Child hunger persists in a country that wastes an estimated 30-40% of the food supply. America produces so much, yet fails to adequately utilize the new forces of productivity in the interest of the individuals who constitute the society. For children to grow, both literally and figuratively, the government must create programs that ensure children can receive nutritious meals three times a day, every day of the year. By instituting this measure, no child would be shamed for their parents’ inability to pay for lunch, nor would they receive a cheese sandwich to merely quell their hunger. A child who is fed little to nothing while at school has little chance to succeed.
The dated belief that people are born with innate capabilities is inherently false -inequality of fortune and economic status is not a “natural law.” Children who are perpetually hungry face a serious impediment to achieving their full potential and developing into productive, intelligent members of society. Perpetually hungry children face a myriad of issues that their well-fed peers don’t, including anxiety, depression, behavioral problems and chronic health conditions. Allowing children to suffer from these issues when it is within our government’s ability to end child hunger is shameful. Some may believe that one is born with the natural ability to create something as complex as the microchip, those people would be wrong, for a person to discover and create they must be nurtured. Not nurturing a child infringes on their liberty.
The 13 million children that went to school hungry this morning are affectively having their liberty taken away before they even have a true opportunity to exercise it. They have an increased likelihood of dropping out of school and developing emotional and physical ailments, which will hinder their ability to exercise liberty as adults. If the government exists to protect our rights it cannot ignore the fact that what happens to a child today shapes the adult they become. Of course, the individualist liberal will contend that forcing them to pay taxes for children that they have no responsibility for infringes on their liberty, but in our connected society child hunger impacts all of us.
The numerous impacts childhood hunger has on society make it a clear public issue. The behavioral problems stemming from childhood hunger may cause them to be a danger to the other members of society or the lack of quality education will make them either unemployable or in such great poverty that they become dependent on the state. In a connected society what seems to only affect one of us may actually impact all of us.
The government needs to develop a social plan to adequately distribute the benefits of modern production. Charities have developed several programs to help children in need, such as providing them weekend meals when they leave school on Friday or summer meals when school is not in session, but they don’t have the resources of the United States government. If the government learned from the charities and instituted these types of programs nationwide and allocated funding to ensure its success childhood hunger could be eradicated. We cannot tell a child to pull themselves up by their Velcro straps, in some instances the government must intervene to ensure their protection, even if that is perceived as infringing on someone else’s property rights.