If one place underscores just how dire America’s hunger problem has become during the pandemic, it is here—in the middle of the breadbasket that supplies food from coast to coast. The ranks of Americans fighting hunger are projected to swell some 45% this year to more than 50 million. Traxler, her husband and six children are among them. She had come to this spot, an empty school parking lot in the town of Mankato, to collect free boxes of food staples: milk and apples and carrots. Hundreds of Minnesotans waited in line ahead of her for hours.
With the nation pitched in a fierce debate over entrenched and systemic inequalities, the most basic divide—who eats well and who goes hungry—is becoming more acute every day. Even before the pandemic, the U.S. already had the highest number of people who couldn’t afford a basic energy-efficient diet among the world’s 63 high-income countries.
“We are no longer projecting a surge—we are experiencing a surge in food insecurity,” said
Allison O’Toole, the chief executive officer of Second Harvest Heartland, which helps to
run the Mankato food bank.
During the pandemic, about a 10th of American households reported they haven’t had
enough food in a given week. That’s a shocking figure for the world’s richest country.
It’s more than double pre-Covid figures and the highest since comparable government
data starts in 1995.
In contrast to the Dust Bowl years of the Great Depression or the rationing of World War II, the crisis has nothing to do with food supplies. The U.S. is in a time of historic abundance, with plentiful grains, meat and dairy, so much so that farmers have been plowing over excess crops and dumping milk. But lockdowns have snarled supply chains, and food inflation is projected to rise at the fastest pace in almost a decade. Meanwhile, unemployment, low wages and reduced working hours are diminishing purchasing power—all of which are disproportionately impacting women and minorities, as is food insecurity.
Demand at Minnesota’s food banks is up 65% this year, and groups like Second Harvest Heartland say the peak has yet to come. The federal government’s $600 weekly supplement to unemployment insurance, which helped millions weather job losses and pay household bills, came to an end last month,and Congress can’t agree on a replacement. Donald Trump issued a stopgap measure to provide $300 a week in federal support to most jobless-benefit recipients, but the funds are only slowing moving into Americans’ wallets.
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