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This is THE INDICATOR FROM PLANET MONEY. I'm Darian Woods.
这里是THE INDICATOR FROM PLANET MONEY。我是Darian Woods。
And I'm Wailin Wong. Darian, if you couldn't already tell from the smell of sharpened No. 2 pencils in the air, it's back to school season. I was wondering what that smell was.
我是Wailin Wong。Darian，如果你还不能从空气中飘来的2号削尖铅笔的味道中看出，现在又到了开学季。我在想那是什么味道。
And one aspect of U.S. educational policy has become a particular flashpoint in the presidential election cycle - school meals and which students should get to eat for free.
美国教育政策的一个方面已成为总统选举周期中的一个特别焦点——学生餐以及哪些学生应该免费就餐。
Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz made school meals free as governor of Minnesota. He touted this policy in his speech last week at the Democratic National Convention.
民主党副总统候选人蒂姆·沃尔兹在担任明尼苏达州州长期间免费提供学生餐。他在上周民主党全国代表大会的演讲中大力宣传了这项政策。
So while other states were banning books from their schools, we were banishing hunger from ours.
当其他州禁止在学校里放书时，我们却在消除饥饿。
Meanwhile, a group of House Republicans wants to get rid of an Obama-era program that allows universal access to free meals in low-income school districts.
与此同时，一群共和党众议员希望废除奥巴马时代一项允许低收入学区普遍享受免费餐食的计划。
So school meals are political, to say the least. But you can't really dig into school meals without a big serving of our favorite topic - economics.
因此，学生餐至少可以说是政治性的。但是，如果你不谈论我们最喜欢的话题——经济学，你就无法真正深入研究学生餐。
It's a school food fight at the government policy level. Today on the show, we explore an important question at the heart of the economic debate about feeding students. What helps low-income children more, paying just for their meals or paying for everyone's meals?
这是一场政府政策层面的学生餐之争。今天在节目中，我们探讨了关于学生餐的经济辩论的核心问题。什么对低收入儿童更有帮助，只支付他们的餐费还是支付所有人的餐费？
Feeding public school students in the U.S. is a huge undertaking. Almost 5 billion lunches were served last year, so that's a lot of tacos and fruit cups.
为美国公立学校的学生提供餐食是一项艰巨的任务。去年，学校提供了近50亿份午餐，有很多玉米饼和水果杯。
Marcus Weaver-Hightower is a professor at Virginia Tech. He's also the author of the book "Unpacking School Lunch: Understanding The Hidden Politics Of School Food."
Marcus Weaver-Hightower是弗吉尼亚理工大学的教授。他也是Unpacking School Lunch: Understanding The Hidden Politics Of School Food一书的作者。
As I am an education policy person, I kind of was looking around for what I thought would be the most complex thing I could find about schools, and it happens to be school meals.
作为一名教育政策人员，我一直在寻找我认为最复杂的学校问题，而这恰好就是学生餐。
Marcus says cafeterias operate kind of like their own businesses within schools, and a crucial part of their funding comes from the federal government in the form of reimbursements.
Marcus说，食堂的运营方式有点像学校内部的自营业务，其资金中很重要的一部分来自联邦政府的报销。
The basic mechanism for how the school lunch program works - kid comes. They get a tray of food. Cashier rings it up.
学校午餐计划的基本运作机制是孩子得到一盘食物。收银员结账。
And then he says the government pays for either the whole meal or part of it. This depends on whether the student pays full price, reduced price or gets the meal for free.
然后他说政府会支付全部餐费或部分餐费。这取决于学生是支付全价、减价还是免费用餐。
In terms of eligibility, a family of four on a little over $40,000 a year or less qualifies for free lunch, and a reduced lunch is for families earning just over $57,000 a year or less.
一个年收入略高于40000美元或以下的四口之家有资格享受免费午餐，而减价午餐适用于年收入略高于57000美元或更少的家庭。
Now, here's a number that gives you a sense of how many children rely on a subsidized meal. Last year, 71% of lunches served were free or reduced.
现在，这里有一个数字，可以让您了解有多少儿童依赖补贴餐。去年，71%的午餐是免费或减价的。
Yeah. I think a lot of people would be surprised by that statistic. And as we just said, the government reimburses all meals to some extent. Marcus says this adds up to a sizable price tag, and to make meals universal would require even more resources.
我想很多人会对这个统计数据感到惊讶。正如我们刚才所说，政府会在一定程度上报销所有餐费。Marcus说，这加起来是一个相当大的价格标签，而要使餐食普及化，则需要更多的资源。
It's not a cheap program to feed kids in schools. I think currently, it's at about $21 billion. I did some sort of back-of-the-envelope calculating, and I think that, you know, to do universally free school meals for all kids would cost about double that.
这一学生餐方案花费高昂。我认为目前大约需要210亿美元。我做了一些粗略的计算，我认为为所有孩子提供普遍免费的学生餐将花费大约两倍。
So Marcus says the meals are good value for families. Even when they're paying full price at the register, lunch typically costs just three bucks out of pocket.
所以Marcus说这些餐食对家庭来说很划算。即使他们在收银台支付全价，午餐通常也只需自掏腰包3美元。
Now, as a public school parent, I will say I've looked askance at some of the food that gets served sometimes.
现在，作为一名公立学校的家长，我会说我有时会怀疑一些提供的食物。
The meals do have to meet certain nutritional standards to qualify for reimbursement, and there's been debate over things like, does the tomato sauce on pizza count as a vegetable?
这些餐食确实必须符合某些营养标准才有资格获得报销，而且人们一直在争论一些问题，比如披萨上的番茄酱算不算蔬菜？
It's a fruit. A minor detail, Darian. Marcus says the food is generally considered healthy.
它是一种水果。Darian，这是一个小细节。Marcus说这种食物通常被认为是健康的。
Recent research has shown that in terms of nutrition, it's one of the best meals that you can get outside of your house. And, you know, where are you going to get a meal anywhere else that's going to cost you $3 that's going to be that nutritious?
最近的研究表明，从营养角度来看，它是你在外面能吃到的最好的食物之一。你还能在哪里花3美元就能吃到如此营养的饭菜呢？
In some areas, the price is even lower. Rebecca Wood (ph) lives near Boston and is a mother to a sixth grader. When her daughter was younger and in elementary school, lunch cost $2.50.
在一些地区，价格甚至更低。Rebecca Wood住在波士顿附近，是一名六年级学生的母亲。当她的女儿还小，还在上小学的时候，午餐要花2.5美元。
I don't think I could create a well-balanced meal to send with her for $2.50. I was talking with the vice principal. She mentioned Charlie (ph) always ate her vegetables. Charlie's my daughter.
我认为我无法以2.5美元的价格为她准备一份营养均衡的餐食。我和副校长谈过。她提到Charlie总是吃蔬菜。Charlie是我的女儿。
That's what every parent wants to hear. Right. And so they were serving her all of these foods that I think maybe if I served her at home, she wouldn't be interested in.
这是每个家长都想听到的。对。所以他们给她端上了所有这些食物，我想如果我在家里端给她吃，她可能不感兴趣。
But because she was eating them with her friends and it came from other trusted adults, she dug in.
但因为她和朋友一起吃，而且是其他值得信赖的成年人送来的，所以她吃得津津有味。
So even though Rebecca was happy that Charlie was getting a healthy, inexpensive lunch at school, meals were a source of stress for their family.
尽管Rebecca很高兴Charlie在学校吃到了健康、便宜的午餐，但饭菜还是让他们的家庭感到压力。
Rebecca's income was too high to qualify for free or reduced lunch. And at the same time, she was a single parent grappling with high rent and medical expenses, and sometimes she had school lunch debt.
Rebecca的收入太高，不符合免费或减价午餐的资格。与此同时，她还是一位单亲妈妈，要应付高昂的房租和医疗费用，有时还要承担学校午餐的债务。
I was constantly keeping a count of what I had in the cupboard. How many cans of beans? Did I have a loaf of bread? Would we have enough? Do we have the right things for a growing kid? That type of stuff.
我一直在数着橱柜里的东西。有多少罐豆子？有一条面包吗？我们有足够的食物吗？我们为成长中的孩子准备了合适的食物吗？诸如此类的事情。
Then Rebecca learned about a federal program called the Community Eligibility Provision. It was first rolled out in 2011 during the Obama administration.
然后Rebecca了解到一项名为“社区资格条款”的联邦计划。该计划于2011年奥巴马政府期间首次推出。
Under this policy, if a certain percentage of the student population in a school or district qualifies for free meals, then all kids get free meals.
根据这项政策，如果学校或学区中一定比例的学生有资格享受免费餐，那么所有孩子都可以获得免费餐。
Rebecca realized that her school district met the threshold but didn't participate in the program, so she pushed administrators to sign up - and they did.
Rebecca意识到她所在的学区达到了门槛但没有参与该计划，所以她敦促管理人员报名——他们也报名了。
Later on, she joined up with an anti-hunger organization in Massachusetts called Project Bread to make universal free meals a statewide policy.
后来，她加入了马萨诸塞州一个名为“面包计划”的反饥饿组织，将全民免费餐变成了一项全州政策。
Massachusetts made this a reality last year. It's now one of eight states with universal free school meals. Others include California, Michigan and, of course, Minnesota.
去年，马萨诸塞州将这一政策变为现实。现在有八个州实施全民免费学生餐。其他州包括加利福尼亚州、密歇根州，当然还有明尼苏达州。
For Rebecca, free meals as a statewide policy was a mental and financial relief.
对于Rebecca来说，免费膳食作为一项全州政策是一种精神和经济上的解脱。
When her daughter started attending middle school in a new district, for example, Rebecca didn't have to worry about whether that district would meet the threshold for the Community Eligibility Provision.
例如，当她的女儿开始在一个新学区上中学时，Rebecca不必担心该学区是否符合社区资格条款的门槛。
That little bit of money, as small as it is, having that in my pocket - it gave me breathing room in my budget.
虽然那笔钱不多，但有了它，我的预算就有了喘息的空间。
The Community Eligibility Provision is still around, but a recent budget proposal by a group of House Republicans calls for getting rid of the program.
社区资格条款仍然存在，但众议院共和党人最近提出的预算提案呼吁取消该方案。
In its place, the federal government would give states chunks of money to spend more flexibly on child nutrition programs, and the money would only go to, quote, "truly needy households."
取而代之的是，联邦政府将向各州提供大量资金，以更灵活地用于儿童营养计划，而且这些钱只会流向“真正需要帮助的家庭”。
These lawmakers' objections flow into a larger debate around universal versus targeted policies. We saw a version of this play out around the expanded child tax credit that families received in 2021.
这些立法者的反对意见引发了一场关于全民政策与针对性政策的更大辩论。我们看到了这种情况在2021年家庭获得的扩大儿童税收抵免。
Yeah. Universal programs can come with a high price tag. Remember, Marcus Weaver-Hightower estimates that making free school meals universal would roughly double the cost - over $40 billion.
全民计划的价格可能很高。请记住，Marcus Weaver-Hightower估计，将免费学生餐普及化将使成本增加一倍左右——超过400亿美元。
Some of that money would go to school districts in affluent communities.
其中一些资金将用于富裕社区的学区。
But there is research showing that universal programs have particular benefits for recipients who do need the support. Michelle Marcus is an economist at Vanderbilt University who's studied the economic impact of the Community Eligibility Provision.
但有研究表明，普及计划对确实需要支持的受助者有特殊好处。Michelle Marcus是范德堡大学的经济学家，她研究了社区资格条款的经济影响。
What's interesting here is that some of the poorest households, who we really care about, are, in fact, benefiting from expanding access to everyone in the classroom.
有趣的是，我们真正关心的一些最贫困的家庭实际上正受益于扩大覆盖范围。
According to her study, after the expansion, low-income families were able to spend less on groceries every month, and they saw lower food insecurity.
根据她的研究，扩大覆盖范围后，低收入家庭每月在食品上的支出减少，粮食保障也提高了。
So this suggests that these households, even though they were previously eligible - there were some barriers to access that prevented them from taking up these benefits.
因此，这表明，这些家庭即使以前有资格享受这些福利，也存在一些阻碍他们享受这些福利的障碍。
And these are probably nonmonetary barriers, things like social stigma. And we think those seem to be really important.
这些可能是非货币障碍，比如社会歧视。我们认为这些似乎非常重要。
Michelle says her research suggests that making free meals available to everyone took away those barriers.
Michelle说，她的研究表明，向所有人提供免费餐食可以消除这些障碍。
She is careful to point out, though, that because the Community Eligibility Provision only applies to high-poverty schools, it's not clear what the economic impact would be if a school in a more affluent area offered universal free meals.
不过，她谨慎地指出，由于社区资格条款仅适用于高度贫困学校，因此尚不清楚如果较富裕地区的学校提供全民免费餐食，会产生什么样的经济影响。
OK. Sounds like an opportunity for future economic research in those states that have free lunches. Yeah. Time to sharpen some pencils, Darian.
好的。听起来像是在那些提供免费午餐的州进行未来经济研究的机会。是的。是时候磨砺一下了，Darian。
