Klar: Universal school meals cost too much

A recent Vermont Joint Fiscal Office 2023 Report on Possible Revenue Sources for Universal School Meals affirms that costs for universal lunches will increase for the expanded provision of meals to students ineligible for federal meal subsidies. It increases the projected costs of the program from $27.2 million for 2023 to as much as $31 million for 2024, and outlines a number of legislative options to consider as funding sources, including new sales taxes on “pre-written software accessed remotely,” sugar taxes on candy or beverages, and an expansion of existing sales taxes.

Vermont Agency of Education

Vermont is rushing toward the creation of a permanent universal student meals program that will cost taxpayers an estimated $31 million annually.

The magnitude of the economic burden posed by this program is displayed by the size of permanent new taxes being considered. As the report indicates, if new sales or other tax revenues are not generated to cover the now $31 million annual price tag, this money will come directly from property taxes through the Education Fund.

For decades the federal government has conditioned reduced-cost or free lunches on income eligibility. Vermont’s universal lunch proposal, and almost all of its costs, will primarily provide free breakfasts and lunches (including during the summer) to wealthier Vermonters who are ineligible for federal support. This is a regressive spending plan even before regressive funding structures are weighed. This plan allocates tax dollars not to indigent Vermonters who need a hand up, but to well-to-do elitists who don’t need a free lunch.

Vermont’s Legislature must carefully consider the content of the studies it statutorily commanded be prepared to address the high costs of this program. The Jan. 16, 2022 Legislative Report explains that Vermont must pay the cost of ineligible lunches, and warns of the potential rising cost of this provision. It also cautions that accurate reporting of eligibility is imperative to obtain federal funding in areas beyond meals:

Decreases in return rates on school meals applications and Household Income Forms impact educational programming as well, since along with direct certification through SNAP and TANF participation, these constitute the currently available metric for determining student poverty.

The Feb. 1, 2023 Report acknowledges these threats, but chiefly focuses on how this $31 million cash flow could be procured to provide food benefits to those who don’t currently qualify for them. The report explains that this increase will fall fully on real property taxes absent alternative funding, and presents a table (Potential Universal School Meals Funding Options) listing possible annual tax revenue proceeds from various non-property tax resources. The options presented are: taxes on sugar-sweetened beverages, at either $0.01 per ounce ($17.3 million FY 2024) or $0.02 per ounce ($31.7 million); tax candy at 6% ($3.7 million annually); apply sales taxes to Prewritten Software Accessed Remotely ($18.4 million); or increase the existing Sales & Use Tax above 6% (raising revenue of $9.1 million for every 0.1% increase).

It is dubious to expand free meals to non-needy Vermonters at an expense of $30 million annually. It is equally iffy to tax sugar in either candy or beverage form (or powdered — the rule would apply to lemonade and other mixes) when the federal government subsidizes high fructose corn syrup.

This strange path of sugar money is seen in Vermont’s universal meals system — taxpayer money will be used to buy processed foods subsidized by the federal government that include unhealthy fats and sugars. Perhaps there is some perverse equity/revenge logic in sickening wealthy Vermont children with diabetes, obesity, and cancer using subsidized industrial dining. Raising taxes on sugary foods through either a candy or sweetened beverage tax would financially burden the low income Vermonters who are being used as pawns to justify this massive industrial food bureaucracy.

It should be noted that the universal meals legislation requires that schools source 15% or more food locally. If the entire $31 million were invested in sourcing food locally, there would indeed be economic benefits as well as improved health outcomes. But that is not what is being proposed: the majority of the Vermont Education Fund increases implemented to support universal lunches will flow out-of-state to pay for high-calorie processed foods trucked from far away.

The Joint Fiscal Office Report responds concisely to the Legislature’s request to provide alternative new paths for more tax revenue. Summarizing various sales tax revenue sources, the report discusses “Other Expansion of the Sales and Use Tax”:

The largest exemptions are for groceries, medical products, energy purchases for a residence, and clothing and footwear. These four exemptions alone account for an estimated $270.8 million in forgone revenue in FY 2024. These items are exempted to make the Sales and Use tax less regressive. Changing the exemptions for consumer staple items like those mentioned above would make the Sales and Use tax more regressive in Vermont.

Yet allowing this new $30 million annual tax to fall onto property taxes (on top of other likely increases) is every bit as regressive as a sales tax on groceries, clothing, or energy purchases for a residence. It is just a question of which poor pocket the money is extracted from to provide to corporations to feed dubious food to those who don’t qualify based on need.

John Klar is an attorney and farmer residing in Brookfield. © Copyright True North Reports 2023. All rights reserved.

Images courtesy of U.S. Department of Agriculture and Vermont Agency of Education

7 thoughts on “Klar: Universal school meals cost too much

  1. So, it’s not worthwhile to have children properly fueled for maximum scholastic effort? Illustrator William Hogarth showed the advantage to society in Georgian England of using gin, cheaper and more available to the masses than the usual carbs, fats and proteins. Let’s really reduce the cost of investment in America by providing school kids with that same caloric fuel.

  2. Why do the proponents think this is necessary, and why should people on a fixed income be paying for it?

    • Ed, 40% of school kids prepare their own breakfasts. For students not to nod off before lunchtime, glucose levels need to be at a maximally efficient level. Simple sugars kick in almost immediate, get used up first. Complex sugars take longer to get converted to glucose and pick up when the simple sugars have bee used up. Fats take even longer to convert, so kick in when the conversion to glucose of the complex sugars has faded out.

      Kids who prepare their own breakfasts rarely know or act on this. The result is a bunch of kids whose glucose levels have dropped even before the bus has gotten to school. If you’ve ever been a teacher, you’ve suffered those results in the classroom. That’s why this program is necessary.

      A couple of solutions are to either pay workers better so at least one knowledgable parent can be home to make breakfasts for the kids, or to have school breakfasts and lunches provide a proper mix of carbohydrates, fats and proteins.

      Since the first option is the more unlikely, the second represents a sound investment in the future of America. And that means investors– in this case, taxpayers– are needed. There is no need to argue about them being people on a fixed income; there is a need instead to argue why the 0.01% of the population who get, say, 10.0% of the aggregate national income ought to pay for it.

      • But the industrial food they provide is making kids fat and unhealthy. Gin would arguably be better. And the socialism angle is weak — low income kids already get these unhealthy meals — why should the middle class (and low income Vermonters on fixed incomes) fund meals for rich families? Oh, because 40% of them make their own lunches? It’s a vicious cycle of using failure to justify even greater failure…..

  3. How about a little common sense ? An example……When I was a youth in the good old days,
    here is the story……Students brought their lunch to school. Even in elementary school, I made my lunch to bring to school. Lunch consisted of a sandwich (maybe peanut butter and jelly, or a slice of ham and a piece of cheese). Also an apple or a cookie might be added. Then I’d put my lunch into
    my lunch box and I was ready to get to school where students could purchase a half pint of milk for
    five cents. This process was great because I learned to become self sufficient, and I knew that I
    would enjoy my lunch. Thankfully, my parents taught me work ethic and personal responsibility. That was an important gift for the rest of my life. And, student lunches were not a burden on taxpayers !

  4. Let’s all be real. Children that need the free lunch should get it, all others can pay. This program
    is nothing more than another source of funding for the educational system. This program takes
    away parents’ responsibility to provide for their child. This program is one more step toward state
    government taking over for the parents. What’s next.. 4 year olds in the schools in order to keep up the student population numbers in order to keep up with the extreme education costs in Vermont? Wait..
    oh yeah they are working on that as well. We owe Vermonters better than another handout.

    • Another part of this problem is that these parents are being trained not only be dependent but also look to the government for their answers. By doing this, you are training them to become Democrat Voters that then vote for ‘the free stuff’.

      What I see here is a business opportunity and opportunity to learn and do.
      Someone could start a non-profit to take this on.
      The school PTAs could have a fund raiser to raise the amount needed to cover the numbers of free lunches needed.
      Local restaurants could take this on in exchange for a tax break or something.
      There are many answers here to solve this in the private sector within the communities.
      People need to work together and figure out how come up with answers for these things on their own instead of going to the government looking for hand outs and free lunches..

      The creation of helpless, dependent people has a lot to do with why this is a problem..
      Times are going to get really hard- people better learn to stand on their own two feet and build tight knit communities around themselves because they’ll need it.
      It’s a security risk to have a state full of parents that can’t even figure out how to get their own kids fed.
      Yes, lets get real and how about growing up too.

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