America Won't Feed Its People

>> But I can't think of any other way to distribute food (or, indeed, most products and services) except in exchange for money. At least not any way that will encourage the producers of the food to continue doing so.<<

There are many different models of resource allocation that human societies have used. America is built predominantly on the money model, but other systems are in play too. We can consider food distribution similar to political power: It is currently allocated based on who has the most money (plutocracy). It could be allocated based on age, to seniors first (gerontocracy), or shared out equally to all (democracy), or distributed based on a measure of worth such as work hours (meritocracy). During war times, some cultures (including America and England) have used a rationing system that, while it restricted food choices for the wealthy, substantially improved them for poor and working class people. That's a "democratic" variation intended to give everyone an equal and healthy share. Some intentional communities use a currency based on work hours, in several variations; and that is pretty successful.

What I think would work best is a mixed system: Guarantee the basics of a healthy diet, and then if people want luxury foods, they may buy those at their own expense if they can afford that. As for motivating food production, the most straightforward way to do that is to get more people involved with growing their own food. Gardening and farming are things that many people can learn; it would be a productive and rewarding use of unemployed people. The government is happy to give or sell land to large corporations; often it takes public outcry to stop them from wiping out all the national forests or whatever. Why not look for some parcels of "public land" and use it for feeding the public? Or when banks take bailout funds, the taxpayers should get the properties attached to the bad mortages; use those to house and feed people.

I'd rather see this sort of thing done on a community scale than state or national, because I don't really trust the government. But I'd rather see it done by the government than by nobody, like now. If a society cannot meet its citizens' basic needs -- food, water, shelter, clothing, health care, etc. -- then it is a dysfunctional society that needs to be repaired or replaced. Right now America is doing a lousy job of making sure that everyone's needs get met; much of that is due to the money fixation; and that needs to change.

America is so fixated on money that most people don't even consider solutions that wouldn't required large sums of cash to chance hands. Goods, services, properties, etc. can all be bartered or traded. We should be using what resources we have to meet our needs. With active resources left unused, and needs unmet, the system doesn't function. Money itself is only effective as an economic system if there's enough to go around that people can buy what they need. If that doesn't happen, it breaks down, like now. And when people pursue money first, without regard to consequences, without enough safeguards, the economy goes through dreadful boom-and-bust cycles -- as we've seen through history.

What we have is not working. I would prefer to fix it than wait until people get really desperate and resort to other quaint historic traditions like mobs and torches. And nothing is more guaranteed to spark riots than people not having enough to eat, or being afraid they won't have enough to eat.

>> I think part of the issue is that people don't raise any of their own food. Participating and creating, encouraging farmers markets, community gardens and gardening at home to at least supplement the diet is a good thing to do. <<

You are absolutely right. I've written several Gaiatribe posts on related issues. I'll probably do one on farmer's markets soon -- the big one we visit has its opening day tomorrow, and we're very excited. Meanwhile check out:
http://gaiatribe.geekuniversalis.com/2009/04/27/the-sharing-garden/
http://gaiatribe.geekuniversalis.com/2009/02/07/joining-community-supported-agriculture/

>>Agriculture as it's practiced isn't to produce food, it's to produce wealth.<<

That's true, and it causes many problems. Not only is food distributed unevenly, but harmful practices flourish because they make money -- for example, factory farms, which spread disease.

>> It is among the many shameful 19th c. philosophies that were revived along with supply-side economics. We don't feed our people, we don't provide day care for our children while insisting both their parents work jobs that do not pay enough to afford care, we don't provide medical care for our citizens, nor paid new-parent leave. We are the only first-world country that fails that test. I will not call us "civilized" by any reasonable definition. <<

I agree. I regret that America has fallen so far behind. I hope, however, that new leadership may close the gap.

>>Years ago, the government used to give away surplus powdered milk and cheese and butter. They no longer do that, and I don't think it's because they haven't got the surpluses. Obama might be just a bit too young to remember the program, or might never have come across it, but it would be worth reviving.<<

It hasn't been that long. We used to go for free butter and cheese when I was little, so ... 30 years ago or thereabouts it was still running.

>>And on a completely unrelated note, Happy Beltane, Lady.<<

Thank you! We had a nice celebration yesterday.

>>I suggest you read a book called _The Wisconsin Death Trip,_ if you haven't, and if you can find it.<<

I'll keep an eye out for it.

>>EC is the idea that the Elect are prosperous and the Sinful sink into poverty, always. The rich buy into that. Every rich person got rich because of superior virtue and hard work. Just ask them, they'll tell you so. <<

This Economic Calvinism reminds me very much of Social Darwinism, which implies that "superior" individuals and societies will outcompete "inferior" ones. The problem is that evolution doesn't actually favor "better" ... it favors "successful." Mosquitoes are horrid, but they're very successful.

>> But why do the working people buy into it? <<

I think the strongest lure is pure tokenism: the illusion that everyone could be rich if they just worked hard. It's an illusion because, when everyone has more money, prices simply rise. Everyone can't be rich; there aren't enough resources, even if the system wasn't designed as a pyramid (which it is). It is, however, possible for a few people to rise out of the mud on a glittering gold ladder of success; in addition to working hard, they were lucky and alert enough to take advantage of what opportunities came their way. The people on top then point to these tokens and assert that everyone could do this, which is not true. It is plausible enough to keep the gullible masses subdued ... until the food starts to run out.

>>That's why the workers have to damn the poor even more than the rich do. Because if they ever admit to themselves, even for an instant, that maybe the poor aren't always, inevitably, 100% to blame for their own poverty, then the workers would see that their own lives are hanging by a thread. That they themselves could be destroyed by the tiniest change in the economy or the smallest accident, and there is nothing they can do to protect themselves from it. Nothing at all. And that reality can be horrifying enough to break your mind, if you're forced to face it.<<

That situation is so because America chooses for it to be so. We could have chosen differently, as civilized countries have. In fact, we used to have a pretty good social safety net for the poor. The people in power spent several decades dismantling it, and now that we need it -- in vast, rapidly increasing numbers -- it is not there. This is one of the pitfalls of a society that equates human worth with financial worth: no matter how much money you have right now, you are never really safe, because if anything happens to your money, your life could be instantly and permanently destroyed. That is not, in my mind, a foundation for a secure and healthy society.

That's not really practical. In a sense, it's what I'm hoping to avoid, because the endgame of class warfare is revolution of the flavor that usually leads to widespread slaughter of the perceived masters. That's not an optimum solution, because it doesn't fix the problems oIr replace a broken system with a functional system. It just levels the field so that somebody else can start over.

I don't believe that rich people are inherently evil or deserving of destruction. I do believe that the wealth gap has gotten far wider than is good or safe for anyone, including the rich. Having too much money is like having too much of any other kind of power: it can warp the personality. Plus, when almost all the wealth is concentrated into just a few hands, the economy stops running, like a pump system with most of the water sucked out. That too is good for nobody.

So we need a way to reduce the distance between the richest and the poorest. I think it's okay to have a spectrum of wealth; that seems to be a natural tendency, avoided by very few societies, mostly ones living on the edge with NO surplus. It's when the gap gets beyond a certain width that serious problems arise, particularly if wealth is routinely passed down the generations. Rich people who earned money by hard work are less prone to destructive behavior, because they have a different background for comparison, than people born rich who did nothing to earn it and who grew up with that sense of entitlement.

I didn't think you meant really eat them. But the comment was very much in tune with the anti-rich diatribe fulminating in the culture today. I believe that people with money and power largely caused the current economic crisis, but I'm leery of jokes that increase class tension. It's tempting to trash the rich, but that doesn't make it right. Sometimes I resist the temptation better than other times.