The hunger-relief advocates at Bread for the World wanted to quantify the cost of hunger to the U.S. economy, and they did: $160 billion. Every year.
And the biggest share of that cost was related to mental health, to the depression, anxiety, and toxic stress that arise from severe financial difficulty. That cost is born by children raised in food-insecure homes, by the parents who struggle to feed them, and by seniors whose fixed incomes leave them short on food month after month.
Read more about the mental health costs of hunger.