My friend @grimalkina introduced me to the "hamburger test" as an outcome baseline for education policy interventions. In short, whatever elaborate scheme you're planning, if the outcome isn't going to be more cost effective dollar for dollar than feeding that kid a hamburger, then feed that kid a hamburger instead.
It turns out that sets a _very_ high bar, because the societal return on an investment of "make sure children don't go hungry" actually incredible.
Holy shit! Free school lunches!!
Friends, I can't begin to tell you how important this is from the perspective of a former teacher. There's nothing as heartbreaking as the piles of kids who come back to school hungry every day.
And with allergies, it's so much harder for parents to come up with affordable packed lunches day after day (peanut butter is the cheapest source of protein). This is a game changer for so many parents all across the city. I hope it goes through.
https://www.ctvnews.ca/toronto/gta-elections-2026/article/chow-promises-to-provide-school-lunches-to-all-toronto-students/
I wonder if anyone's done any analysis of means-testing as some sort of threshold determinant, also. As in, if some means tested social intervention didn't quite succeed, would it have succeeded if the money spent on the means-testing process have gone to doing the actual thing?