By Bart J. Allen

With the buzz over health care recently, it seemed like a good time to revisit a few of the basic truths behind the way we take care of each other in this country. I’ll just stick with one aspect related to our children, since their voice is usually drowned out in the fray, if even existent at all. Those that are paying attention know that children make up a significant portion of those impoverished and lacking health care in the USA.

I worked for many years in the food additive industry, specifically producing vitamin mixtures added to food, principally grain based. Look at the panel on the side of your bread, bagel, tortilla, or anything else made with flour. That’s what I did. The government requires it, mostly so we stay healthy enough to defend ourselves, an issue during WWII. In stark terms, the government saw vitamin fortification as a good investment, with the profit being the ability to defend ourselves.

Additionally, vitamins are also added to nearly all animal feed. The reason we do this is because, ultimately, the animal is being raised for profit. The incentive to make the animal as healthy and strong as can be is because those attributes will, ultimately, be rewarded in the market place.

Interestingly, those same incentives aren’t true for our nation of children. Most Americans don’t seem to want to be aware that among westernized nations, we’re ranked at the bottom in how we take care of our youngest, most vulnerable citizens. It’s been that way for a long time, and getting worse. It’s no secret.

In this political season, I hear the term capitalism bandied about. Make no mistake – I’m a huge fan of capitalism. I would suggest, however, that the term “profit” might need to be fine tuned for the sake of our children and our future as a country. What’s truly sad is that we all, to a person, know that raising our children, the next generation, is probably the only truly important, worthwhile job we have on this earth.

Somehow, we need to figure out how to make taking care of our nation’s children a profitable venture. You know, go green with our kids. Most green technologies have long been considered unprofitable, until the meaning of profit was modified to account for the new, long-term priorities of our country. Surely, our children are just as important.

Currently, the fact of the matter is that there isn’t as much “profit” in investing in our next generation as there is in raising farm animals. I, personally, would love to live in a nation where I could invest in a healthy bunch of humans, other than my children, and reap the same rewards in the marketplace of life as I can with a pen full of hogs and chickens. Call me a dreamer.

 

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