History of free-market food distribution and nutrition...

Economics Economics Questions
1

So someone just sent me this message to my Youtube account inbox:

"The food distribution market in the U.S., when it WAS completely free market, was as bad as our present free market health care delivery system. As undeniable proof of that statement, check out what happened to ONE-FIFTH of the men who showed up for induction into the military during World War Two – they were rejected due to NUTRITION deficiencies. This at a time when the military was taking anyone who could hold a rifle. It was THAT reason – the lack of people able to fight a war – that caused governmental intervention into food distribution. The fact that people were badly fed had almost nothing to do with it.

Over the decades, as the depths of hunger and malnutrition in the U.S. became more clear, government’s role in the distribution of food has (praise be to God!) increased, meaning fewer and fewer people are left vulnerable to malnutrition."

It kind of caught me off-guard. How should I respond?

2

So, the people who showed up during the second World War, which was going on during the Great Depression? Seriously? ABCT.

As to current free market healthcare - government spending accounts for half of healthcare spending.

3

WWII was 10 years into the Great Depression. Challenge him to lay out what some of FDR’s policies were, in regards to food and farming, during those 10 years. Make sure he includes specific dates. Then ask him to explain what criteria he uses to classify “free market.” For example, the Agricultural Adjustment Administration was created in 1933. Just when exactly did the government start recruiting for the military? Bottom line, his history is screwed up, and there were massive interventions into the markets years before WWII.