GorillaOffTopic, Everything But Gorilla Trades

Many parents gripe about the price of school lunches during the year, as well they should. Costs can be high, especially if your kids are in high school. Lunch prices can often exceed $3 per day, depending on what your kids choose to eat. But hold on to your wallets parents- the news gets much worse!  The economy is being pummeled in many areas; i:e, gas prices and soaring food costs. Unfortunately, it has now filtered into your kids’ schools, via their lunch costs. It is projected that next fall, school cafeterias everywhere will be feeling the pain of higher food costs and the result will be 50% more or approximate 5-20 cents more per item for your kids. Man, that’s a painful lesson in economics that your kids will be learning!  The sad thing is, while milk has gone up 12%, cheese 15%, and bread by 17%, sadly, the National School Lunch Program has increased what it pays local school districts to feed 30.1 million schoolchildren by only 3%. Pricier ingredients are only part of the reason. Erik Peterson, a spokesman for the School Nutrition Association says that the federal subsidy simply hasn’t kept up with rising food costs, with rising labor costs, fuel costs, and benefits costs- even at $8.5 billion per year. It is simple to calculate the losses. About roughly half of schoolchildren receive free lunches and the bare minimum cost to prepare it is about $2.66 per meal. Since the federal subsidy is only $2.47 per meal, that is a loss of 15 cents on every one of the 15 million lunches served. Since the law requires the programs to be self sustaining, the costs must obviously be recouped somehow, thus the raised prices for next school year. 

In Brevard County, Florida, for example, breakfasts are expected to cost roughly 50% more and lunches will be about 35% more. Luckily, most price increases won”t be that extreme, but school officials from across the county say they will have to charge more. So parents, next year when your kids tell you they need four dollars for lunch, chances are, they are not upping the price so they can pocket the rest; a little trick a young Gorilla used to pull with his parents. Much like driving a Kia Rio may come into high style due to higher gas prices, the return of the brown bag lunch may become all the rage again for those kids in high school. Desperate measures? Perhaps so!