Why Do Underprivileged Families Contribute To Food Poverty?

A. How many of you are worried about where your next meal will come from? Are you unsure of how you’re going to purchase next week’s groceries or what you will be feeding your children for dinner tonight? This probably isn’t something most of you think about from day to day. When you are hungry, you eat. It’s easy for you to grab a sandwich, order a pizza, or run through the drive thru when you are on the go. However, there are many families, not just in other countries, but here in the United States as well, that are going hungry every day. According to kidshealth.org, a child dies from malnutrition and related causes every 6 seconds.

After reading the extensive “The New Face of Hunger” (Tracie McMillan), my eyes became more open to the overall issue of hunger, faced by many people today. In a few words, I was absolutely shocked by the true meaning and examples provided of what exactly food insecurity is. Honestly speaking, when I hear the word “hunger” I think of a human who has no food, living on the streets. “The New Face of hunger” brought to my attention that food insecurity is much more than simply having no food. In fact, “In 2006 the U.S. government replaced “hunger” with the term “food insecure” to describe any household where, sometime during the previous year, people didn’t have enough food to eat” (The New Face of Hunger). Not only was I able to see the harsh

It was difficult to read that countless millions of federal dollars and many of our country's most successful efforts to halt the spread of childhood hunger and starvation have recently been withdrawn. And as a result, this problem of childhood hunger is not getting better but is actually getting worse. The most recent estimates compiled by the USDA in 1999 indicate that 36.2 million Americans live in food-insecure households, which means that their access to adequate and safe food is limited or uncertain. This too is very disturbing information.

There are many people in America who cannot afford their basic needs. In Connecticut alone, thirty eight percent of the states population cannot afford to meet their basic needs, such as food (New Haven Register). The meal gap, the difference between the amount of people who can and can 't afford food, is a major problem in our state. However, an even bigger problem is the lack of knowledge about the systems and programs that can help those who cannot afford food in the vast majority of people that need this help. These programs would also allow for an increase in the federal funding through incentives given out by the government. An easy way to lower the meal gap would be to find ways to spread awareness about these programs to those in need, thereby lowering the meal gap and increasing federal funding, allowing the government to help more people.

So, why do fifteen million children in America face hunger every day? How does this happen? Many people are on food stamps, and they can be extremely helpful, but it is difficult to feed family with them. Food stamps provide only a dollar per person for each meal, according to the organization, Food is Power. More often than not, unhealthy, processed foods are a lot less expensive than nutritious, organic food, and because of this issue, many people on food stamps reach for less expensive junk food. Unquestionably, healthy foods can be very hard to find and expensive in places like food deserts. Food is Power found that thirty-three percent of Americans live in food deserts. Of course, public transportation helps families reach grocery stores, but it still can be a lengthy trip, and in rural and suburban areas, there can be little or no public transportation at all. These issues make it a struggle for parents to provide healthy food for their

Imagine your stomach growling, a feeling of emptiness, fatigue, and an inability to concentrate. Most people would associate these feelings with hunger and eat. Unfortunately, many Americans do not have the luxury of eating because of living in poverty. According to the Census Bureau and the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the number of people living in poverty rose from 31.6 million in 2000 to 36.5 million in 2006. The number of people living in households facing food insecurity rose from 31 million in 1999 to 35.5 million in 2006. More than 12 million of the people living in food insecure households were children (Labue, 2009). Food America (2017) reports:

Mornings without breakfast transition to nights without dinner, but the situation does not change for America's poor and needy. The face of food insecurity is often invisible. Behind lowered blinds and shut doors, poverty establishes itself in many styles and we attempt to defeat it in numerous ways. Food assistance programs are the primary tool the government uses to alleviate the hunger pangs and empty diets caused by nutrition insecurity. Increased government oversight is generally not helpful, but in the case of America's SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program), such government management would probably do good. Right now, there is an array of problems facing

Most people in the United States today are unaware of the increasing numbers of child hunger throughout the country. Today, a staggering one in five kids struggle with hunger in our own country (Francisco 18). Not only does it affect their concentration and grades in school, but also their overall health. Over 1.02 billion people in the world are considered to be malnourished, and hunger and malnutrition is the leading cause of child deaths, which accounts for 6 million children each year (Nah and Chau). When most people think of children and families going hungry, they think that it is just a problem in other countries. However, there is an increasing amount of children and their families in North Carolina

On some cases, the reasons range from, “They don’t need it; they can do it themselves” to “I don’t see any starving children.” However, charitable services and food programs are already struggling to serve eligible families (1). With the high percentage of hunger rates and little support, food programs generally run out of food and supplies before they can serve all of those who need it. Furthermore, signs of malnutrition are not always evident. While the most obvious sign of hunger is little to no fat in bones, families that are obese could also be living with insufficient meals. Because poor families are limited to their food choice, they choose high fat foods since they are much more affordable and long lasting than fresher and healthier options (7). Denial of food hunger in Solano County prevents people from getting the help they need, and makes the situation even

The main reason why low-income areas are full of malnutrition and hungry people is because food companies have no reason to sell food there. As Erika Nicole Kendall, a former user of food stamps herself, states in her post on A Black Girl’s Guide to Weight Loss, “The reason that food deserts exist is because it is assumed that the people in those geographic locations cannot afford the products that a fresh food-selling store would provide”. However, food stamps and other programs can give companies incentives to sell food in these “food deserts” if the government subsidizes them. Through these programs, the government uses economic strategies to help the poor get the

This causes a big problem, for one this makes it harder for kids to focus in school. This is overall bad because lots of food hunger comes from lack of education. Education is key to everything in life if it's getting a job to just being able to do a daily thing, and if a kid can't stay awake then there low hope. For many kids there only meal a day is the one that they get from school and on the weekends it's hard to find one. Georgia Mountain Food Bank knows this so they make an impact by being open on the weekends and allowing those families and many others come in. The biggest way to help is donate whether it's food, money, or volunteering. Georgia Mountain Food Bank works with many other organizations to set up events for food insecure people all across Georgia. Once a month a group called Hands Across Atlanta holds a eat day where volunteers come with prepared food and serve back to the community. Many people come and businesses, many times there will be showers, barbers, a dj, and sports to play for

Before I came here for high school, I always thought the U.S. as a country without poverty; it has affluence resources, superior technologies, and an efficient politic system. After all, the U.S. is the most developed country in the world, and it is hard to associate poverty with Americans. However, my experiences of volunteering in food banks changed my perception about poverty problem in the U.S.: it is more prevalent than I thought. I volunteered for two different food banks.

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program is the United States’ largest public assistance safety net. In a country with the wealth and food resources that the US has, no one should be hungry. Yet, in 2015, over 43 million people in the US were living in poverty (“Hunger

Imagine you are an academically failing student sitting in math class your stomach growls at you as you fail to understand what the teacher is trying to explain. Why? Because you are considered food insecure, so you don’t have enough food to create the energy needed to focus on school meaning that you could get held back. Think about this 16 million children are considered food insecure just in America. In Buncombe county 34,340 people are food insecure. Many people confuse hunger and food insecurity as the same thing however the are not. A person can be hungry because they didn’t eat breakfast, but someone who is food insecure doesn’t have access to enough healthy food. One local organization working to solve this problem is MANNA Food Bank.

In 2014, a foundation called Feeding America did a survey on the people they serve and found that in order to stretch their food budgets 79% of them purchase inexpensive and unhealthy food in order to stay fed. This can seriously impact their health, because no matter the age, healthy bodies and minds require nutritious meals. In some cases, food insecurity can even lead to Type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease and obesity. These are just a few examples of why food insecurity is so harmful. Fortunately, there are many organizations, clubs, and foundations that are committed to ending hunger in America, and eventually the world. The first step to solving this problem is spreading information, and realizing just how dangerous food insecurity is, and who it affects. After learning these things, you may want to help and there are many ways to do that. I’m sure in the past, you've donated food to the annual canned food drive our school puts on, and that’s just one way you can contribute to solving this problem. There are many organizations that ask for donations and will put your money to great use, for example every dollar you donate to Feeding America will provide 11 meals for a child in need.If you don’t have food or money to donate, you can donate