Even worse - it's sold to the lowest bidder so they can sell it back to you for profit. This is a perfect example of why GDP isn't a good measure for how well a country is doing - if the kids do it themselves they may learn a bunch and enjoy it and make their lives better, but it doesn't create jobs or profit, so the incentives are against it.

It wasn't just sold to the lowest bidder, the subsidized lunch program is specifically not to subsidize the kids, but to bail out farmers growing crap nobody wants.

when your tax money helps hungry children that's socialism and that's evil. when it helps agricultural conglomerates, otoh...

In our case, sold to the bidder who gave kickbacks to the district supervisor.

we had pepsi machines in my middle school because the pepsi distributor in town "donated" a new score board.

Selling to the lowest bidder isn't necessarily bad if the requirements are set correctly.

Look at what the grown-ups are eating…