quite sure it is a number substantially larger than 0.
https://www.shape.com/healthy-eating/diet-tips/americans-are-malnourished-not-reasons-youd-think
If you want to blame the difficulty of feeding the homeless on somebody, then it is obviously the existing laws and regulations that are the biggest issue. There was just a recent story where a church was going to lose its status as a religious organization because they were sheltering homeless (and probably feeding them though that isn't explicitly mentioned in the story) (https://www.cleveland.com/business/2019/12/local-church-will-appeal-city-to-keep-doors-open-to-homeless-community.html).
Was there some evil corporate entity behind that decision? No, just the Cleveland city council as far as I can tell. In their infinite wisdom as government overlords they have decided that it is safer for the homeless to sleep outside in freezing temperatures than to sleep in a facility that has not met all the regulatory requirements for being a "temporary residential use (R1) facility". If you can show me where corporations are participating in lobbying or some other action to prevent the homeless from being fed or housed, then I'll buy the argument that at least those corporations are to blame and they should be exposed for it. Otherwise, I'll put the blame where it lies in either case, with the government and the individual politicians making those decisions. Government should not have the power to make laws about how and where I can give food to somebody. As long as it does have that power, it will use it poorly more often than not. That has been thoroughly demonstrated time and time again.
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You do realize corn subsidies exist and unhealthy food is often the cheapest, right?
C'mon, dude. Don't be an idiot. Blaming poor people is disgusting.
You've never had to struggle, and it shows. You don't even know what food at a supermarket costs. It's cringe.
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Please quote me where I blamed or even implied blame on poor people because I didn't. In fact, what I said that most directly related to the subject was "Hard work doesn't guarantee wealth but it is usually a prerequisite for obtaining or keeping it." Emphasis added. You know what's disgusting and cringeworthy? Straw men arguments, ad hominem attacks, putting words into peoples' mouth and piss poor assumptions about people you know nothing about. I don't know what food at a supermarket costs? I shop at one every week so how would I not know? WTF do you know about me? Don't answer, that's rhetorical and the answer is clear. Jack shit. You don't have the slightest clue what my struggles have been and I wouldn't wish them on anyone. Moreover, it's also clear you don't even read what I type because you are responding to things I haven't said or even implied.
Subsidies? I'm 100% on board with eliminating all subsidies of all kinds whether it be corn, soybean, wind, solar, oil, coal or whatever. Not the government's job as far as I'm concerned. It's much better to eliminate subsidies as a problem than to try to work around these "solutions" with other government "solutions".
Unhealthy food the cheapest? Not generally true. Yes, if you are talking about prepared food then it is sometimes true. A McDonald's cheeseburger is far cheaper than an alternative at a restaurant that has healthy food for instance. But then pound for pound a roast chicken from a supermarket is much cheaper and healthier. Many fresh fruits and vegetables are also relatively cheap. Do you want me to give you some supermarket prices from the supermarket you say I never go to? Bananas, 69 cents/lb, sweet potatoes, 89 cents/lb, Zucchini and yellow squash, 99 cents/lb, 1.5 lb bag of cauliflower or broccoli, $2.50 (on sale this week), red grapes $2.49/lb...and so on. Things like whole wheat pasta, rice, and bread are also relatively inexpensive. You want beef, bacon or mangoes? Yeah, that stuff is quite a bit more expensive. But you don't need those to eat healthy. And these prices are at Publix where I usually go which tends to be a little more expensive than say a Wal-Mart or the farmers' market at our local flea market (which are farther from me and in the case of the flea market not open when I usually shop). Using coupons and/or the bogo deals at Publix gets you pretty close to Wal-Mart prices though. There are other alternative stores which often have even cheaper prices on fresh fruits and vegetables and other stuff (Aldi and Bravo come to mind but that's just what I have available locally).
A U.K. story but applicable in the U.S. as well:
https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/features/healthy-eating-cheap-cost-unhealthy-food-obesity-diabetes-poverty-a8535701.html
Bottom line from that story? You can eat a reasonably healthy meal for less than $1.
If you don't have any money then you can't buy anything but for an individual to eat healthy it is not generally more expensive than eating crap. Yeah, a pack of ramen noodles is cheap but you are MUCH better off eating the equivalent value in some of the foods I mentioned above.
In Florida, WIC provides up to $200/person/month for those in need for food. I'm not going to say it is easy but if you can get to a grocery store and are willing and able to prepare your food, you can certainly eat healthy enough to not suffer from malnutrition for that amount. Again, the problem is not availability of food, it's the willingness/ability/knowledge/time for those in need to obtain and prepare it or the logistics of getting it done for them. And one more time for emphasis, malnutrition is not just a problem with the poor, it is also a problem for others (who are NOT poor...just trying to clarify here so you don't twist this into an accusation of me blaming the poor again) who make poor nutrition choices for convenience or other reasons.
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https://www.usda.gov/media/blog/2011/05/03/interactive-web-tool-maps-food-deserts-provides-key-data
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