School Lunches Should Be Free

I wouldn't have had such a big problem with Suddenly being forced to pay for school lunches in senior year of high school when my mom's income went like 5 dollars over the limit for free lunch if the amount of food provided was you know actually a complete meal? As someone who had free lunch at scholl most of my life I can't comprehend why anyone has ever had to pay for it when half the time there's not enough fucking food on the goddamn tray. Some of us, that was the only meal we got that day. And if you wanted seconds, YOU HAVE TO PAY!

"Sorry those 8 microscopic "chicken" nuggets aren't enough to fuel you for the next three days while you have no food over the weekend, but you gotta pay if you want 8 more!!!!!!!!"

Don’t worry after president Elon gets done, kids won’t be able to go to school. tRump loves the poorly educated.

The purpose of a representative government is to improve the lives of its citizens.
The purpose of a private corporation is to accrue money in the pockets of the owners (who are usually already wealthy) no matter who it hurts.
When politicians talk about "running government like a business," they are fundamentally misunderstanding what government is FOR.

Heritek. Blasphemy! Pass the stones
..

Two things:
1) Having been through multiple of both, and as someone who narrowly dodged them, I can say this with confidence - big layoffs are more demoralizing than a bunch of small ones.
You see, you won’t JUST do one big layoff; you’ll do one big layoff until something else goes wrong, and you as a business owner have no guarantees about when that will happen - particularly after you just scared the hell out of your remaining employees.
The company that did this ultimately didn’t recover and had to do it again a few years later, in part because everyone was so - you guessed it - demoralized. They were later purchased by the competitor that was a fraction of their size at the time they enacted this strategy, which they were trying to outdo.
2) When you cut costs in a business by laying them off, you are AT BEST expecting them to find work with your competitors, at worst (and more commonly) not giving two shits if they find more work. This is frustrating in the private sector, where there IS theoretically somewhere else to go, but the equivalent of this in the public sector would be having other governments to choose from. Since that doesn’t exist (hoo boy, that would really be running it like a business), there are just two options: immigrate to a different country (just great for our economy) or the preferred option, die.
And that’s what makes it all so callous - you’re basically telling people if they don’t contribute enough they are supposed to die. Running a government like a business is really that simple.

Ah yes, "Mr Wonderful."

Spouse and I like Shark Tank. I usually have two main reactions to segments. First is "That sounds interesting, I should research." The second is "Attitudes like that are why socialism is so popular, these days." It's usually O'Leary causing the second.

Anyone who says government should be run like a business should not be allowed any authority in either...

Maybe if they're looking to cut the fat, they should start with the fat cats

That's capitalism for you. Nothing can be free. How would the rich get richer?

He clearly didn't know that connection between hunger/poverty and school performance. Tells you everything you need to know about the value of his opinion on this subject.

I don't get why it's such a problem in a country with so many billionaires that children need to be fed. A country where you can get into debt for being ill, hungry, or just getting out of bed. Feeding children shouldn't even be a question. The Republicans might not like Scotland, but at least we feed our kids and know that they won't be shot at school.

School meals should be free. With so many school shootings, the condemned are allowed a last meal.

I’m in a school that gives free lunch I’m sorry to the ppl who dont

America is so fixated on money, "the bottom line" and "running it like a business," we're willing to starve and/or poison our children in school. "Bottom line" food approach is psychotic. Imagine if restaurants could make you patronize them; they'd buy the worst possible "food" they could. This is what our schools do.
Budget cutting kills and injures. The homeless are the most obvious proof.

Repubes cannot stop saying, "Throwing money at schools won't fix the problem!"
CA spends $22,000 per year per kid.
CA private schools cost $50,000 per year per kid.
So THEIR Kids are worth over double.
Get it? THEY want the good schools for THEM. Not YOU.

I hate the way basically every side mosconstrudes WHAT a government IS in or der to abuse the systems for their own benefits instead of for the betterment of the people in general. Because the best way to look at a government, in my opinion, is to look at it as a business. BUT, modern businesses are horribly managed, and the current model is what people think of when they hear the idea that a government is a business.

At the most base, a government is a business that charges a fee(taxes) as a form or rent or service fee for the protection of select rights for individuals residing within the land based bounds of their designated services. That is the kind of business that the government is. By extension, it is also reasonable to extend the recognicion of HOAs as small governments. The problem is that people are abusing the system that the government is managing by effectively becoming shareholders and changing the rules the system applies to not apply negatively to them. That kind of behavior should not be allowed.

In my school growing up in the early 2000s i would get a stamp on my hand meaning i owed money. To much owed and no lunch.

The government can not be run like a business. It's fantasy to think so.

1. i would be beyond fine paying an extra couple bucks in taxes so that the kids who dont know if their parents can afford to feed them tonight get fed. 2. im pretty sure that at least for more profitable grocery store locations, and certainly for walmarts and so on, giving inventory they have reason to believe they may not be able to sell before it goes bad to schools so kids can eat would only hurt the profitability of the company because every last fraction of a penny that doesnt HAVE to be put elsewhere will go to the executives. 3. i do not care about the financial responsibilities to shareholders. the shareholders can eat shit. the economy, and the ability of the elderly to continue a decent life once they are no longer able to be wrung for labor, should not be at the whims of a few dozen rich pieces of shit.

You could make a case for almost all everyday necessities being free we should only really pay for luxury goods

Would be nice to live in Star Trek land that’s basically how I imagine it works

Even in prison, we are legally required to feed the prisoners for free. (Yes, i know you can buy extras at the commisary, and that the food quality is terrible)

Yet, because you get to go home at the end of the day, it's fine. Meanwhile, the food is often just as bad, while you have to pay for it.

The reason government shouldn't be run like a business is because it's not a business. We have businesses for the stuff that businesses do.

It's a bullshit statement. School lunches should NOT be free! People should simply be payed enough so that they can afford for their children to eat!! Making school lunches free hides the real problem. Even if the children were to eat every day, they are still locked in a system of modern slavery, forced to work for way too little money because some billionair thinks he needs another billion.

Fix the root cause! Not one of the lesser symptoms. Fixing the root cause will solve many other issues as well, like low health due to no access to healthcare, low life expectancy, misserable living conditions, no way out of the modern slavery.

I will never understand anyone who doesn't agree that school lunches should be free

Not only free, but also a decent quality meal. Our local elementary school has free lunch (yay!) but a friend of mine's daughter, keeping in mind she's not a particularly picky eater, once reported, and I quote: It looked like a donkey backed up to my tray and had diarrhea on it.
I know not all schools have this issue, and I'm hoping it was a one-off.

School Lunches at Public Schools should be free for all students!!

The government should never have started providing school lunches. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that schools shouldn't have cafeterias.

When you're right, you're right...

If school lunches were free then how are the administrators supposed to buy vacation homes ?
Priorities, it's all about the priorities.

Luckily Michigan agrees and breakfast and lunch are free in all Michigan public schools

Unfortunately we can't pay for it.

Labour party in the UK are considering getting rid of free school meals.

Conservatives are bullies, nuff said.

Agreed. They also need more healthy saturated fat with omega 3s and less sugar. Why is there no whole milk? Why are there no packets of salt? Who thinks (specially made for schools) low fat pizza and chips for school are necessary or a good idea? One thing I agree with: only offering sugar free soda. Too many school lunches are a camel made by committee, but at least they should be free!

You say "we have to provide food as they are forced to go to school by law". Trump will say "Then, abolish compulsory education."

None of it matters because trump is planning on stopping all funding to public schools.

While we are at it, can we please bring back government cheese? I loved that stuff. I used to trade my cookies for it.

I had to pay for lunch. You don't have money you don't eat. They will take the tray away.

I disagree hard that all public school lunches should be free. My kids are in public school, but I am well off and don’t need their lunches covered by the government. Whatever funds that would cost would be completely wasted on me, and I would much prefer that money be directed to places it is actually needed.

feeding kids is a no brainer free breakfast and lunch at schools

How can children learn if they are not hungry for wisdom! Will they not feel the accomplishment by devouring new information, satiating their hunger for knowledge. Take a slice out of my book and skip school. The amount of cost per square inch of diploma is just not worth the risk of lunch debt!

I agree that they should be free, but we also need a way to prevent the crazy amount of food that gets thrown away. I work in schools, and I seen kids come in with lunchboxes full of candy and junk food. They throw their free lunch directly in the trash.

The high school nearest to my house has 2,000 teens attending but only seats for 200 in the cafeteria because when they were planning these schools they assumed the majority of kids would walk home or bring a lunch box. The junction closest to the school has a McDonald's, a deli, a fried chicken place and a pizza place that are almost totally reliant on the kids grabbing a burger or whatever then heading to the park.

My city council introduced free school lunches about 10 years ago for the kids starting their 1st year. Each year's budget since then they've expanded it to include the next year so those kids never fall out the system and the kids behind them continue to benefit so now that goes all the way up to kids in S2. As part of this to accomodate everyone its now "one free hot meal a day" so you can still get lunch in the cafeteria or if you come early theres "breakfast clubs" where you get pancakes or bacon and eggs or whatever for free first thing and that's become really popular as well because it let's people fill their boots first thing then still go out to hang in the park with their pals at lunch etc.

Should going to school be free of the likelihood of being shot dead
Every week there’s yet another school shooting
Wasn’t there a stat that more Americans have died from the right to own a firearm than have died in every military conflict since WW2

If it were up to morons like O’Leary, everything in school would be a la carte, you know, “for freedom.”

Standard courses would cost X, anything they consider optional (arts, social sciences) would cost more, and Bible studies would be free.

Forcing people to work when they study is what is making the biggest cut in American's education. They just focus on working, and probably hanging out outside with some of the excess money they gain from work, and as many right wingers rant in TV don't graduate to work in their field... which is kinda their fault.

They f*** up the system, then say the system doesn't work. Then they spend money on rigging elections, and say Government spends too much money, so they get their tax cut that conveniently pays for the election rigging, and they get to cut taxes again and again.

Why do people not realize this is happening is beyond me... maybe they just too lazy to realize the truth, and American's are going to need some pain in order to realize how deeply they are getting f**ed in the ** every day by some right winger on TV.

The responsibility of the parents is to make sure their kids are fed. The responsibility of the school cafeterias should be to provide healthy food for the kids at a reasonable price. I went to school in France and my parents had to pay $5 everyday for my lunch 5 days a week and the food we got was varied and changed every day. No juice or sodas, only water. No vending machines either. We were poor and my parents were still able to afford to do it without any kind of governmental assistance. To expect the government/schools to pay for the kids to eat pizza and other junk foods because the parents can't be bothered to pay for their own kids to eat or to pack them a lunch is the problem.

"Whack everybody." Wow, just wow. 😮

No kid should be forced to go through that lunch line and get all the way to the end and suffer through the embarrassment of typing in your student ID number only to find out that they owe too much and have to put it all back and go hungry for the day while they watch their friends eat like I had to. That’s one of the big philosophical differences between the left and right, the left says “I suffered and shouldn’t have had to so I’m going to change it so you don’t have to” while the right says “I suffered so you should too”.

Also, guys like Kevin O'Leary make tons of money in government contracts....