Bill Moyers Journal: 'Hunger in America'

Source:Bill Moyers Journal- a woman who was interviewed for this piece.

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From Wikipedia 

"Bill Moyers Journal looks at shortages in America's food banks. For more information, see:Bill Moyers Journal." 

From Bill Moyers Journal

Hunger or food insecurity which I guess would be the new popular term for people who don't have enough food to eat because they can't afford to buy enough food would be what I would call level three in poverty. I four levels - homeless being the worst and level four. Food insecurity being level three. Unemployed and low-skilled with kids being level two. And employed perhaps full-time and maybe another job on the side, as well as collecting Food Assistance being level one. 

Level one of poverty being the best (if you want to call it that) because these people are workers and have work experience and perhaps a lot of it and perhaps they just need to further their education or receive additional job training at work in order to get a good job and move out of poverty. 

But a problem with food insecurity, is that effects all levels of poverty. If you can't even afford to have a place to live, you probably can't afford enough food as well. And of course if you are food insecure, you don't have enough food to eat. 

If you are on public assistance like Welfare Insurance, you are probably collecting Food Assistance as well. And obviously can't afford enough food to eat on your own. And if you are a low-income, low- skilled worker, maybe you can afford enough food to eat or not. Maybe you are not collecting public food assistance, but you are eating at Church and other community places. And perhaps you collect food from food banks as well. 

With the Great Recession, if anything food insecurity has become a bigger problem in America and people that used to be middle class or upper Middle class workers and are well-educated, have now slipped into poverty and have lost their homes. And are collecting Food Assistance because they've been unemployed for so long. 

I have some ideas in how to solve this problem that gets to temporary food assistance for these people. As well as helping them further their education job training so hungry people no longer need this assistance . But ideas aren't in the New Deal or Great Society area. I'm not a Democratic Socialist.  (As if you didn't already know) 

I don't think in welfare state terms to solve these problems, but I do consider myself a Progressive and would like to see some progress here. My ideas have to do with creating a national system of food centers, at least semi-private in the short-term, that wouldn't be run by the Federal Government as well as non- profit, where each state would have their own food assistance system. 

This system would not be run by government and would be semi-private and non-profit with like a national headquarters. But each state would have their own system and these food centers would be a combination of grocery stores and like cafeteria's, with discounted food, with mostly healthy food, that people who are eligible for them could buy their grocery's, eat their meals, spend their money and use their Food Assistance to help pay for their food. 

This would be where individuals and organizations would be eligible to donate their extra food and other food to a food center that would be located in areas with high food insecurity. As we would set up a food assistance system like this. 

We as a country need to do more for people in poverty so they can get better skills and a better education, so they can get better jobs. And be able to move off of public assistance and into the middle class and to self-sufficiency. So they no longer have to collect from these programs which would make them easier to run.