Inflation Deepens Food Insecurity for Military Families – By Elizabeth Howe (Defense One) / Nov 22 2021
SecDef Austin rolls out tools for leaders, orders up plan to fix the problem.
Once again, the Pentagon is flying 175 tons of holiday food to troops deployed around the world. But that doesn’t help the military families who are seeing the cost of Thanksgiving dinner rise at their local commissaries and grocery stores.
“The pandemic and tight housing markets across the country have made financial struggles even tougher,” Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said of military families during a Pentagon briefing on Nov. 17. “With the holidays approaching, I know that this is on the minds of our military communities. And it’s certainly top of mind for me.”
Overall, the Farm Bureau’s calculations show that a Thanksgiving meal for ten costs around 14 percent more than it did in 2020. The cost of turkey alone increased around 24 percent per pound. The increase has put significant strain on military families.
“Our men and women in uniform and their families have enough to worry about. Basic necessities, like food and housing, shouldn’t be among them,” Austin said last week.
