yes, 1000% the details of how complicated our school lunch programs are may surprise some non-US Tilderinos: this is, to me, the epitome of the "everything must be means-tested" flavor of...
it also serves to advance a broader goal that liberals ought to pay more attention to: making government simultaneously more ambitious and simpler.
yes, 1000%
the details of how complicated our school lunch programs are may surprise some non-US Tilderinos:
At the moment, we have a three-tier system for lunch in public schools. Kids whose family income is below 130 percent of the poverty line (or $39,000 for a family of four) get free meals; those with an income up to 185 percent of poverty (or $55,500) get reduced-price meals, and everyone else pays full price. Families usually have to apply to receive such assistance, which creates a barrier for those who can’t or don’t want to deal with the paperwork. Then, eligibility has to be verified and tracked, and in the cafeteria itself, payments have to be processed. Many school districts have to employ full-time staff just to administer the system.
this is, to me, the epitome of the "everything must be means-tested" flavor of neoliberalism.
there's an oft-repeated cliche about "I turned down a pay raise because it would have put me into a higher tax bracket". that's not actually a concern, because of the way progressive tax brackets work. but, it can be a problem with these sort of means-tested programs with arbitrary income cutoffs.
imagine a family of four - two parents and two kids, trying to survive on $38k a year. that's going to be a real challenge. but hey, at least they don't have to pay for their kids' school lunches.
the parents get a raise, and make $40k a year...and now they have to pay for lunch. it's the "reduced price" lunch, but it's still an extra cost that's put onto the parents. when they made $38k/year, they "deserved" free lunch, but at $40k/year the formula says they're now the "undeserving poor" when it comes to free lunch, and they need to chip in part of the cost.
ditto for a family making $54k/year who gets a raise to $56k/year. sorry, you crossed the magical arbitrary income threshold and now have to pay full price for your kids' lunches.
oh, and all this requires the parents to fill out paperwork documenting their income, and someone at the school district to verify it (because you might have a parent lie about their income in order to try to "steal" free lunch for their children). and you need to repeat that every school year because jobs and incomes can change year-to-year.
like the article says...just fucking feed them.
but, the objection goes, a family making $500k/year would have their kids eat for free, even though they can obviously afford to pay.
don't care. this is a solved problem. tax the high-income parent at a sufficient rate to offset the perceived unfairness of the "giveaway".
the cost of this more than pays for itself in the long run, because children that are better-fed will do better in schools, and wind up with higher-paying jobs as adults, and thus pay more in taxes. but that doesn't even matter. ensuring children are well-fed should be treated as a moral imperative, not as a factor in a cost-benefit analysis.
Unfortunately there is a large minority of this country that would rather see people starve or be homeless rather than one person trace advantage of a generous and caring system. One side sees...
Unfortunately there is a large minority of this country that would rather see people starve or be homeless rather than one person trace advantage of a generous and caring system.
One side sees helping people as the goal, the other side focuses on making sure no one gets a single penny they don’t need/qualify for.
it's not as simple as a left-vs-right thing...there's a reason I mentioned neoliberalism in my comment. centrists and moderate liberals love means-testing programs as a way of "compromising" with...
One side sees helping people as the goal, the other side focuses on making sure no one gets a single penny they don’t need/qualify for.
it's not as simple as a left-vs-right thing...there's a reason I mentioned neoliberalism in my comment. centrists and moderate liberals love means-testing programs as a way of "compromising" with conservatives who'd prefer to cut the programs or scrap them entirely.
we have a Democratic governor and Democratic majorities in both houses of the state legislature. and in a total $69 billion state budget, $100 million for free school lunch was just too expensive, so they trimmed it back to only cost $16 million.
The bill’s title is still “Providing free school meals for all.”
But now the “for all” refers to kids in kindergarten through fourth grade at schools where at least 30% of students meet federal income eligibility requirements for free and reduced lunch.
So called Christian nation. Jesus's great great great [etc] grandmother, king David's grandmother, Ruth relied on gleaning to survive. There was no income verification. Field owner Boaz didn't...
So called Christian nation. Jesus's great great great [etc] grandmother, king David's grandmother, Ruth relied on gleaning to survive. There was no income verification. Field owner Boaz didn't humiliate her by asking for proof of her dead husband and charge her for water and limit how much she could take home.
They really would rather set grain on fire than to see any go to the undeserving.
If you’re a parent, you might remember what happened when schools no longer had to determine eligibility. Not only were many more students eligible for meals, including those who had trouble paying before, but the removal of the layers of bureaucracy just made everything easier. “If you take away that paperwork, it’s such a benefit to families and students. And it also speeds up the lunch line,” says Diane Pratt-Heavner of the School Nutrition Association.
We usually associate critiques of bureaucracy and the complexity of government programs with conservatives, who often argue that government is inherently cumbersome and inefficient. In some cases they’re right — but it’s liberals who have the greatest interest in making government work better. Though some policy areas are unavoidably complicated (health care, for instance), liberals should be on the lookout for places where things can be simplified, because it helps more people and improves the government’s image.
It's this simple: if a government requires its citizens to be in a certain place for a certain amount of time, then the government must provide while the citizens are in that place at that time....
It's this simple: if a government requires its citizens to be in a certain place for a certain amount of time, then the government must provide while the citizens are in that place at that time.
In prison, inmates are fed. So should school children be fed.
yes, 1000%
the details of how complicated our school lunch programs are may surprise some non-US Tilderinos:
this is, to me, the epitome of the "everything must be means-tested" flavor of neoliberalism.
there's an oft-repeated cliche about "I turned down a pay raise because it would have put me into a higher tax bracket". that's not actually a concern, because of the way progressive tax brackets work. but, it can be a problem with these sort of means-tested programs with arbitrary income cutoffs.
imagine a family of four - two parents and two kids, trying to survive on $38k a year. that's going to be a real challenge. but hey, at least they don't have to pay for their kids' school lunches.
the parents get a raise, and make $40k a year...and now they have to pay for lunch. it's the "reduced price" lunch, but it's still an extra cost that's put onto the parents. when they made $38k/year, they "deserved" free lunch, but at $40k/year the formula says they're now the "undeserving poor" when it comes to free lunch, and they need to chip in part of the cost.
ditto for a family making $54k/year who gets a raise to $56k/year. sorry, you crossed the magical arbitrary income threshold and now have to pay full price for your kids' lunches.
oh, and all this requires the parents to fill out paperwork documenting their income, and someone at the school district to verify it (because you might have a parent lie about their income in order to try to "steal" free lunch for their children). and you need to repeat that every school year because jobs and incomes can change year-to-year.
like the article says...just fucking feed them.
but, the objection goes, a family making $500k/year would have their kids eat for free, even though they can obviously afford to pay.
don't care. this is a solved problem. tax the high-income parent at a sufficient rate to offset the perceived unfairness of the "giveaway".
the cost of this more than pays for itself in the long run, because children that are better-fed will do better in schools, and wind up with higher-paying jobs as adults, and thus pay more in taxes. but that doesn't even matter. ensuring children are well-fed should be treated as a moral imperative, not as a factor in a cost-benefit analysis.
Unfortunately there is a large minority of this country that would rather see people starve or be homeless rather than one person trace advantage of a generous and caring system.
One side sees helping people as the goal, the other side focuses on making sure no one gets a single penny they don’t need/qualify for.
it's not as simple as a left-vs-right thing...there's a reason I mentioned neoliberalism in my comment. centrists and moderate liberals love means-testing programs as a way of "compromising" with conservatives who'd prefer to cut the programs or scrap them entirely.
here in Washington state, for example: WA legislators scrap plan for free school lunch for all students
we have a Democratic governor and Democratic majorities in both houses of the state legislature. and in a total $69 billion state budget, $100 million for free school lunch was just too expensive, so they trimmed it back to only cost $16 million.
So called Christian nation. Jesus's great great great [etc] grandmother, king David's grandmother, Ruth relied on gleaning to survive. There was no income verification. Field owner Boaz didn't humiliate her by asking for proof of her dead husband and charge her for water and limit how much she could take home.
They really would rather set grain on fire than to see any go to the undeserving.
It's this simple: if a government requires its citizens to be in a certain place for a certain amount of time, then the government must provide while the citizens are in that place at that time.
In prison, inmates are fed. So should school children be fed.