How Can We Fix The "Food Insecurity" Problem in the US?

Over the last year or so, I've been interested in learning more about food and what is really a healthy diet, why are some foods or food additives bad, the different types of diets to lose weight and how they work, etc.  And it has gotten me interested in learning more about the food we eat in general in the US - particularly GMO food and processed foods, and why they are bad for us.

And with my general interest in food and learning more about it, I just watched a documentary called "A Place At The Table" that has me wondering... how can we fix the food insecurity problem in the US?

Now first of all, the term "food insecurity" is stupid as far as I'm concerned. It's a polite way of saying there's a lot of people who don't have enough food to eat each day, so they're often living in a state of hunger.

Why? They're hungry because they don't have enough food to satiate their appetite, and the food that they are eating is the wrong kind of food in the first place to keep them healthy and make them feel satisfied after they eat it.

The main problem is that they don't have enough money to buy enough real food (meat, vegetables, fruit and some minimally processed foods) for themselves and their families to eat to satisfy their appetite and keep them healthy. There are millions of people in the US who work jobs (including people who work full-time jobs) who still just don't make enough money to buy enough real food. But they often make too much to qualify for public assistance (food stamps). 

There are millions more who do qualify for public assistance, but the amount they get isn't enough to buy enough real food either.

So they try to make the money they do have for food stretch as far as possible, which means they buy the cheapest food they can, to get the most volume of food possible. That means that most of their food is comprised of cereals, ramen noodles, bread, cheap processed meats, canned soups and spaghettio-type foods, etc. These foods are full of carbohydrates, GMO's, preservatives, additives, artificial flavors, sugars, artificial sweeteners (high fructose corn syrup), and all kinds of other things that aren't good for you!

So not only do they not have enough food to eat, the food they do eat doesn't satisfy their hunger, and it's unhealthy for them as well - getting them closer and closer to obesity, diabetes and heart disease with every bite they take. And that's just the problem on the surface of the issue.

If you go a little deeper into the problem, you'll see that this issue affects quality of life, crime, education, and the economy. When people are hungry on a regular basis, their thoughts tend to focus on how they're going to get their next meal more than just about anything else, because food is one of the basic human needs. And with those thoughts come stress and worry, which lower their quality of life.

When people are hungry, they tend to be more irritable and don't think as clearly as they could or would if they weren't hungry. It doesn't take much of a stretch of the imagination to see that this could cause people to commit more crime. And it should be obviously to every one that kids who are hungry will not be able to pay attention as well in class, or retain what they do learn as well, so their education is impacted in a negative way. And don't even get me started on the quality of school lunches...

Poor focus in class leads to poor grades. Poor grades leads to lower chances at graduating from high school or going to college. That limits the types of jobs a person can get, which limits their income as well. And when too many people are in that bucket of society, there is always someone willing to take a minimum wage job - regardless of how low that minimum wage is. That allows companies to keep paying those low wages. 

Unfortunately, the Fed is still printing money like nobody's business in the meantime which leads to inflation, which leads to higher prices for the same goods, which moves a livable wage further and further away from the minimum wage, which leads to all kinds of other problems - one of which is not being able to afford enough real food to eat on a regular basis.

So how can we fix this problem? I've heard multiple ideas...

• Raise the minimum wage
• Increase the amount of public assistance available to low-income people
• Let charitable organizations make up for the difference (food banks in particular)
• Teach food 
• Encourage community gardens
• Improve school lunch quality
• Etc.

Each of these may help, but not enough - and each of them have problems too. So I wonder how it could be fixed... I honestly don't know. It seems simple, but I think it's a pretty complicated issue.