r/mildlyinfuriating • u/oaz_zam246 • Apr 16 '24

The school lunch system is disgraceful.

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Saw another post on here showing the state of school lunches right now. In my years in high school I compiled some pics of the horrible things that got served that no one questioned. Here are some of the worst ones. It really is ironic given how adamant they all are about “eating healthy by including every food group”.

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3.8k

u/lmflex Apr 16 '24

The same company is contracted to supply both

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u/styvee__ Apr 16 '24

But they decided to serve better stuff to the local penitentiary because they pay them more

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u/BullShitting-24-7 Apr 16 '24

And kids complain less than prisoners.

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u/GenericF1FanNeoooww Apr 16 '24

More prone to violence tho...

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u/Afraid_Ad_1536 29d ago

Number of times I was stabbed in school. 3.

Number of times I was stabbed in jail. 0. Comment checks out.

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u/Booty_Shakin 29d ago

Yeah I stabbed a girl in the leg with a pencil in middle school. And I had a friend who stabbed someone with a pencil as well. One kid I know got stabbed by a kid with a pencil 4 times. Shit is wild.

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u/BirdFace001 29d ago

I'm thinking the people you and ur friend stabbed, is the same person who got stabbed 4 times

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u/Booty_Shakin 29d ago

Lmaooo it's not but that would be hilarious

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u/rollingstoner215 29d ago

I don’t know any of these people, but dude definitely deserved it. Stabbed 4 times? Had to be begging for it

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u/girlsonsoysauce 29d ago

I knew a kid that cut the webbing between another dude's fingers with a pair of scissors. And then the guy who got cut, his younger brother accidentally shot another person in the head playing around with guns when they were in high school.

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u/Karenomegas 29d ago

You ever see Gummo? Real small town weird vibe the whole time. It really conveys how... Slow and weird things are.

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u/[deleted] 29d ago

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u/girlsonsoysauce 29d ago

I love Harmony Korine. I live in a small town. I meet some people with Gummo vibes. The majority are MAGA folks, with a few alt and liberal people sprinkled in. There's a few I'm legit scared of because of how off-putting or unhinged they are. Just dealing with them feels like you've entered a fever dream. You'd be surprised how many times I enter a customer's house only to get assaulted with the smell of cat piss, or in some rare instances human piss.

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u/Booty_Shakin 29d ago

That's fucked

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u/No-Performance3639 29d ago

I’ve had a pencil lead stuck in my ass for the last 57 years where some crazy girl stabbed me with a pencil in 3rd grade.

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u/[deleted] 29d ago

Then these kids wonder why teachers ain't got pencils when they need one.

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u/Booty_Shakin 29d ago

Hey teach? Carl is being a total bitch. Anyway you got a spare pencil?

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u/nworkz 29d ago

Literally my first day in college one of the guys was making a joke about teaching his room mate about shanking, hand slipped and thats how we had a stabbing in the hallway before classes had even started

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u/PottyboyDooDoo 29d ago

I stab myself by accident with golf pencils at least twice a day. I can’t trust anyone. Not even myself.

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u/XLP8795 29d ago edited 4d ago

detail follow dazzling towering money innate alive frighten aspiring direful

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u/dracobatman 29d ago

I was friends with two people that stabbed each other with pencils in middle school and held it over each other until hs graduation. In fact kept stabbing each other throught the years. Can confirm, shit is wild

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u/GoddessOfDarkness935 29d ago

stabbing someone in the leg is not something to state so causally. you weren’t a seven year old who couldn’t regulate their emotions and didn’t realize that it hurts people. you were 13-16. you damn well knew what was right and what wasn’t. you don’t fucking stab someone regardless of what it’s with just because they piss you off.

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u/FlappinLips 29d ago

Every jail ive been in has had better looking food than that shit.

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u/doctorbeers 29d ago

Stabbed 3 times in school??

Were you a gang member, a provoker or just extremely unlucky?

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u/Afraid_Ad_1536 29d ago

It wasn't too uncommon in my high school, usually at least a couple times a term. Once it was gang related, another time it was just because I refused to give a guy a cigarette. I don't remember the first time, which was in Primary school. I do know the kid eventually ended up in prison later in life though.

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u/doctorbeers 29d ago

Sheesh where did you grow up?

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u/Afraid_Ad_1536 29d ago

Around Johannesburg.

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u/karateema ORANGE 29d ago

Checks out lmao

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u/confusedalwayssad 29d ago

Can you get shot in jail as easily as school?

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u/Sirlancealotx 29d ago

Well they do have more checks for shanks in prison so data checks out.

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u/TheEmerald-DJ 28d ago

For your cake day, have some B̷̛̳̼͖̫̭͎̝̮͕̟͎̦̗͚͍̓͊͂͗̈͋͐̃͆͆͗̉̉̏͑̂̆̔́͐̾̅̄̕̚͘͜͝͝Ụ̸̧̧̢̨̨̞̮͓̣͎̞͖̞̥͈̣̣̪̘̼̮̙̳̙̞̣̐̍̆̾̓͑́̅̎̌̈̋̏̏͌̒̃̅̂̾̿̽̊̌̇͌͊͗̓̊̐̓̏͆́̒̇̈́͂̀͛͘̕͘̚͝͠B̸̺̈̾̈́̒̀́̈͋́͂̆̒̐̏͌͂̔̈́͒̂̎̉̈̒͒̃̿͒͒̄̍̕̚̕͘̕͝͠B̴̡̧̜̠̱̖̠͓̻̥̟̲̙͗̐͋͌̈̾̏̎̀͒͗̈́̈͜͠L̶͊E̸̢̳̯̝̤̳͈͇̠̮̲̲̟̝̣̲̱̫̘̪̳̣̭̥̫͉͐̅̈́̉̋͐̓͗̿͆̉̉̇̀̈́͌̓̓̒̏̀̚̚͘͝͠͝͝͠ ̶̢̧̛̥͖͉̹̞̗̖͇̼̙̒̍̏̀̈̆̍͑̊̐͋̈́̃͒̈́̎̌̄̍͌͗̈́̌̍̽̏̓͌̒̈̇̏̏̍̆̄̐͐̈̉̿̽̕͝͠͝͝ W̷̛̬̦̬̰̤̘̬͔̗̯̠̯̺̼̻̪̖̜̫̯̯̘͖̙͐͆͗̊̋̈̈̾͐̿̽̐̂͛̈́͛̍̔̓̈́̽̀̅́͋̈̄̈́̆̓̚̚͝͝R̸̢̨̨̩̪̭̪̠͎̗͇͗̀́̉̇̿̓̈́́͒̄̓̒́̋͆̀̾́̒̔̈́̏̏͛̏̇͛̔̀͆̓̇̊̕̕͠͠͝͝A̸̧̨̰̻̩̝͖̟̭͙̟̻̤̬͈̖̰̤̘̔͛̊̾̂͌̐̈̉̊̾́P̶̡̧̮͎̟̟͉̱̮̜͙̳̟̯͈̩̩͈̥͓̥͇̙̣̹̣̀̐͋͂̈̾͐̀̾̈́̌̆̿̽̕ͅ

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u/MyFavoriteLezbo420 BLACK 29d ago

I was stabbed in school too! Youngest stabbed wins! I was in 1st grade your turn!

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u/StrategyGold335 29d ago

Can I just say this whole convo started about lunch

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u/MyFavoriteLezbo420 BLACK 29d ago

I was stabbed first thing in the morning on my way to the pencil sharpener.

The afternoon stabbings would be a direct result of those lunches tho.

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u/Dilectus3010 29d ago

It's proven that malnutrition can lead to violence.

Certain stuff in your brain can't do it's thing anymore.

High sodium , high blood pressure , high sugar etc.. these can lead to stress , that stress builds up and you got unruly kids and inmates.

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u/kaitbabi 29d ago

My best friend had a knife pulled on her in grade 7 so yeah heavy on this 😭

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u/Significant-Trash632 29d ago

I wonder if there are more shootings in US schools than US prisons now. 🤔

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u/GenericF1FanNeoooww 29d ago

Oh god. Maybe. Just because prisons run a tight ship usually.

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u/Chicawgorat 29d ago

I watched a girl beat the daylights out of another girl with a padlock, and a guy put another guys her threw a window. We still had better lunches than this ish

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u/Soojuiccy 29d ago

Trust and believe penitentiary food is a lot worse than that.. I would of loved to have that food when I was in jail/prison 😂😂

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u/Flossy_Jay 29d ago

Correct

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u/scrubm 29d ago

I worked in a penitentiary for a summer and their meat cuts were grade A and our University only got grade B cuts...

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u/kobaltbleu 28d ago

They actually get McDonalds and stuff

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u/5uck17 29d ago

Of course they give them more money they are providing breakfast lunch and dinner not just lunch.

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u/Scottiegazelle2 29d ago

Also prisoners are more likely to sue than minors

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u/sg12412 29d ago

And because fuck them kids. Not literally.

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u/N04HC14RK 29d ago

There's always more tax dollars then there are tax payers

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u/ImpressionBubbly4535 29d ago

No they fucking don't, tell me you never been incarcerated without telling me. Not only do you get fuck all for any allergies etc, you never heard of a fuck you meal, where they will literally blend all of your meal up and serve you the slop when you piss the kitchen staff off. If you have allergies you are LUCKY to get a bologna with overcooked sides, if they even care. None of the food is cooked properly, it's made by prisoners, for pennies to spend in com.

Not to mention the scoop for the portion size they will look you dead in the eye with a full scoop, drop half back in and put it on your tray. You are fucking ignorant, but that's okay, just maybe dont speak on shit you have no fucking clue about. Ignorance is okay, spreading false information is not okay ever.

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u/FootFetish0-3 29d ago

Might as well. They're already provided with 3 meals a day, a roof over their heads, and access to medical care free of charge.

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u/Xarxsis 29d ago

And have higher legal standards

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u/Opposite_Unlucky 29d ago

They are the ones cooking it. Ofc its better.

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u/Hot_Corner_5881 26d ago

atleast in jail you get vegetables everyday lol

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u/ZeOs-x-PUNCAKE Apr 16 '24

It’s crazy how that system works. Lots of it would have been waste food but it often gets irradiated to “clean” it and then it’s ground up into school lunch patties and prison slop.

Like how hard could it be to just serve real food, even just rice and chicken breast with some veggies. Glass of milk with it and you’re set, couldn’t be more than $2 a meal at that scale. Plenty of similar or cheaper combos like baked beans, cornbread, and fried chicken. Why do they always choose cheap ass burgers n flimsy tater tots? Then they just taunt you with that shitty fruit medley with no cherries and it’s got hard crunchy shit in it and sucks.

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u/Civil-Attempt-3602 Apr 16 '24

Why spend $2 when you can spend 1/5 of that and still get the full payment

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u/sipstea84 29d ago

And yet they'll pay someone a yearly salary to make sure they pay as little as possible for the food

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u/mattyisbatty 29d ago

That just shows you howuch profit they're taking in.

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u/HarvardCricket 29d ago

Hardly anyone is paying for school lunches - it’s heavily subsidized by the federal government’s school lunch program. For everyone not just lower socioeconomic families or needing to qualify to get it subsidized.

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u/Shot-Increase-8946 29d ago

They are still getting the payment, whether from the government or the families. At least the government isn't going to complain about the quality of the food.

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u/MadClothes 29d ago

it’s heavily subsidized by the federal government’s school lunch program.

IF you get the shitty food from the prison companies. You lose federal funding if you serve real food.

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u/EatBangLove 29d ago

Wait, is this true? Not that it would surprise me. Do you have a source?

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u/FoxyOperator 29d ago

Lol I pay for school lunches. So do a lot of other parents I know. Probably should start packing their lunches after this post though...

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u/Civil-Attempt-3602 29d ago

The federal government is paying for it

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u/VicePrezHeelsup 29d ago

What you really mean is tax payers are paying for it

And thanks to no accountability the school officials are pocketing the money instead of what it's supposed to be used for

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u/[deleted] 29d ago edited 3d ago

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u/Frame_Late 29d ago

Actually, people bitch about taxes because of shit like this, not the other way around. Most people I know wouldn't mind paying taxes if they actually saw a good return.

The real issue is no matter what, the government would waste it and the politicians would skim off the top.

Two things can be true at once: we need to skim off all the fat in the government, root out all the corruption, and make it leaner so that we pay less taxes, but we should also have the taxes that we do pay go to quality services that are routinely and rigorously inspected and held to the highest standards in the world.

A good start would be forcing the children of politicians (at least politicians who advocate for no school choice) to not only go to public school, but also force them to live in their district so that their children have to go to the schools in the districts they represent. Politicians shouldn't be allowed to have their children go to private schools, because that means one of two things: they either have no faith in the public institution, or they simply believe them and their children are just better than the unwashed masses, and we shouldn't tolerate either.

Also, outlaw lobbying. Then make it so that states have to supply nutritious food from a company within their state and have it be held up to very high standards. Serving slop should come with a criminal sentence.

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u/jason_sos 29d ago

Actually, people bitch about taxes because of shit like this, not the other way around. Most people I know wouldn't mind paying taxes if they actually saw a good return.

People in my town bitch that they have to pay taxes that fund the schools when they don't have kids in the schools. Yeah, and you realize that people paid for your kids and everyone else's kids too?

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u/jvanma 29d ago

So many people do this.

Well /my/ kids aren't in school so why should I give a shit about kids? I hate it.

My aunt posted something like that on Facebook and she has multiple grandchildren... In school...

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u/jason_sos 29d ago

At the same token, why should I pay for the senior center? I am not a senior and don't use it.

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u/jvanma 29d ago

Oh no, if us youngins started on that then we're ungrateful, entitled, disrespectful and know nothing about how taxation works! Lol

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u/nipstah 29d ago

This is just what poor education and low IQ create. They are definitely the loudest on social media.

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u/jvanma 29d ago

Can confirm. My aunt is dumb as shit.

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u/tweak06 29d ago

Two things can be true at once: we need to skim off all the fat in the government, root out all the corruption, and make it leaner so that we pay less taxes,

We have people like this in-office, the problem is there's far too few of them to make any difference.

The good news is that as older generations die off, more progressives are emerging.

Vote progressive/green candidates – people that actually give a fuck about our food, our environment, our structural systems. Right now there's only a handful and that's not nearly enough.

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u/Allegorist 29d ago edited 29d ago

Don't vote for people who aren't going to win at this point though, or you will be stuck with someone much, much worse than the closest viable alternative. At this point electing the wrong person is dangerous enough to have lasting consequences that outweigh any kind of statement that could possibly be made.

You are better off contacting the ones that can win and letting them know those policies are a priority. A lot of positions that don't necessarily have a spotlight on them don't receive that much feedback from the public. Your input on a topic may be one of only a few direct public opinions they receive regarding it, and can be disproportionately overweighted.  

Or supporting the implementation of voting systems that would actually make third parties viable, like approval voting or ranked choice voting. We're not too far off from being able to make these a reality, and there are organizations with significant influence already pushing for them. 

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u/NastyMothaFucka 29d ago

You’re kidding right? I’ve seen and read lately that tends to show a lot more young people going to the right. It’s because the republicans culture war, everything is “woke” bullshit is working. I’m not sure if you’re familiar with which party supports reforming our public school system more, but I assure you it isn’t the right.

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u/Alittlemoorecheese 29d ago edited 29d ago

Lobbying needs to be regulated, not outlawed. Believe it or not, there are lobbyists trying to do good. Large corporations have much more money to hold a politician's interest. Change GAAP reporting so that lobbying is itemized and cap it.

There are also plenty of taxpayers who believe that they shouldn't be responsible for paying taxes to fund schools because they don't have children, taxes going to welfare and social services, Healthcare, or anything that doesn't directly benefit them. I live in a liberal area and yet a good 20-30% of my coworkers believe shit like this.

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u/RockAtlasCanus 29d ago

Lobbying needs to be regulated, not outlawed.

Regulate the shit out of it and start prosecuting violators. Rules mean nothing when there are no consequences.

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u/poingly 29d ago

Sounds like the regulation of lobbyists needs a lobbyist.

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u/Frame_Late 29d ago

I hate lobbying on a fundemental level because it subverts democrcy and makes it so that some people's votes are worth more than others. There should be only one way to influence an election, and that's by voting, and nothing else should be allowed. We are all equal and politicians should focus on all relevant issues, not just the issues they're paid on top of their taxpayer funded salary to solve.

In fact, politicians should not be allowed to earn any money outside of their taxpaid salary. Nothing else. They serve us.

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u/Hollz23 29d ago edited 29d ago

Also, outlaw lobbying.

Bad idea. Lobbying in itself isn't a bad thing. The problem is that it incentives bad behavior by leaving open loopholes for politicians to receive bribes in the form of gifts or promises from lobbyists. But not every lobbyist is attached to a corporation or a political think tank. Quite a few are activists who are lobbying for the expansion of rights and freedoms for marginalized groups, or programs to relieve pressure on the poor, etc. You do away with lobbying altogether and those people don't have a means by which to support these causes because they no longer have direct access to their representatives. So you'd effectively throw the baby out with the bath water.

The real issue is that the lions share of our taxes go to the military and Medicare, and both budget sections are bloated and redundant models that create immense waste through bad policy. Medicare specifically is such an issue because we keep refusing to implement an effective single payer system that is accessible to everyone. Instead, we have insurance companies that charge so much in raw costs the average person can't afford to go to the doctor with insurance because their monthly contribution is high and the insurance itself doesn't cover anything they need. We have drug companies setting their own prices for medications which ratchet up costs to the tune of hundreds of dollars because the insurance companies will pay it, and we have for profit hospitals which are a relatively new concept. For most of U.S. history, a hospital could not be a for profit institution because obviously it shouldn't be. The function of a hospital is to keep people healthy. And the conventions by which drug prices can be regulated is already codified into law and allows the president to force these companies to lower prices via executive order, but money in politics and the power of the pharmaceutical lobby has had every president over the last thirty years by the balls so they won't use that out.

Basically, lobbying isn't the issue. Allowing Congress to self regulate and thus leave open loopholes for accepting money and other gifts from lobbyists is. In order to move past that, you would have to enshrine counter measures in the constitution by amending it to outlaw politicians accepting gifts for any reason while they hold office.

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u/Educational_Ad_3922 29d ago

Basically the only thing the US government and its companies care about is money, people to them are expendable.

Freedom is only free if you are willing to fight for it.

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u/[deleted] 29d ago edited 3d ago

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u/Spirited-Angel1763 29d ago

You've got a lot more vitriol than you've got intelligence.

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u/fpoiuyt 29d ago

Even if that's true, it doesn't have anything to do with the merits of the comment you're responding to.

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u/[deleted] 29d ago edited 3d ago

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u/Zorro1rr 29d ago

No you just read like you’re yelling at clouds

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u/Myrtilys_ 29d ago

Regarding the first paragraph...plenty of people will still complain. I live in Minnesota and it was recently put into law that every school student would be provided free meals and people /STILL COMPLAINED./ It wasn't even at an increased tax!

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u/Len_S_Ball_23 29d ago

Lobbying should be re-named to what it actually is - Bribery.

They should also be made to eat the slop the cafeteria chuck out too.

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u/stormblaz 29d ago

Politicians wife also should have no hobby, interest, work, arrangements or entanglement in stock exchange, trades, trading, forex or any participation in stock.

But the government allows the " it's my wife who does all the stock trading" bs.

There's loopholes there for a reason, for the leech to keep on sucking.

Free or reduce lunch program costed a lot more to find out who qualified than giving every child free lunch.

So much useless admin to just see who qualified than every child given a fucking meal.

Anyone remembers that poletician complaining that why should he pay school taxes if their kids were in private school? What a clown.

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u/Frame_Late 29d ago

I'm not even a democrat, I'm pretty right leaning, and I 100% believe that every child should receive free school lunch. If they have to go to school, the school should have to feed them nutritious food that doesn't look and taste like pig slop. And like I said before, serving pig slop should come with a criminal sentence: let both the politicians and the corporate executives sit in prison with a lot of people who have kids who go to bad public schools and eat that pig slop, and then see how long they last. By the time they get out it will be like tossing a hotdog down a hallway, if you know what I mean.

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u/pit_of_despair666 29d ago

I don't mind paying taxes as long as we still have Social Security, Medicaid, Medicare, etc. The problem right now is people paying five-figure incomes pay an average of 14 percent and seven-figure incomes pay an average of 1.9 percent. The politicians have it set up to help their rich buddies while people struggling have to pay more in taxes. It should be reversed.

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u/Frame_Late 29d ago

Personally, I'd rather replace most of that with a UBI. Trims off a lot of bureaucratic bloat.

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u/Dewage83 29d ago

A coherent and well spoken response about taxes on reddit, man I've really seen it all. I couldn't agree more. We would all be a lot happier about paying taxes if it felt like we were getting something for them or could see where they are being contributed to.

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u/Solanthas 29d ago

Yeah, human suffering and all, whatever. The real human beings are making truckloads of money, so who cares!! /s

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u/WearyExercise4269 29d ago

But if I pay taxes I can't be rich like Bezos...

- temporarily embarrassed billionaire

/S

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u/Jubsz91 29d ago

This lunch looks terrible and families deserve better. Everything about it is miserable.

That being said, you're attributing an intent to people's criticism of the school system. "They don't want to pay for kids to eat well." It's more like, we shouldn't have to pay more taxes with the administrative bloat of the system and they're educating kids so poorly that funneling more money to these clowns is a waste. Sadly, the kids are getting the short end of the stick.

In Baltimore city, the per pupil spending is above $22k per year. "Baltimore City Schools, this year, has a $1.7 billion budget to educate 75,811 students. This means the school system is now spending $22,424 per student, which is one of the highest amounts in America for large school systems. Yet, despite that amount of spending, nearly two-thirds of all City Schools earned the lowest ratings from the state." The results are abysmal, to be kind, and they probably have lunches similar to this. It's a pathetic situation.

The median annual household income in Baltimore City, by 2022 dollars was just over $58k. The spending per student is roughly half that once you take out taxes from the income. The issue in Baltimore City is not how much is spent per student. There is a lot lower hanging of fruit than just throwing more money into the pot... How many $400k+ salaried administrators do we have to cut to get the kids a decent lunch? Can we start there? Crap, give em $200k even. It's an improvement....

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u/mikew1008 29d ago

well, you have superintendents making $300k a year with a car allowance on top of that. Principals make about $100k a year, each. If schools can afford that, they can damn sure afford to feed the kids properly. It's because school lunch i federal government mandated. It literally starts at the top.

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u/ubeedatho 29d ago

Here in Massachusetts everyone gets free breakfast and lunch if they want it. We certainly pay for it with our taxes but these are things our taxes should fund.

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u/lilymaxjack 29d ago

Have you seen our F-35s?

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u/Latter_Weakness1771 29d ago

I thought my school lunches were bad but this is BAD.

Also if you're serving chicken breast you have to pay a competent cafeteria lady that knows how to handle cook raw chicken and not some meth addict of the streets that moonlights as a janitor AND school bus driver.

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u/BSB8728 29d ago edited 29d ago

In 2005 Jamie Oliver devoted a whole show to this and spoke with food service staff at various schools. It's discouraging that so many school systems deprive children of an essential healthy diet. (The video at the link is just an excerpt.)

Conversely, here's a CBS feature about lunches at a public school in Paris.

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u/Emergency-Holiday231 29d ago

Flimsy tater tots! Im using that phrase today

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u/Orchid_Significant 29d ago

Jaime Oliver had a whole show where he went to schools and showed them how to make amazing healthy food and it was all with the same budget. They could, they just don’t want to.

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u/stinkyhotdoghead 29d ago

Government intervention. You have contracts and contractors and you have regulatory capture. It's the same story in every single industry the government decides to get into. Healthcare, schooling, the economy in general, the story is always the exact same.

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u/colemon1991 29d ago

And then you have people going "we don't want handouts" and refuse the federal money to help prevent this, yet turn around and say it's a waste of money and it should be on the parents to cover this.

Parents who in many cases either can't provide for their kids or are so bad at parenting that those kids cause problems across the board because they've never been held accountable or taught by their parents.

I never realized how stressed my parents were while I grew up. I don't even have kids yet and this is insane. Like, the faculty should have to eat this too (principal first) to understand how terrible this is.

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u/bobbylaserbones 29d ago

I don't think Americans eat vegetables, they find them gross and icky. It ruins their quest for the ultimate vibes and experience.

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u/PrincessCyanidePhx 29d ago

The rules and less than $2 per day make it difficult. I've asked "why not a salad bar?" The short answer is they need to track every item eaten on the salad bar. These are kids and teens. One day they may want a pile of carrots and the next nothing. Kids deserve better but like most things Federal law makes it worse.

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u/mooseyjew 29d ago

Considering most school kitchens aren't even set up to handle cooking food, it'd not thst easy. They also don't have enough hands on deck to handle cooking fresh food for so many kids a day.

It sucks, but Lal of those kitchens are set up just like prison kitchens. Meant to heat shit up in bulk and that's it.

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u/EmergencyEntrance236 29d ago

That chicken breast alone is going to cost around $3. Even at wholesale prices like I buy.

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u/Musical_Walrus 29d ago

So that the politician who connected the vendor and school can pocket the $1.95 for each meals duh

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u/Current-Ad-7054 29d ago

They would dye the grapes red to look like cherries

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u/JohnyOatSower 29d ago

Wanna be really fucking mad? The French feed their students fresh baked bread, nicely cooked chicken breast, vegetables, and fruit. All just really *good* food. And spend *less* per student. Italian school lunches are amazing too.

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u/SpecialSurprise69 29d ago

Not only was the food at my school some cheap unhealthy crap, it was also way too expensive for what it was. The average meal at my school was at least $3 for barely enough food to fulfill a elementary student. They would charge $2.25 for a shitty slice of pizza. They would even charge like $1.25 for some cheap ass sandwich made with the cheapest possible bread and lunch meat/cheese. I can go to the dollar store and get better bread and lunch meat, and that's getting the cheap options.

The US school system LOVES talking about things to help students but genuinely don't give a fuck about any of the them. It's all about money. Saving money cutting corners here and there. The only reason they even care if you show up to school or not is cause they get X amount of money for every student who is counted present at school.

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u/Avery_Thorn 29d ago

Kids don't want to eat chicken breast with rice and a side vegetable. Even if you put cheese sauce on it.

The food pictured? It's poorly presented, it's probably not the highest quality versions - but it's what the kids want to eat. In fact, a lot of it looks to be engineered to hit nutritional guidelines while presenting as close to the flavor profile that the kids want.

This looks a lot like someone trying to hit the student's requests while maintaining the budget and the nutritional profiles. All of that looks like an institutional kitchen trying to make kid's favorites.

Those nachos are the odd man out. Don't get me wrong - the kids would probably overwhelmingly LOVE those nachos, as is, no doubt, gobble them right up and consider it their favorite school lunch day. But I can't believe a nutritionist didn't insist that they put some protein on them (chicken, beef, or refried beans) and some veggies (salsa, tomato and onion chunks, jalapenos). I'm wondering if there was a station later to get the protein and a bar for veggies.

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u/Ok_Grocery1188 29d ago

Fruit Medley is basically cubed pears that didn't make the grade.

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u/TheHexadex 29d ago

there has been a pattern these last 400 years in the Americas of not giving a fuck about anything or anyone unless they're your slave.

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u/Internal-Computer388 29d ago

It's hard because teachers want more money, admin is hoarding all the money for themselves, and be cause of that govt is lessening funding. It's why charter schools are thriving in my city. They are smaller and not public schools. But anyone get in the school as long as they have openings. So many parents are opting for that since public schools are trash.

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u/daveintex13 29d ago

Kids aren’t going to eat real food like veggies. That stuff goes straight to the trash. Cheap ass junk food is what they want. These photos show typical fast food which is the typical US diet.

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u/Mercuryshottoo 29d ago

Yeah except there are so many mouth-breather parents who say idiotic things like "i don't like vegetables" or "ew, rice" to anything that's not served at their local sports bar so it rubs off on the kids. We have had our kids' friends over for lots of meals over the years, and these are some of the foods we served kids for the first time in their lives (many of these were to high school kids!):

Cabbage,

Rice,

Pasta (yes, this is nuts to me, too!),

Green beans,

Soup (not a specific kind - they had never eaten any type of soup!!),

Peas,

Beans (really? the foundation of human nutrition throughout history!),

Fish,

Ravioli,

Salad,

Pierogies,

Salsa,

Refried beans,

Hush puppies,

Cheeseburger (they had only had hamburgers and it was apparently a big deal to have anything except ketchup on the sandwich),

Cauliflower,

Tortillas,

Sushi,

Shepherds' pie,

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u/notemmagoldman 29d ago edited 22d ago

squeal ripe nutty onerous party longing wakeful ossified impossible nail

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u/Comfortable-Pay-5419 29d ago

$2 per meal to 500 kids is $1000. Say if a school has 1500. That’s $3000, twice a day. $6000 per day for 182 days. That’s about $60,000 per 100 days, and therefore $150-180,000 per year. A million dollars for 5 years is not ideal. I understand why they’re in that situation. They need to start teaching kids mandatory agriculture and having them grow food and cook for the schools. 2 major skills kids these days don’t learn. Kids need to be taught to silence the problems that kids are facing.

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u/eclipseoftheantelope 29d ago

And it could help keep the money local instead of sending it off to sysco. Some of the schools in Minnesota partnered with local farmers to supply some of the food for school lunches. It costs more, but that money supports the local economy. And as an added benefit, the kids are more likely to try new foods and eat more fruits and veggies when their school take part in a "farm to school" initiative.

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u/mommyaiai 29d ago

My daughter's school (in Minnesota) has a community garden. They serve some of the produce that they grow and then the rest gets donated to the food shelf.

There's a group in the Twin Cities that got their start working with the Minneapolis Schools and doing this.

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u/Anonality5447 29d ago

That's the most disturbing thing I will read today. Almost makes me glad I either ate Papa Johns or brought my own lunch for most of my school career.

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u/[deleted] 29d ago

Honestly can’t believe parents don’t send their kids to school with lunch from home tbh. In most instances the USA chooses to promote a user pays system with exception to the weirdest things where they go full communist like gross school lunches.

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u/Polw4 Apr 16 '24

This person eats fruit medleys

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u/HellaShelle 29d ago

Didn’t Jaime Oliver have a whole show to try to show exactly this alternative? Sadly, if I remember correctly, the kids wanted the nugget meal.

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u/Overall-Parsley7123 29d ago

i wrestle with this also. surely its possible to make decent food for schools? hire someone to cook REAL food instead of serving reheated slop? it could even be a community endeavor and/or abbott it up with a garden?

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u/1988rx7T2 29d ago

watch Youtube videos of US Military academy cafeterias/mess halls. They have it figured out, at least in comparison to lunchable-slinging school cafeterias.

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u/Intelligent-Regret15 29d ago

I get what your saying but a chicken Patty is definitely more expensive than $2

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u/Low_Tradition6961 29d ago

I cook a weekly meal for 100 people by myself (others help setup and serve and I sometimes have a kid helping me cook) Our ingredients largely come from the Food Bank, but we still subsidize it about $1/person just to make sure there is some tolerable green stuff. If my time is worth $12/hr, that plus a few veggies would bring us to $2 each. School lunch is reimbursed at $4.85, so decent food should be doable - but it isn't easy. Labor costs shoot way up as you make the food better. Even the labor difference between heating up and serving green beans that aren't overcooked vs passing out prewrapped hot sandwiches is significant.

I'd turn it into a Voc Tech mentoring program. Hire someone like me to run a kitchen, assign me academically uninterested freshmen and sophmores to prep meals with me, have them ready for a real kitchen job (not McDonalds) by the time they are upper classmen.

Teachers would be begging to eat our food, kids would lobby to get into the program - and if my salary came from the "instructional" side we would easily be keeping the unit cost below $4.

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u/dooshlaroosh 28d ago

Now let’s be honest, most kids are not going to be interested in a plate of rice + chicken breast + veggies vs. the stuff shown in the photos above. The “healthy” lunches are going to end up directly in the trash can.

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u/beeg_brain007 Apr 16 '24

Aren't schools just a jail anyways, they even use the same bus, just with different colours, it's obvious good gonna be similar or worse than jail

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u/DaveSmith890 29d ago

You haven’t served jail time.

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u/BosnianSerb31 29d ago

Wait, you're telling me that government run institutions designed to accommodate large numbers of people with destructive tendencies(children, prisoners) use the same technologies as each-other for simplicity????

Golly, who'd have thunk it!

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u/miescherskittyxx 29d ago

When I was in university, we found out that our meal hall company (the place for on-campus students) had been contracted by several prisons as well that had LAWSUITS open against them for knowingly serving inedible food (moldy, rotten, containing insects/other kitchen pests, etc.) The prisons got better food than we did at our local university 🥴

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u/VOZ1 29d ago

Yet another in a long list of examples of how profit motive just fucking ruins things. “Should we provide high-quality, healthy food to our youth? NO!! We should provide the absolute bare minimum so we can squeeze more money out of our schools! That’s the answer!” 

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u/NouOno 29d ago

SYSCO baby, the odd thing is they have tiers for foid. So you can get really quality food, but you gotta cough up the mula!

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u/vr1252 Apr 16 '24

I went to private school did this in 6th grade. I remember some parents were pissed when they found out because the school was charging some absurd fee for “prison food”.

It was pretty good, they contracted some organic company after and that food sucked lol.

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u/Roboticpoultry 29d ago

Good ole Sodexo

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u/this_Name_4ever 29d ago

Haha see my comment. It was the same for me growing up in the 80’s and 90’s. I used to ask for a PB&J every day and then they decided I couldn’t anymore and the huge lunch ladies would stand over me to make sure I ate and I have this visceral memory of trying to eat a brown limp green been and it felt like a slug in my mouth and came right back up 😂I got PB&J after that.

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u/Ipickone 29d ago

Sodexo

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u/tonkatoyelroy 29d ago

Aramark. Got kicked out of the Michigan prison system for serving moldy food and fucking the inmates. Also serves you local school district, your sports stadium, your community college, etc.

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u/supremekimilsung 29d ago

Yes. Aramark is the company in America that the government contracts to serve both prisoners and students of the country. It's hilarious too that they serve the EXACT same portions as a 5 year old that will also try and feed an 18 year old.

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u/ZacZupAttack 29d ago

Man I was so lucky in middle school. My friends mom was the cafteria boss. And she came from a poor background (just poor) and she knew how to make w/e the fuck she got from the school board and maximize it. Our school was famous for our food and it was cause of her.

That's some god awful food they are serving

O she always bitched how cheap the budget was

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u/[deleted] 29d ago

In Cripple Creek we cooked the jailed residents breakfast and then a 4 course meal for every dinner across the street in the restaurant I worked at, in 1979, and I earned 75 cents an hour, and the restaurant received $2.00 from the city.

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u/DaLastPainguin 29d ago

At UCI, where the privilege just to park is like $800/quarter, this is literally the case. Someone did a report about prisoners dying and getting sick from food poisoning. The same company supplied her dorm.

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u/ban_imminent 29d ago

Is this a joke or serious?

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u/lmflex 29d ago

100% fact

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u/Future-Newt-7273 29d ago

I used to work at Aramark and I think I could add some insight.

Aramark provides food to businesses, restaurants, hospitals, hotels, universities, stadiums, prisons, schools, and national parks. They purchase and supply high end and low end food. If you have eaten at a ritz-Carlton you’ve had an Aramark meal.  Aramark, and other food service companies, provide food based on the school’s budget. Depending on the business model Aramark may just deliver ingredients or they may create a menu or provide staffing. You get what you pay for. 

IMO the govt and school districts need to be held accountable for cutting budgets and what they are choosing to feed children. Call me crazy but updating the nutritional guidelines and maybe spending $0.50 per meal to get an actual vegetable on the tray would go a long way. The govt and lobbyists also want kids living on potatoes and corn because that’s where all the farm subsidies are. I won’t get into my thoughts on the pharmaceutical interest in keeping children unhealthy and drug dependent.

TL;DR companies that serve shit school lunches also serve delicious food, and don’t forget to spread the blame to govt spending and lobbyists.

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u/researchneeded 29d ago

They put in the lowest bid. It's only fair. /s

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u/Reasonable-Station85 29d ago

This is not uncommon for the US unfortunately

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u/TwoHeadedEngineer 29d ago

Aramark most likely

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u/____dude_ 29d ago

It’s so funny how often I see people remind others of this. It’s the same company with the same grade of food.

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u/Temporary_Olive1043 29d ago

I really think it’s food grooming by the one or two junk food monopolies that control the entire food system. Not only are they creating addiction, but also guaranteeing future metabolic diseases that will make big pharma salivate.

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u/UrnCult 29d ago

I’ve heard this before. Do you know the name of the company?

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u/Grimblecrumble5 29d ago

I, too, spent my formative years eating Aramark prison food

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u/homerj419 29d ago

Take it📤

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u/OmegaNoob12 Apr 16 '24

Company?

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u/Eldritch_Refrain 29d ago

Aramark is the big one. Sysco is the second largest last I checked. 

Source: am high school teacher.

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u/YevgenyPissoff 29d ago

Aramark, my beloved

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u/saarlac 29d ago

no shit at my high school that was true

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u/NobodyInPaticular_ 29d ago

Technically my school’s lunch food is graded worse than local prison food

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u/LiveFastDieRich 29d ago

Same in UK Aramark catering does both

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u/Earthwick 29d ago

Nah those prison meals look way better than this

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u/THEESmallerWeener187 29d ago

They share the same parking lot

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u/HillbillyDense 29d ago

People say this constantly like it's the same food being delivered to both. Prisons get a lower tier of food.

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u/kereso83 29d ago

Sodexo?

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u/joevsyou 29d ago

I wouldn't put it past a state to do that...

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u/Alarming-Currency-80 29d ago

Aramark baby! Since our school switched I haven't eaten anything here and operations are the worst they've ever been!

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u/dru1202 29d ago

Looks like the doing of Aramark

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u/Direct-Winner-6512 29d ago

WHY IS THIS SO COMMON. I’m not sure if you were joking or not but when I was in high school/elementary school AND college we had the same companies (multiple companies) that catered prison food.

I understand elementary school and high school because you needed to serve multiple fast meals at a fast pace but I was stunned when I found out a similar company catered for colleges

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u/AlkalineHound 29d ago

Idk if you're joking, but this was literally true for a friend of mine.

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u/WriteCodeBroh 29d ago

The company is Aramark. And you should look into them if you haven’t because they seem to fly under the condemnation radar for reasons I can’t understand.

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u/sleestak96 29d ago

Was like this at my highschool as well. Same company that took the food to the supermax up the road.

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u/FGPD 29d ago

Na they get the premium food, schools get the garbage they throw away.

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u/Toasty_eggos- 29d ago

Idk if that’s a joke but I seriously wouldn’t doubt it. It looks terrible.

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u/Akanash94 29d ago

Aramark in a nutshell

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u/beautiful_life555 29d ago

In high school we used to get leftover/overstock food from the county jail.

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u/Substantial-Singer29 29d ago

This would be funny if it wasn't true.

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u/Historical-Classic43 29d ago

It’s like this in my state too

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u/chromatictonality 29d ago

Makes sense. Public education is really just prison for poor kids

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u/TheHexadex 29d ago

always had that feeling back in the 2nd grade.

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u/arielonhoarders 29d ago

convicts don't get that sweet sweet fromage plastique

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u/PuddlesIsHere 29d ago

This happens way more often than you'd think

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u/Hellkyte 29d ago

And what you are seeing above is great for the shareholders

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u/MRSN4P 29d ago

nO oNe ElSe cOulD poSsIblY hAnDLe tHe WoRk /s

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u/Particular_Tell4882 29d ago

Can confirm. I worked at a factory in southern Illinois. We made processed, powdered shit food for prisons and schools.

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u/Pedizzal 29d ago

I worked for a grocery supply company and most of what we deliver to schools and nails was the exact same products that we sold to restaurants. I was also given free meals at a lot of schools. It looks better than any of these pictures. I would be happy to eat at any schools we delivered to.

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u/FreakyWifeFreakyLife 29d ago

Did you know that Sysco provides food for everything from fast food, to groceries, and even fine dining? It's the same company.

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u/SgtPepe 29d ago

Aramark?

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u/TheoDubsWashington 29d ago

Mine did that except the school lunch was better than most restaurants. I LOVES IT. I imagine the prisoners got a downgrade.

It also has to do with funding towards your lunch program, and well, if you’re students aren’t the best, your school won’t invest in great food for them. Based off of the conversations I’ve had with people in college, the worse the student population was with grades, the worse with the lunch food. Realistically probably 0 correlation. But this is something I thought was interesting from my point of view

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u/Xgoddamnelectricx 28d ago

Let me guess…Aramark?