The Best of al Ja-Reuters

Jane Galt sticks it to Reuters...again. Man, it's like shooting ducks in a barrell.

This article in Reuters, provocatively titled "In U.S., So Many Obese, So Many Hungry" says that "In a nation where obesity is the second-leading cause of death, 33 million Americans don't know where their next meal is coming from -- a year-round paradox that only becomes more pronounced during the holidays."

This number makes no sense.

It makes no sense because 33 million people is more than 10% of the US population. Yet only 12.5% of the US population is below the poverty line, even with the recession-driven spike of recent years.

It especially makes no sense because those living below the poverty line have much higher incidence of obesity than those living above it. Either the remaining 2.4% of the population that is poor but isn't "food insecure" (the USDA figure they're using) is really whomping the hell out of those averages, or a lot of people who don't know where their next meal is coming from are managing to run into it anyway.

As it happens, the definition of "food insecurity" is rather more tame than "don't know where their next meal is coming from", as this article from the USDA makes clear:

"Food insecure" means being uncertain of having, or being able to acquire, enough food to meet basic needs because of lack of money or other resources. . . on a typical day, the prevalence of food insecurity with hunger is only about 13 to 18 percent of the annual rate. For example, in 1998 people in 3.7% of households were hungry at some point in the year because of inadequate resources."

Note the introduction of "food insecurity with hunger", a different, smaller category from "food insecurity". That is the actual number we should be looking at, and it is about 1/3 of the number Reuters gives us.