Hunger Rates Cost America $167.5-Billion, Study Finds
October 7, 2011 | Read Time: 1 minute
A new Brandeis University report estimates that the recession-fueled rise in hunger across America cost the U.S. economy $167.5-billion last year, Bloomberg writes.
A 30-percent increase since 2007 in the number of Americans who can’t afford sufficient food nearly doubled the economic impact of hunger in that time, as measured in lost productivity, poor education, and higher health-care costs, according to the study by Donald Shepard, a professor at Brandeis University.
The growth of hunger since his last such study three years ago “demonstrates the breadth of suffering associated with this recession,” Mr. Shepard said in an online statement. “All Americans bear a part of these costs.”
Florida, California, and Maryland saw the biggest jumps, with their hunger bills rising 62, percent, 47 percent, and 44 percent, respectively, since 2007, according to the Brandeis researchers.
