The following is presented to elicit thought and comment. Please go to the end to make comments on this essay.
If anywhere, we should expect the United States to have enough food to feed all of its people.
And we do.... And the means to get it to them.
So why do people go hungry? Article 25 of the Declaration of Human Rights gives this as a fundamental human right of everyone. This document was in large part developed by the United States and ratified as a basic statement by the United Nations. Here is Article 25:
(1) Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.
Could it be any plainer than that? Why then, do people go hungry in the United States?
The answer is usually some variation of "How can we give them food if they don't work?" Or "Who will pay for it?" Note that there is never the issue of "There isn't enough food," or "We can't get it to where it's needed." These problems are solved. It is always the question of how to pay for it, or how to supply the food to people who don't work (and don't even try to work).
Whenever the "how to pay for it"-type questions come up, then the free market system is getting in the way of doing something. This is what I mean by a failure of the free market system.
We have the food. We generally have more than enough food. We have the means to get it to where it is needed. The only thing that keeps the needy from getting the food is the free enterprise system. Because of this system, we must ask the question of "How will we pay for it," or "Who will pay for it." The system forces this question. The free enterprise system puts this roadblock in the way of doing the right thing.
Is this a call to do away with the free enterprise system? Of course not. I still believe it is the best system in the world to do most things. The purpose of this essay is to present a rebuttal to those who can find no wrong with the system. Even though it is highly successful, and probably the best choice we have before us, it does have some failures. This essay points out one of those failures.
It is important that we recognize that the system is not perfect. Only then can we say that we must find "a way around the system" to do the right thing. As long as we are unable to make this statement, we will continue to use it as a roadblock to proper action.
In passing, I will add these additional thoughts:
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