Take what you need

[micky]

[Arlen Holder]

Hi micky,

Would you kindly stop posting your infantile politics to the repair ng?

[micky]

You ddin't even look, did you. It wasn't politics. It was home repair.

STOP TROLLING. It makes you look like a hyprocrite.

[Jim Joyce]

I've been toying with the idea of building an enclosure like that and putting canned goods inside, such as soup and veggies, maybe some Ramen noodles, etc. I'd add a sign that says, "Take what you need, give what you can". My neighborhood is fairly small, only about 90 houses, so I'm not sure there's a real need here. Down in the city, though, my wife volunteers at a Catholic church where they hand out free meals to needy people. She says there's a steady stream of people, from opening to closing time, so at least down there they have a need.

[micky]

What a coincidence. I've been buying Cup Noodles, but I mistook the wrapper for 6 and when I opened it yesterday, I ended up with 12 Ramen noodles in cellophane. I ate one but didn't like it as much and I was trying to figure out where I could get rid of the other 11.

It's hard to give away food. A lot of people feel insulted to take it, even though we all eat food, and they're doing me a favor. Maybe some feel, If you don't like it, why would I? but I think that's less common than being insulted, or if not exactly that, not wanting to look, I don't know, poor? by taking it.

That sounds like the right place.

People who send food to hurricane zones, etc. and expect it to get shipped are aiui doing no favors, when what they really need is money to buy food that is already there.

[Dean Hoffman]

I couldn't find it online. There was a tv clip showing refrigerators set up in a city with the same idea. People were supposed to take what they needed but leave stuff from their own supplies they didn't need for the next person.

[Jim Joyce]

I have to disagree. Under the right circumstances, it's way too easy to give away food. Food insecurity is a huge problem in this country. When I lived in San Antonio, they did a local TV piece about a couple of neighborhoods where people put canned goods out by the sidewalk, in one of those cabinet things. At first, they said the food simply disappeared overnight, but over time it became a case where random people were putting food back into the box, so it mostly sustained itself and they only occasionally had to replenish it. One of those neighborhoods was just across the valley from my house.

In my neighborhood, someone put a cabinet on a picnic table in the picnic area of our development. He initially stocked it with children's books, but it quickly grew to have any kind of books and some magazines. People figured out the concept really quickly. You can take books or you can bring books, or you can do both. Every week or two the titles completely turned over.

It depends on the specific situation. If a major storm wipes out most of the local food and supplies, authorities will sometimes ask for donations of food and supplies versus cash.

[micky]

My examples come from going door to door in my n'hood. So I meant giving it to people who were not hungry, but are as likely as anyone to enjoy the food I wanted to give them. It's hard to give them food. I don't try anymore.

I am friends with one family where they seem to be happy to take food I've bought by mistake, even once when it was open, a half gallon of non-alcoholic sangria. Lots of people like sangria and I thought I'd give it another try, but I still don't.

I know.

That's very good. Maybe the difference was that they didn't have to talk to anyone face to face.

A valley can make a big difference. One block can make a big difference.

Books are different. I've seen a couple of those book things in Baltimore and more elsewhere.

I haven't notice that, maybe because I'm too far from most hurricanes, but I'm sure you're right.

[Clare Snyder]

That depends a LOT on circumstances. If for instance a small or island nation is hit HARD by a hurricane, there is often nothing available to buy locally. WHether food or supplies of other types. In these cases "material aid" is pretty much required. If the disaster is localized, and particularly long term, material aid can often cause more problems by eliminating the market for locally produced/available goods.

My daughter is very heavily and deeply involved in foreighn aid and international development and the dumping of (particularly inappeopriate) food and used clothing into African countries with agricultural and textile industries often causes economic disaster.

[micky]

The link above? It's still there.

Giving away nothing but 10mm sockets, regular and deep. There are 29 of them, 10 deep ones!

[micky]

I myself know no examples of this, but food companies get a tax deduction for donating food, maybe if a food doesn't sell well and they decide to stop making it. The IRS doesn't know if it caused economic trouble in the country where it was donated, and even if someone told them, the food company would say that's not an exception and it would take a court case to try to show that donating food to people whose income is below $nnnn is not deductable just becaue it damages the agricultural sector.