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How Meals on Wheels Works · Stuff You Should Know

0:01
Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you should know from house stuff Works
0:04
Speaker 1: dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark.
0:14
Speaker 1: There's Charles w Chuck Bryant's just the two of us.
0:17
Speaker 1: Today we had guest producer Tyler and here for a second.
0:20
Speaker 1: He pressed your cord and left and it's just us.
0:24
Speaker 1: It's cool. One of us needs to get our index
0:28
Speaker 1: finger working so we can do that. Well. Remember we
0:32
Speaker 1: used to say we were going to replace Jerry with
0:34
Speaker 1: one of those dipping birds. Yeah, is that what they're called?
0:37
Speaker 1: Dipping birds? Don't know, I just I just remember my
0:39
Speaker 1: grandmother had one where the bird would dip its beak
0:42
Speaker 1: in the water. All we have to do is arrange
0:46
Speaker 1: it so we can press the space bar. Uh. Well,
0:49
Speaker 1: we should be better than this, Chuck, because this is
0:52
Speaker 1: a very nice, wonderful humane episode. Humane and human even
0:59
Speaker 1: and human and it ties. Yeah, this is one of
1:03
Speaker 1: our what we like to do, a little awareness shows
1:06
Speaker 1: every now and then and meals on wheels, which, by
1:10
Speaker 1: the way, for the past two days in my head,
1:13
Speaker 1: I've been going meals on wheels. What is that? You remember?
1:20
Speaker 1: It may have been a local thing when I was
1:21
Speaker 1: a kid. That was a thing it was called World
1:24
Speaker 1: of Wheels. It was like, I don't know if it
1:26
Speaker 1: was a car show or like one of those monster
1:28
Speaker 1: truck things, but it was. That's what they used to do,
1:32
Speaker 1: is World of Wheels. I got you. That's funny you
1:36
Speaker 1: say that, because I've had my own thing in my head.
1:38
Speaker 1: There was a thrill Kill Cult song that was in
1:42
Speaker 1: the movie Cool World called Sex on Wheels. So I've
1:46
Speaker 1: been going meals on wheels, meals on whales, that's been
1:52
Speaker 1: That's weird though, that we each have just kind of
1:54
Speaker 1: had some weird loop in our heads. Maybe that helps
1:56
Speaker 1: us research maybe and maybe meals on eels And we'll
2:00
Speaker 1: get to the funding part of it at the end.
2:03
Speaker 1: But maybe they would have better chances getting federal funding
2:06
Speaker 1: if they had a cool theme song. Yeah, like by
2:09
Speaker 1: the thrill Kill culture. That would surprise everybody, I think. So.
2:15
Speaker 1: So we are talking meals on wheels today just just
2:18
Speaker 1: to do our do diligence upfront. We just want to
2:23
Speaker 1: tell everybody in case you don't know what that is,
2:25
Speaker 1: but I'm sure most people do. Meals on wheels is
2:29
Speaker 1: a meal delivery program here in the States and Canada, Australia.
2:34
Speaker 1: I think it's all over the place where if you
2:38
Speaker 1: are usually if you're a senior citizen, senior adult not
2:43
Speaker 1: quite sure what they go by these days, and you
2:47
Speaker 1: are homebound basically where you're able to care for yourself
2:51
Speaker 1: in your home, but you're getting up there in years
2:54
Speaker 1: and you haven't um gone into an assistant care facility,
2:58
Speaker 1: but you're still you don't have a out of contact,
3:00
Speaker 1: you might not have family around. What Meals on Wheels
3:03
Speaker 1: does is they bring you a meal once a day,
3:06
Speaker 1: five days a week. She'll lunch and uh say, hey,
3:10
Speaker 1: how are you doing. Feeling good? Good? Okay, well we'll
3:12
Speaker 1: see tomorrow. Enjoy your meal and um. Just that little
3:16
Speaker 1: simple act of doing that, just apparently in research bears
3:21
Speaker 1: this out completely changes the life and and extends the
3:24
Speaker 1: life expectancy of people in that situation. Yeah, and it's
3:28
Speaker 1: not just uh, I mean, we'll get to some of
3:30
Speaker 1: the other things they do. But the main three pronged
3:33
Speaker 1: reason for the home visit is the meal, like you said,
3:37
Speaker 1: the visit, and then the final thing is the safety
3:40
Speaker 1: check component, which is geez, uh, mr muldoon, you have
3:45
Speaker 1: a wire hanging out of your wall. Uh, and it's sparking,
3:49
Speaker 1: So let me see if I can get some help
3:51
Speaker 1: with you, get some help for you on that, sir,
3:54
Speaker 1: right exactly, that that could that could turn bad on
3:57
Speaker 1: you exactly. So there's this there's this whole idea that
4:02
Speaker 1: just by showing up at somebody's house with a meal, um,
4:05
Speaker 1: you can you can just really vastly help improve their lives.
4:09
Speaker 1: And when I think about like meals on wheels or
4:11
Speaker 1: when I researched this stuff, it's like there's no like,
4:14
Speaker 1: if you if you've lost faith in humanity, just look
4:18
Speaker 1: into meals on wheels like it. It it cancels out
4:22
Speaker 1: so much bad in the world, you know, and it
4:25
Speaker 1: takes like this this population that here in the West,
4:28
Speaker 1: Like it's very easy to become disconnected from your family
4:33
Speaker 1: because you're you're offspring. Your kids as some people call them,
4:37
Speaker 1: they grow up, they get their own jobs, they move
4:39
Speaker 1: around where highly mobile culture Western civilization is um and
4:45
Speaker 1: you can find yourself basically alone. Like if you're friends
4:48
Speaker 1: with your neighbor and your neighbor dies or moves away,
4:51
Speaker 1: you don't know the new younger neighbors, maybe they don't
4:53
Speaker 1: care about you. Um, you can find yourself isolated and
4:57
Speaker 1: being socially isolated is a huge problem. So the idea
4:59
Speaker 1: that there's people out there who are strangers to you,
5:02
Speaker 1: who will come to your house and bring you a
5:04
Speaker 1: meal to make sure you're taken care of. That's there's
5:07
Speaker 1: humanity right there. In a nutshell. Yeah, we had Um
5:11
Speaker 1: she's moved away now, but are are older? Um and jeez,
5:14
Speaker 1: I had no idea how old she was. She was
5:17
Speaker 1: one of those ladies, Miss Jesse, our neighbor, who could
5:20
Speaker 1: have been seventy or a hundred and six. I have
5:24
Speaker 1: no idea. Is she the one with the goats? No? No, no,
5:28
Speaker 1: we fed the goats again this morning. By the way,
5:30
Speaker 1: Um No. Miss Jesse and Mr Otis lived next door.
5:33
Speaker 1: Mr Otis had daily dialysis passed away um, which was
5:37
Speaker 1: very sad because he was just great. Um. But Miss
5:40
Speaker 1: Jesse was really nice. It took us a little while
5:42
Speaker 1: to earn her trust. But um, she had her daughter Connie.
5:47
Speaker 1: He would come by and get her what she needs
5:49
Speaker 1: and bring your groceries. But we would always offer, you know,
5:51
Speaker 1: we're going to store. Miss Jesse need anything, and she
5:54
Speaker 1: would never take us up on it. But I think
5:56
Speaker 1: just us talking to her on a daily basis because
6:01
Speaker 1: she was one of these that would like you know,
6:03
Speaker 1: she she would open the blinds every time she heard
6:05
Speaker 1: a noise in the neighborhood. She was very on it,
6:08
Speaker 1: which was great for when we went out town because
6:10
Speaker 1: Miss Jesse was the best like watchdog you could asked for.
6:12
Speaker 1: Did she give you a list of like teenagers that
6:15
Speaker 1: she spotted while you were gone whenever you return home. No,
6:19
Speaker 1: she just said that that ne'er do well, that guy
6:21
Speaker 1: is up to no good. Anyway, She's a very sweet lady,
6:24
Speaker 1: and I think eventually we earned her trust, and I
6:26
Speaker 1: really got the sense that just us having a conversation
6:29
Speaker 1: with her from for five minutes getting out of the
6:32
Speaker 1: car meant a lot to her. Um, that's apparently what
6:35
Speaker 1: the research shows that that kind of thing has a
6:39
Speaker 1: pronounced impact on the life of somebody who has become
6:43
Speaker 1: socially isolated. But she moved away. Yeah, she's like nuts
6:47
Speaker 1: to those two. Yeah, someone bought her house. Uh, but
6:51
Speaker 1: she's you know, she's doing great. The good end of
6:53
Speaker 1: that story. She did not pass away. She moved away, right, gotcha?
6:56
Speaker 1: So where did she move? Did she moved to an
6:58
Speaker 1: assistant care facility? And she moved into an other house.
7:00
Speaker 1: Does she moved in with her daughter. I think she
7:02
Speaker 1: may have moved in with her daughter. But it was funny,
7:04
Speaker 1: like she meant a lot to us, but it was
7:07
Speaker 1: sort of like so long, suckers, we didn't get it.
7:09
Speaker 1: Wasn't that like a cheerful goodbye. All of a sudden,
7:11
Speaker 1: we're like you're moving. She's like, yep, sold my house
7:14
Speaker 1: and she was out of there right, So shuts the
7:18
Speaker 1: U haul gets in, flips you the bird on the way. Yeah.
7:22
Speaker 1: So well then this one's for miss Jesse. Yeah there
7:25
Speaker 1: you go. Um okay, so well, let's talk a little
7:28
Speaker 1: bit of history. It's about meals on wheels because despite
7:31
Speaker 1: how utterly human it is, um, it was started by robots.
7:36
Speaker 1: It was robots who are trying to win us over
7:39
Speaker 1: before they take over. Very strange, um the the it
7:43
Speaker 1: hasn't been around for as long as you think, although
7:47
Speaker 1: I think that it came about right around the time
7:51
Speaker 1: when the need first arose because I was doing some
7:54
Speaker 1: research and it seems like with industrialization and the rise
7:57
Speaker 1: of like factory work, that is are a lot of
8:01
Speaker 1: the the schism between our traditional society that was usually
8:07
Speaker 1: a grarian based and this new modern society we live
8:10
Speaker 1: in really began, and around that time is probably when
8:14
Speaker 1: you would have started to have found some isolated seniors,
8:18
Speaker 1: is like a growing population. Yeah, that makes sense because
8:21
Speaker 1: I found it interesting that, uh, and we'll dig into
8:24
Speaker 1: the history here, but I found it interesting that it
8:26
Speaker 1: seemed to pop up within about a fifteen year period
8:30
Speaker 1: in many countries around the world, and not because they
8:34
Speaker 1: had heard of it. You know, It's not like they
8:35
Speaker 1: read on the internet in nineteen fifty four that hey,
8:40
Speaker 1: someone in England is doing this. So it I think
8:43
Speaker 1: that has a lot of merit to it, that the
8:45
Speaker 1: need was there kind of all at the same time,
8:47
Speaker 1: yeah and all. Yeah, and it also kind of underscores
8:50
Speaker 1: just how basically human and idea this is. You know, Alright,
8:53
Speaker 1: so World War two raging England, being bombed, neighborhood and
9:00
Speaker 1: regions being devastated. Uh, it became clear that people, you know,
9:05
Speaker 1: like literally just their home or kitchen were destroyed, so
9:09
Speaker 1: they couldn't do simple things like cook the meals they're
9:12
Speaker 1: used to providing for their family. The Woman's Volunteer Service
9:17
Speaker 1: for Civil Defense came around and they said, you know what,
9:20
Speaker 1: we're gonna start delivering some some meals, some home cooked
9:24
Speaker 1: meals to people that whose houses have been devastated, who
9:27
Speaker 1: can't cook for themselves right now. They delivered them at
9:30
Speaker 1: first in baby carriages, which is where the that's the wheels,
9:34
Speaker 1: that's where it came from. Yeah, that that's what everybody
9:37
Speaker 1: around town called it. Um. They called it meals on wheels,
9:40
Speaker 1: pretty neat. It was just just the It was not
9:43
Speaker 1: capitalized or anything like that. It was just kind of
9:45
Speaker 1: like the the slang term what the cool kids called.
9:49
Speaker 1: About ten years later or so in Philly, uh in Pennsylvania,
9:53
Speaker 1: woman named Margaret Toy who became the first director of
9:56
Speaker 1: Meals on Wheels in the United States, she organized something
10:00
Speaker 1: called the Platter Angels and just by coincidence, there were
10:03
Speaker 1: some British students in Philly doing some social work at
10:08
Speaker 1: a community center where Mrs Toy volunteered, and they said, hey,
10:11
Speaker 1: this is a lot like what we've got going on
10:13
Speaker 1: in England with the Meals on wheels. Ditch that platter
10:16
Speaker 1: angles angles angles there thinking of Joseph Angles. Ditch the
10:21
Speaker 1: Platter Angels name and call it meals on wheels. And
10:25
Speaker 1: I don't think they said ditch that name, but the
10:28
Speaker 1: does would be some pushy exchange theory. Uh you know
10:32
Speaker 1: those pushy British exchange students. They're the worst state. Surrounded
10:36
Speaker 1: poor Mrs Toy and like poked her in the shoulder
10:39
Speaker 1: and like blue cigarettes smoke in our face. Hey, platter
10:42
Speaker 1: angel right out of her hand. So that's how it
10:49
Speaker 1: became meals on Wheels in the United States. And then
10:51
Speaker 1: over the next like twenty and thirty years in the
10:53
Speaker 1: US they started popping up all over the place. They did.
10:57
Speaker 1: And here's what you're kind of referring to earlier. So
11:00
Speaker 1: that was that same year in September in Um, South Australia,
11:08
Speaker 1: which is where Adelaide is. Shout out to Adelaide where
11:11
Speaker 1: the summerton man is from, right, Um, a woman named
11:15
Speaker 1: Doris Taylor came up with the same exact thing, and
11:20
Speaker 1: from what I understand, called it meals on wheels as well.
11:23
Speaker 1: Is that correct? Yeah? She was something else man Um.
11:26
Speaker 1: She was disabled. The best I can discern is she
11:31
Speaker 1: had a fall when she was seven which gave her
11:33
Speaker 1: a limp, and then another fall when she was eleven
11:37
Speaker 1: that paralyzed her from the waist down permanently. Like that
11:41
Speaker 1: was it. That was it. She was wheelchair bound from
11:44
Speaker 1: that point on. Yep, from that point on, and despite
11:47
Speaker 1: the fact that as an eleven year old in a
11:50
Speaker 1: wheelchair for life, she had a big heart and and
11:54
Speaker 1: realized that there was a need to provide for people
11:56
Speaker 1: in her community, just like was was going on in
12:00
Speaker 1: American Britain, and said, hey, what about bringing a meal
12:03
Speaker 1: to people? And then in September, like you said, meals
12:07
Speaker 1: on wheels of South Australia, Uh, which I had to
12:10
Speaker 1: look up on a map. I figured it was in
12:12
Speaker 1: the South. Yeah, and in Australia it is. But it's
12:15
Speaker 1: a big chunk um, a big chunk of land at least,
12:18
Speaker 1: I don't know how populated it is. Well, if Adelaide's there,
12:23
Speaker 1: it's great. Well, yeah, of course it is. But that
12:26
Speaker 1: has grown. She actually lived long enough to see that
12:29
Speaker 1: grow into a huge organization. And um, I don't know,
12:33
Speaker 1: they have these all over the world and all over
12:36
Speaker 1: the country here in America. But we just wanted to
12:38
Speaker 1: shout her out specifically for you know, being disabled herself
12:42
Speaker 1: and and going on to do like just this amazing thing.
12:46
Speaker 1: It's it's pretty remarkable. Yeah, And and so you think, like, okay,
12:50
Speaker 1: big deal, she's a wheelchair abound and she can she
12:52
Speaker 1: can use her arms, she can juggle that kind of stuff. Nope,
12:55
Speaker 1: she had rheumatoid arthritis, crippling rheumatoid arthritis on top of
12:59
Speaker 1: all of the us and so she was just basically
13:03
Speaker 1: she had no use of any of her limbs and
13:06
Speaker 1: she still was out there raising like she had. She
13:09
Speaker 1: used her mind too to get other people to get
13:14
Speaker 1: off their duffs and help people less fortunate she was.
13:17
Speaker 1: She was an amazing person. It's pretty great. Five thousand
13:20
Speaker 1: clients in South Australia now ninety branches. Uh and this
13:24
Speaker 1: is all because of Doris Taylor and then Chuck. So
13:26
Speaker 1: speaking of South Australia, you were you were onto something
13:31
Speaker 1: huge chunk land, not very populated. Adelaide is the capital
13:35
Speaker 1: with just under one and a half million people, and
13:37
Speaker 1: that's the population of South Australia as a whole. Well,
13:42
Speaker 1: there you have it. There's a lot of unused land there.
13:45
Speaker 1: Should we take a break? Oh sure, all right, let's
13:47
Speaker 1: do it. Okay, So meals on wheels starts springing up
14:13
Speaker 1: as like these community programs all over the world. Right,
14:17
Speaker 1: just because there's a few spiritually aligned do gooders out
14:22
Speaker 1: there who have this good idea, and it just spreads
14:23
Speaker 1: and spreads and spreads. But the thing that they have
14:26
Speaker 1: in common, aside from the basic we bring a meal
14:29
Speaker 1: once a day to someone who can't get out of
14:32
Speaker 1: their house, they also had in common that they were community,
14:36
Speaker 1: grassroots organizations. That's how they that's how they operated, that's
14:40
Speaker 1: how they were funded. That was it, and that was
14:43
Speaker 1: the case until I believe nineteen with the Older Americans Act,
14:48
Speaker 1: when the FEDS finally said, all right, okay, a good
14:52
Speaker 1: idea is a good idea, we'll cough up some money
14:54
Speaker 1: for your Meals on wheels programs. And it's been that
14:57
Speaker 1: way ever since. Customarily, the Older Americans Act provides about
15:02
Speaker 1: thirty percent of funding for the Meals on Wheels programs
15:05
Speaker 1: in America, I should say, and then the rest. It's
15:09
Speaker 1: like it's an early public part private partnership, where the
15:13
Speaker 1: rest is meant to come from state and local governments,
15:16
Speaker 1: private donations, foundations, grants, wherever they can get money from.
15:21
Speaker 1: But the the the Meals on Wheels program is meant,
15:23
Speaker 1: ever since nineteen sixty five in the US, to have
15:26
Speaker 1: been able to rely on over a third of its
15:30
Speaker 1: annual budget coming from the US government to provide that
15:33
Speaker 1: foundation so they can get the rest. Yeah, so that,
15:36
Speaker 1: like you said, is specifically because the O A A
15:39
Speaker 1: and delivered through the Office of Health and Human Services
15:44
Speaker 1: and got a shout out corporate donations because I feel
15:48
Speaker 1: like they, you know, people like to bag on big corporations,
15:51
Speaker 1: but um, part of their funding does come from corporations
15:54
Speaker 1: chipping in. And then you talked about grants. There are
15:57
Speaker 1: three specific uh block grant programs. Uh the Community Development
16:03
Speaker 1: Block grant, the Social Services Block grant, and Community Services
16:07
Speaker 1: Block Grant. And just put a pin in that because
16:11
Speaker 1: that will come up again later. So um, again, the
16:15
Speaker 1: most of the funding comes from things other than the
16:18
Speaker 1: federal government, right, And and that there's another way that
16:23
Speaker 1: these this program is funded and this is kind of
16:25
Speaker 1: surprising to me, but it's from the people who are
16:28
Speaker 1: the recipients of this aid as well. It is and
16:33
Speaker 1: this is actually another Doris Taylor innovation, at least in Australia.
16:37
Speaker 1: Before it was well you're this is charity, so here
16:40
Speaker 1: just take this, she was like, yes, we're gonna incorporate volunteers,
16:45
Speaker 1: and the volunteers don't need to be paid obviously, but
16:47
Speaker 1: we still need to pay for the food. We still
16:49
Speaker 1: need to pay workers to prepare the meals, and so
16:53
Speaker 1: obviously some of that could be donated, but yeah, sure
16:56
Speaker 1: not all of it. You just can't rely on that
16:58
Speaker 1: always to be donated. You could kind of always rely
17:01
Speaker 1: that there's gonna be somebody there who will fill in
17:04
Speaker 1: for somebody who didn't show up that day in meal delivery, right,
17:07
Speaker 1: or you can go do that yourself. But the more
17:10
Speaker 1: skilled stuff, you need to be able to pay somebody
17:13
Speaker 1: so that they will show up and do this stuff. Right.
17:15
Speaker 1: So the idea of having the people who can afford
17:19
Speaker 1: it pay for the meal, UM, that's that is kind
17:23
Speaker 1: of innovative and it helps keep the program going. The
17:26
Speaker 1: thing is is if you can't pay for the meal
17:28
Speaker 1: you get that you get it for free. Well, and
17:31
Speaker 1: then there's a that's a continuum. There's a sliding scale
17:34
Speaker 1: between I can I can I can afford a little
17:37
Speaker 1: bit for this meal, um, here's here's some and then
17:40
Speaker 1: I think the people who are able to physically able to,
17:45
Speaker 1: but are financially unable to afford a meal UM are
17:49
Speaker 1: asked to volunteer to be a part of the Meals
17:51
Speaker 1: on Wheels program. Themselves. Yeah, I'm a big You can
17:55
Speaker 1: call me an old hippie if you want, but the
18:01
Speaker 1: sliding scale is one of my favorite things. An old
18:06
Speaker 1: hippies like the sliding scale, sure, man, like everything from
18:10
Speaker 1: I mean when I was a young, broke mid twenties
18:14
Speaker 1: something and I wanted to go to a shrink, they
18:17
Speaker 1: you know, I found a shrink at a sliding scale.
18:19
Speaker 1: Like there are people out there to be like, you know, what,
18:23
Speaker 1: what can you what can you pay? Right? And it
18:26
Speaker 1: wasn't some government program, it was a private uh therapist.
18:31
Speaker 1: And this is across the board. There are all sorts
18:33
Speaker 1: of people who offer sliding scales, like you know, meals
18:37
Speaker 1: of wheels. If you can pay a dollar, then that helps.
18:40
Speaker 1: If you can't pay anything, we'll give it to you
18:42
Speaker 1: if you can pay full price. I didn't see what
18:44
Speaker 1: full price was for a meal on wheel. I saw
18:47
Speaker 1: somewhere and this is a just a meals on wheels
18:51
Speaker 1: um Like a volunteer who wrote something on Vox said
18:54
Speaker 1: that they they are usually about two dollars and five cents.
18:57
Speaker 1: That's full price, yeah, man, which is ridiculously low. Well yeah,
19:02
Speaker 1: because I guess they're only paying for food costs. And
19:06
Speaker 1: they're getting bulk you know, they're getting gallons of mayonnaise
19:12
Speaker 1: at the warehouse. Yeah, you know, yeah, but you have
19:18
Speaker 1: to order about ten overage for mayonnaise to to cover
19:22
Speaker 1: shrinkage because everybody's always got their fingers in the man
19:25
Speaker 1: is joke as they're walking in and out of the kitchen.
19:27
Speaker 1: You know. That's what Pappy used to say, That's what
19:29
Speaker 1: Mr Otis always said. He probably did so. Um, so
19:33
Speaker 1: there is there is, there's money. There's financial contributions involved.
19:37
Speaker 1: But for the most part um the being a part
19:41
Speaker 1: of meals on Wheels as a recipient, it's based entirely
19:44
Speaker 1: on need. And I think the first thing that they
19:46
Speaker 1: look at is your medical need, right, yeah, so how
19:50
Speaker 1: how able are you to get around your house? How
19:53
Speaker 1: able are you? And this is a this is one
19:54
Speaker 1: I hadn't thought of, But I'm like, Okay, well you
19:57
Speaker 1: can get up and get around your house, you can
19:58
Speaker 1: cook for yourself. Can you also go to the grocery store? Huge?
20:02
Speaker 1: Huge one. So you may be physically able to, um,
20:05
Speaker 1: hang out in your house and you know, maybe play canasta,
20:09
Speaker 1: do whatever. But but getting to like, let's say you
20:12
Speaker 1: lost your driver's license or you don't have a car
20:15
Speaker 1: any longer, or or it's just getting to the grocery
20:18
Speaker 1: store and shopping and then getting back is just way
20:21
Speaker 1: too much. Um, you would probably qualify to be a
20:26
Speaker 1: Meals on Wheels recipient, right yeah. I mean there's a
20:28
Speaker 1: range of people like they also have uh like centers
20:32
Speaker 1: where they feed a lot of people like in a
20:34
Speaker 1: cafeteria setting, and they encourage you if you can get out,
20:38
Speaker 1: you can still get your your really nutritious. Because I
20:41
Speaker 1: don't think we've said that yet, but that goes without
20:43
Speaker 1: saying these meals are specifically catered to the needs of
20:48
Speaker 1: the elderly, right yeah. I think ever since nineteen two,
20:52
Speaker 1: there was like an amendment maybe to the Older Americans
20:54
Speaker 1: Act that said, maybe get those those um single cigarettes
21:00
Speaker 1: out of that tray that you're bringing to the to
21:03
Speaker 1: the older seniors. Let's actually make this like like a
21:05
Speaker 1: nutritious meal. Yeah, so you can go to a place
21:09
Speaker 1: and eat with a bunch of other people like you
21:12
Speaker 1: and have a good conversation if you can get out
21:15
Speaker 1: of the house. But the real focus in the core
21:18
Speaker 1: of the program are those we call them shut ins
21:22
Speaker 1: at our church. I don't know if that's a I
21:24
Speaker 1: think homebound is what they normally call them. Yeah, I
21:26
Speaker 1: think that's probably an antiquated Southern Baptist term, right, But
21:30
Speaker 1: we would deliver meals to shut ins through our church.
21:32
Speaker 1: It wasn't like Meals on Wheels. And there are plenty
21:35
Speaker 1: of other programs that do this, but Meals on Wheels
21:37
Speaker 1: is definitely the biggest and broad ut. Yeah, I get
21:39
Speaker 1: the impression to that Meals on Wheels is in particularly
21:42
Speaker 1: concerned by competition. No, I don't think they're like, okay,
21:45
Speaker 1: as fine as long as everybody's getting their their meals. So, um,
21:50
Speaker 1: let's say you you are you qualify medically as somebody
21:54
Speaker 1: who is a Meals on Wheels recipient. Um, next they
21:57
Speaker 1: would look at your finances, what can you for? What
21:59
Speaker 1: can't afford? And they're not going to like go through
22:01
Speaker 1: and dig dig through your check. They say, hey, give
22:03
Speaker 1: me a wallet, right right, let me see what's in there. Yeah,
22:07
Speaker 1: you go to grab it from and they just put
22:09
Speaker 1: their palm on your forehead and hold you back right. No,
22:12
Speaker 1: they're not gonna do anything like that. They're going to
22:14
Speaker 1: just ask you like what can you afford or what
22:16
Speaker 1: are you living on a month? How much extra income
22:18
Speaker 1: maybe do you have. That's probably going to be the
22:21
Speaker 1: extent of it. I get the impression that it's largely
22:23
Speaker 1: an honor system kind of thing, right, and then if
22:26
Speaker 1: you if if you're like I just can't afford it,
22:28
Speaker 1: they'll say okay, great. Um. Depending on where you live,
22:33
Speaker 1: you will either be put into the rotation or you'll
22:37
Speaker 1: be putting sadly on a waiting list. And if you're
22:41
Speaker 1: put on a waiting list, there's you. You might be
22:43
Speaker 1: waiting a little while before they can include you. The
22:46
Speaker 1: whole reason anybody would put you on a waiting list
22:49
Speaker 1: is funding. And we'll talk about funding later on. Um,
22:52
Speaker 1: let's stick to the good stuff right now. Yeah. So
22:56
Speaker 1: the meals that you're getting are or they're delivering, can
23:00
Speaker 1: be hot meals, they can be cold meals. They can
23:03
Speaker 1: be frozen if that's what you want. If you don't
23:05
Speaker 1: want to eat it, right then, uh, they can be
23:08
Speaker 1: shelf stable or canned. Um. If you live way out
23:12
Speaker 1: in the sticks, you can probably arrange to have like
23:15
Speaker 1: a week's worth of meals delivered frozen. They really try
23:19
Speaker 1: to work with you because they try to, I mean,
23:22
Speaker 1: their goal is to say that there is no community
23:25
Speaker 1: in the United States that we cannot serve right. Yeah,
23:29
Speaker 1: I think if you like live out in remote Alaska,
23:31
Speaker 1: they're they're gonna be like, can we just bring you
23:34
Speaker 1: a week's worth of frozen meals? Can we just drop
23:37
Speaker 1: an elk off on your front porch and a buck
23:40
Speaker 1: knife and a buck knife that's right? And you'll say, yeah,
23:44
Speaker 1: that'd be great. Well, the rural Alaskan, elderly Alaska would say, well,
23:48
Speaker 1: I'll just put it with my other nineteen buck knives
23:51
Speaker 1: and my other three elk and they would say, whoa, whoa, whoa,
23:55
Speaker 1: you got that many elk We're gonna share it with
23:57
Speaker 1: the rest of the community. And you'll say, uh, that's
24:00
Speaker 1: wealth distribution New socialists. So here's one interesting stat though
24:06
Speaker 1: that I saw that um less than five percent there's
24:09
Speaker 1: an estimate, but less than five percent of eligible older
24:12
Speaker 1: Americans receive meals, and that on average they received less
24:16
Speaker 1: than three meals per week. Man, that is that is sad.
24:20
Speaker 1: It is sad. And I don't know if that's is
24:22
Speaker 1: that because they can't the program can't be robust enough.
24:25
Speaker 1: I'm sure there's a million different factors involved, but I
24:29
Speaker 1: would I would be very surprised that the leading factor
24:32
Speaker 1: was not funding. Yeah, because there seems to very much
24:35
Speaker 1: be a will. There seems to be a pretty great system,
24:39
Speaker 1: decades old system in place the through communities throughout the
24:44
Speaker 1: uh the country. Um, I would guess that it's just
24:48
Speaker 1: having enough money to add another person to the list,
24:51
Speaker 1: you know. Yeah, well that's a sad wait list, I
24:54
Speaker 1: would guess. Also, volunteer volunteers are They're probably another fact
25:00
Speaker 1: after as well. I was looking into volunteering. Actually after
25:04
Speaker 1: doing this research, I was like, man, that's because not
25:06
Speaker 1: only do I want to teach, Like having a kid
25:09
Speaker 1: really can inspire you to be a better person because
25:12
Speaker 1: you start to think, oh, well they're gonna be looking
25:15
Speaker 1: to me and what I do. Uh. And it's great
25:18
Speaker 1: to donate money to stuff, which is we're good about.
25:22
Speaker 1: But volunteerism is a really big thing that I think
25:26
Speaker 1: not enough people do and I certainly didn't do enough
25:29
Speaker 1: of that. I'm going to try and teach is an
25:31
Speaker 1: example going forward, Like man hours person hours is vital
25:37
Speaker 1: to every program like this in the world. Yeah, Like
25:41
Speaker 1: money is one thing, and funding is super important, but
25:44
Speaker 1: it goes lockstep with people showing up and saying I
25:48
Speaker 1: will help you do this. Yes, yes, that is what
25:51
Speaker 1: Well put Chuck Well put man, because yes, donating money
25:55
Speaker 1: is great. You could be like, wow, we've got ten
25:57
Speaker 1: thousand meals, but they're all just sitting here rotting because
25:59
Speaker 1: we don't have anybody to deliver all of them. It
26:01
Speaker 1: is very important. Emily did it in high school. Actually,
26:05
Speaker 1: oh yeah, I'm totally not surprised. Meals on wheels. Yeah
26:07
Speaker 1: she did. She's a candy striper and died meals on
26:09
Speaker 1: wheels and um, she said it was tough. You know,
26:14
Speaker 1: sometimes this is the only human contact these people have
26:17
Speaker 1: in a day. Uh, And she said it and she
26:21
Speaker 1: really takes stuff on emotionally and it's hard for her.
26:24
Speaker 1: And she said as an adult, she said, I don't
26:27
Speaker 1: know if I would be able to do that, Like
26:29
Speaker 1: I'm gonna try something else. But she said, all I
26:31
Speaker 1: would think about is I need to help that one person.
26:35
Speaker 1: I need to like try and help like move them
26:37
Speaker 1: into a different house or and then the next person
26:41
Speaker 1: and the next person exactly. But she said, it's it's
26:44
Speaker 1: tough to Um, you know a lot of these are
26:46
Speaker 1: very very sad cases. And if you have in your mind,
26:50
Speaker 1: like you know, I just whistle zippity dude on bounce
26:54
Speaker 1: around the neighborhoods and drop off meals and have a
26:56
Speaker 1: quick chat. I mean it can be that, but it's
26:59
Speaker 1: it takes an emotional toll. So like hats off to
27:02
Speaker 1: people who are able to do this and put it
27:06
Speaker 1: in the right place in their own emotional life, right, right. So,
27:10
Speaker 1: so any anyone can be a Meals on Wheels volunteer, right,
27:15
Speaker 1: no matter how emotionally invested you are in other humans.
27:18
Speaker 1: And the reason why anybody can do this is because
27:21
Speaker 1: Meals on Wheels. Well, we've we neglected to say there
27:25
Speaker 1: is an organization called Meals on Wheels of America and
27:29
Speaker 1: they are basically like the the lobbying central umbrella unit
27:34
Speaker 1: of all the independent Meals on Wheels programs. There's like
27:37
Speaker 1: five thousand of them around the country. Right, So they
27:39
Speaker 1: do advocacy, they issue grants, they figure out best practices,
27:44
Speaker 1: and one of the things they've said is like here
27:46
Speaker 1: is what you as a volunteer should expect. Right, Yes,
27:50
Speaker 1: you're going to be confronted by people you want to help,
27:53
Speaker 1: but all you have to do is like all that's
27:56
Speaker 1: expected of you, and you can you can get as
27:59
Speaker 1: involved in invested as you want, but all that expected
28:02
Speaker 1: of you, and it is enough to to bring a
28:06
Speaker 1: meal to this person's house, say hey, how are you doing?
28:09
Speaker 1: Good to see you. You're looking fine today, um, and
28:12
Speaker 1: I'll see you tomorrow. You take care of yourself, see
28:14
Speaker 1: you tomorrow. That that they've figured out that that is
28:17
Speaker 1: enough to keep people from being completely disconnected from society.
28:22
Speaker 1: And again, the food that you're bringing them is is
28:25
Speaker 1: helping keep keep them alive. I read that something like
28:29
Speaker 1: three thousand to five thousand seniors in America die of
28:35
Speaker 1: malnutrition every year every year. This is not like a
28:39
Speaker 1: nineteen seventeen statistics, this is this is this year. Um.
28:44
Speaker 1: So the actually it was based on two thousand and
28:47
Speaker 1: six data. I can't imagine it's gotten too terribly much better.
28:50
Speaker 1: But the fact is that if you volunteer just doing
28:53
Speaker 1: those those basic things, it's it's enough to have a
28:58
Speaker 1: major impact in the life of somebody. Me. Do you
29:00
Speaker 1: want to take another break? Yeah, let's all right. We're
29:03
Speaker 1: gonna go deliver three meals and we'll be back right
29:07
Speaker 1: after this. You know, I'm glad you said that before
29:32
Speaker 1: break about this is like what all you have to
29:35
Speaker 1: do because I didn't want to scare people off by
29:40
Speaker 1: volunteering because of Emily's taking things on emotionally, Like, there
29:45
Speaker 1: are people that are will do a great job going
29:48
Speaker 1: out there checking in on people and can successfully do that.
29:54
Speaker 1: Does that make sense? Oh? Yeah, totally. And I'm sure
29:56
Speaker 1: like and I'm sure Emily would would tell you that
29:59
Speaker 1: there's probably probably recipients out there you're like, good lord,
30:02
Speaker 1: that person is a jerk, or this person is sweeter
30:05
Speaker 1: than that person, or this person is really easy to
30:07
Speaker 1: talk to, Like I'm sure just the experience on both
30:11
Speaker 1: sides is different for each interaction as well. For sure. Yeah,
30:15
Speaker 1: I think that was that was worth saying. For sure,
30:17
Speaker 1: there's that we should just say though when we were
30:20
Speaker 1: talking about what you're expected to do, So there's basically
30:24
Speaker 1: three things you are doing just by visiting. And they
30:27
Speaker 1: said that they can, um, they can arrange your your
30:30
Speaker 1: Meals on Wheels volunteer schedule. If you want to volunteer,
30:33
Speaker 1: just go look up Meals on Wheels America and they
30:35
Speaker 1: will connect you to whoever's got a program going in
30:38
Speaker 1: your community. It's easy as pie. Um. They they will
30:43
Speaker 1: whatever your schedule allows. That's great, they'll take it. That
30:47
Speaker 1: would be fine for them if it's like, call me
30:50
Speaker 1: if you need somebody to fill in, or I can
30:52
Speaker 1: do this once a week, or I can do this
30:53
Speaker 1: once a month, or I can do this five days
30:55
Speaker 1: a week. Um. What they typically say is, you don't
30:58
Speaker 1: have to um be independently wealthy, you don't have to
31:01
Speaker 1: be unemployed. You you can do this on and typically
31:06
Speaker 1: if you have an hour and a half for lunch break,
31:08
Speaker 1: they they can put you on a meals on Wheels route. Yeah,
31:11
Speaker 1: and they typically try to fit the meal deliveries into
31:14
Speaker 1: that lunch break and it's a mid day delivery. But
31:18
Speaker 1: if you're like, man, I can't get away from my job,
31:20
Speaker 1: so sorry, I can't help you, They'll say, no, no,
31:22
Speaker 1: no, no no, We'll find something for you to do after hours.
31:25
Speaker 1: There are there are always plenty of things to do,
31:28
Speaker 1: whether it's helping out in the warehouse or if you
31:31
Speaker 1: want to volunteer in the kitchen. You can do stuff
31:34
Speaker 1: like that too. Yeah, yeah, for sure. Especially I would
31:37
Speaker 1: guess if you have like food prep experience, like like
31:40
Speaker 1: actual experience, they would probably say, yes, I'm sure there
31:43
Speaker 1: is a need for that. Ye. So volunteering is very easy.
31:47
Speaker 1: The program is really good. What you're doing again is
31:50
Speaker 1: you're showing up with a good meal. U is usually
31:53
Speaker 1: I saw somewhere. It's like a third of of UM
31:56
Speaker 1: the daily calories of people who are receiving the meal UM.
32:00
Speaker 1: And just that alone is worth bringing a meal for,
32:03
Speaker 1: even if it's the biggest jerk in the world or
32:05
Speaker 1: you're the biggest misanthrope in the world. Just giving them
32:08
Speaker 1: this meal can do things like help them recover from
32:13
Speaker 1: disease faster, illnesses or conditions faster, UM keep them mentally acute.
32:18
Speaker 1: There's a lot of just benefits to having like nutrition
32:22
Speaker 1: on a daily basis that you take for granted because
32:25
Speaker 1: you can make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich like
32:27
Speaker 1: it's nothing. But imagine if you can't make it to
32:30
Speaker 1: the story to get peanut butter or jelly, or your
32:33
Speaker 1: handshake too bad to to spread the peanut butter the
32:35
Speaker 1: jelly to to be able to have that meal. That
32:39
Speaker 1: alone does it, right. But then the fact that they
32:41
Speaker 1: added in these other two layers, that there's the UM,
32:45
Speaker 1: like keeping social isolation at bay what they call UM
32:49
Speaker 1: and meals on wheels, just a friendly visit where you're
32:52
Speaker 1: to chatting saying Hi, how's the weather. You don't have
32:55
Speaker 1: to be a particularly great conversationalist, but just saying to
32:58
Speaker 1: say hi basically, and then you know, asking if they
33:02
Speaker 1: need anything, looking around, making sure that they haven't fallen
33:06
Speaker 1: is a big one. Like just just keeping tabs on
33:08
Speaker 1: this person five days a week. Just having people who
33:12
Speaker 1: are going to their house that it's going to cut
33:14
Speaker 1: down in the amount of time between something happening to
33:18
Speaker 1: them like a fall and somebody noticing that they they're
33:22
Speaker 1: not answering their door any longer. Yeah, and that's not all.
33:25
Speaker 1: I didn't realize this, but there are and because there
33:28
Speaker 1: are more than five thousand UM Meals on Wheels programs
33:32
Speaker 1: in the United States, it really varies per community as
33:35
Speaker 1: to what it's like, but they all fall under that banner.
33:39
Speaker 1: But in some programs you can get pet food delivered
33:42
Speaker 1: for your cat UM. Sometimes they can offer home repair services.
33:47
Speaker 1: Sometimes they can UM offer transportation services if you have
33:51
Speaker 1: to go the doctor h if there's bad weather coming up,
33:54
Speaker 1: you can get emergency meals UM. They're they're just all
33:58
Speaker 1: sort of like hospital discharge pro rams UH to reduce
34:02
Speaker 1: readmissions there. Sometimes they have gardens that they grow their own,
34:07
Speaker 1: like the Meals on Wheels garden will grow vegetables, um right,
34:11
Speaker 1: that they can. You know, it's like a farm to
34:14
Speaker 1: table meal delivered to your own right exactly. You're like,
34:18
Speaker 1: I've had better buck choy, but thank you. So it's
34:23
Speaker 1: pretty cool, man. I mean it's hard to uh, there's
34:26
Speaker 1: so many great organizations in the world that help people,
34:28
Speaker 1: but Meals on Wheels is like they're really up there.
34:31
Speaker 1: I agree wholeheartedly. So um there, if you talk to
34:36
Speaker 1: anybody in Meals on Wheels or anybody that has anything
34:39
Speaker 1: to do with aging, they will they will. You'll find
34:42
Speaker 1: that they're like biting their nails and looking around nervously
34:45
Speaker 1: while they're talking to you. And the reason why is
34:48
Speaker 1: because remember the baby boom that happened after World War Two,
34:52
Speaker 1: and then we did and they turned into hippies, and
34:55
Speaker 1: then they turned into stockbrokers, and then they turned into
34:59
Speaker 1: um kind of oren again hippies a little bit after
35:02
Speaker 1: they made their millions. Well now they're just they're they're
35:05
Speaker 1: they're the biggest population in the country and there um
35:09
Speaker 1: aging and they're aging fairly fast. And we are not
35:13
Speaker 1: set up at this moment to handle what's being called
35:17
Speaker 1: the silver tsunami, this massive influx of aging people into
35:23
Speaker 1: our economy, into our social structures, into UM needing social services,
35:30
Speaker 1: needing healthcare were we might be set up for it, maybe,
35:34
Speaker 1: but we're certainly not funding it correctly. And one of
35:37
Speaker 1: the programs that is really poised to take a big
35:40
Speaker 1: hit is Meals on Wheels. Yeah, so are we gonna
35:45
Speaker 1: go with the funding talk here? I think so. Uh.
35:49
Speaker 1: March of two thousand seventeen, there or a bunch of
35:52
Speaker 1: big headlines made when UM the President's budget chief Mick
35:58
Speaker 1: mulvaney said, you know, they released what's called their skinny budget,
36:04
Speaker 1: which is basically where everybody can look and see in
36:06
Speaker 1: a broad sense of what's being funded, what's being cut
36:09
Speaker 1: as far as their budget goes. And Meals on Wheels
36:14
Speaker 1: was was one of the things mentioned, and mcmulvaney said
36:19
Speaker 1: that it's a program is one of many that is
36:21
Speaker 1: just not showing any results. What was his quote, which
36:25
Speaker 1: is I think they call that foot in mouth disease
36:29
Speaker 1: because that was a really dumb thing to say, Well,
36:34
Speaker 1: because yeah, what I want to know is what where
36:37
Speaker 1: is he getting that? Like what does that mean? Because
36:40
Speaker 1: there are there have been plenty of legit peer reviewed
36:44
Speaker 1: studies that that show that meals on wheels is a
36:48
Speaker 1: very effective program, right because like just almost immediately people
36:53
Speaker 1: started like tweeting and reporting on studies that show that, um, yeah,
36:59
Speaker 1: there's that actually really good results from meals on wheels
37:03
Speaker 1: In addition to just keeping people alive, it's um it
37:08
Speaker 1: actually is shown to like improve their lifespan, to improve
37:12
Speaker 1: their nutritional health, to um reduce social isolation. And the
37:20
Speaker 1: point of it. The biggest result too, is there's this
37:23
Speaker 1: big push and there has been for a couple of
37:25
Speaker 1: decades now to to get what are called low care
37:30
Speaker 1: UM Medicaid recipients out of assisted living for a couple
37:34
Speaker 1: of reasons. One their low care meaning they can care
37:37
Speaker 1: for themselves. They just have been moved into a home
37:40
Speaker 1: or whatever you want to call it. That's not a
37:42
Speaker 1: nursing home yet. Assisted living is just basically like you're
37:46
Speaker 1: you're at like a senior living facility, but it's not
37:50
Speaker 1: necessarily you're not necessarily receiving nursing care. Right. UM, those
37:55
Speaker 1: people who are low care UH senior citizens, they can
37:59
Speaker 1: live on their own, and if they live on their own,
38:03
Speaker 1: they cost a lot less to society. Then if they
38:09
Speaker 1: were in these assistant care facilities. Now, if you're going
38:12
Speaker 1: to encourage people to live independently, what's called aging in place,
38:15
Speaker 1: which means you stay in your home as you age,
38:19
Speaker 1: you they have to have a lifeline of connection to
38:22
Speaker 1: the rest of society. And there's a number of different
38:26
Speaker 1: programs that the Older Americans Act addresses this through, but
38:30
Speaker 1: one of them is Meals on Wheels. So if you're
38:33
Speaker 1: gonna have it one way, you've gotta have the other
38:36
Speaker 1: thing too, is the point. Yeah, there's a few um
38:38
Speaker 1: stats here. Here's one the average cost of a one
38:42
Speaker 1: month nursing home stay is equivalent to providing home delivered
38:46
Speaker 1: meals five days a week for seven years uh. And
38:51
Speaker 1: another one UH. Two thousand thirteen study from Brown University
38:55
Speaker 1: said that in most states, increasing Meals on Wheels enrollment
38:59
Speaker 1: would result in a net savings from decreased Medicaid costs
39:02
Speaker 1: from nursing home care. And then they found just literally
39:07
Speaker 1: as far as the health goes uh. They did through
39:10
Speaker 1: the a ARP they did a study that said that
39:13
Speaker 1: there were statistically significant differences and health benefits among the
39:17
Speaker 1: three growth groups of people UM, people who got meal deliveries,
39:23
Speaker 1: people who didn't and people who were on waiting list
39:26
Speaker 1: was that the yep, exactly and basically the people who
39:30
Speaker 1: had face to face visits, they had the highest gains.
39:33
Speaker 1: So there is something to this. Another human being touching
39:39
Speaker 1: you physically and handing you a meal. Uh and it's
39:44
Speaker 1: touching you physically in an appropriate manner. Yeah. Uh So
39:47
Speaker 1: I did some digging on this this funding because it's
39:50
Speaker 1: really hard to to go through the web of numbers
39:54
Speaker 1: on how what a budget cut means. Um So, what
39:59
Speaker 1: this budget cut is proposed as right off the bat,
40:03
Speaker 1: cutting three million dollars from the o A A where
40:07
Speaker 1: the of the actual federal funding comes from, right, which
40:12
Speaker 1: is a problem because they need an increase from what
40:16
Speaker 1: I saw of twelve percent a year, not a decrease
40:19
Speaker 1: of any kind. Yeah, we should point that out. This
40:21
Speaker 1: is an organization that already was hurting, right and and
40:25
Speaker 1: with the silver tsunami coming down the pike, if the
40:28
Speaker 1: people who are going to continue to need the expanded
40:32
Speaker 1: version of meals on wheels, you you need more funding
40:37
Speaker 1: and apparently twelve percent increase of years what they're asking for. Right.
40:41
Speaker 1: So remember earlier I said put a pin in those
40:43
Speaker 1: three block grants the c d b G, s s
40:46
Speaker 1: b G, and the c s b G. Uh, the
40:51
Speaker 1: Trump budget completely eliminates all three of those, not just
40:56
Speaker 1: the money, but like there are no more block grants,
40:59
Speaker 1: those three gone, right, And there I have to say
41:01
Speaker 1: there was some pretty poor reporting around that mc mulvaney
41:04
Speaker 1: press conference because he was largely talking about cutting block grants,
41:10
Speaker 1: which is three billion dollars from the federal government. He
41:13
Speaker 1: he just decided to use meals on wheels as a
41:17
Speaker 1: a poster child for the block grants that don't get
41:21
Speaker 1: results because state, state, and local governments use block grants
41:25
Speaker 1: to a kind of stuff, all sorts of different things.
41:28
Speaker 1: One of the things that they customarily using force to
41:30
Speaker 1: additionally fund local meals on wheels programs. Right, but that
41:34
Speaker 1: was just the absolute worst program he could have picked,
41:38
Speaker 1: because not only is it like no, it's as they
41:42
Speaker 1: actually do bring meals to people and keep them alive.
41:46
Speaker 1: That's the result, number one. But then the fact that
41:48
Speaker 1: there's all these peer reviewed studies that show like, even
41:51
Speaker 1: beyond that basis or that basic, that basic need that's
41:55
Speaker 1: being met, it's better than that. That was just a
41:58
Speaker 1: terrible one to pick on. And so trying to find
42:01
Speaker 1: out the actual money is is really hard because the
42:04
Speaker 1: way it's parched out, like you said, with these plot
42:06
Speaker 1: grants going in all different directions. But they finally got
42:09
Speaker 1: an estimate, they think from a senior Office of Management
42:13
Speaker 1: and Budget official that it looks like it would be
42:16
Speaker 1: about forty eight million dollars from that's forty five million
42:20
Speaker 1: from the block grants and three million dollars from the
42:24
Speaker 1: oh A A. It's about forty eight million bucks, is
42:28
Speaker 1: their best guess of what meals on wheels would be
42:30
Speaker 1: reduced annually when they needed more money to begin with,
42:35
Speaker 1: and it's about a one point four billion dollar annual operations.
42:39
Speaker 1: So you can say it's only a three percent cut
42:44
Speaker 1: in federal funding or an overall funding, but a three
42:48
Speaker 1: percent cut when people are on waiting list and they
42:50
Speaker 1: needed three I mean, I'm not gonna say a three
42:53
Speaker 1: percent increase. Probably needed more than that twelve a year. Oh,
42:56
Speaker 1: they needed twelve a year and they're getting a three
42:58
Speaker 1: percent shortfall cut right. Um. And again when you're talking
43:05
Speaker 1: about like figuring out where to put your money, like
43:08
Speaker 1: I've got another one for you ready for this? You
43:11
Speaker 1: kind of touched on it. But that so the annual
43:13
Speaker 1: meal cost according to Meals on Wheels America, the main
43:18
Speaker 1: the main group that kind of oversees all the independent groups,
43:21
Speaker 1: it's about sixty five dollars for the year. For the year. Okay,
43:29
Speaker 1: The cost of one day in the hospital, according to
43:32
Speaker 1: Mathematica Policy Research is no. I'm sorry that Henry J.
43:36
Speaker 1: Kaiser Family Foundation is seventy for one day in the hospital. Right,
43:41
Speaker 1: So the idea um that that this isn't cost effective
43:46
Speaker 1: is is pretty wrong. And then the other aspect of it,
43:49
Speaker 1: like the fact that this is that like being able
43:51
Speaker 1: to stay in your home and age in your home
43:55
Speaker 1: apparently extends lifespans quite dramatically. I saw one that said
43:59
Speaker 1: that healthy, active, seventy eight year old person living independently
44:05
Speaker 1: has a life expectancy of an additional fifteen or more years,
44:10
Speaker 1: So ninety three. That's not bad, right, But that when
44:14
Speaker 1: they enter a long term care facility that life expectancy
44:17
Speaker 1: decreases automatically by fifty according to this one study. So
44:22
Speaker 1: there's there's a really big um. There's good reason to
44:27
Speaker 1: to let people stay in their homes or help them
44:29
Speaker 1: stay in their homes. There's a couple of them. Uh,
44:33
Speaker 1: if they want to of course, if they want to
44:35
Speaker 1: go live somewhere because there's more um socializing or or
44:40
Speaker 1: better food, or who knows, if you want to go
44:42
Speaker 1: live in a a secure facility, I say, yes, do that.
44:45
Speaker 1: I think there should be plenty of choice, plenty of
44:48
Speaker 1: individual choice, depending on the circumstances and the needs and
44:52
Speaker 1: the desires of the individual um for our aging population,
44:57
Speaker 1: no matter whether they're baby boomers or generation ex eventually whoever.
45:01
Speaker 1: I think, once you reach a certain point in your life,
45:05
Speaker 1: you've contributed enough and you deserve to be taken care
45:08
Speaker 1: of by the rest of us. Agreed. That's that's my
45:12
Speaker 1: two cents. Yeah, man, do you got anything else? Uh No,
45:19
Speaker 1: It's just so sad that as you age you should
45:23
Speaker 1: be able to like have a dignified existence. Still, yeah,
45:28
Speaker 1: you know, and not everyone has kids who make enough
45:32
Speaker 1: money to take care of you or to put you
45:35
Speaker 1: in the most expensive, really great quality nursing home. Um,
45:40
Speaker 1: or you might just have terrible kids. That's a good point,
45:45
Speaker 1: you know anyway. Yeah, that's all I have to say. So,
45:49
Speaker 1: we we were told that meals on Wheels has like
45:52
Speaker 1: this big um push going on right now, um, which
45:56
Speaker 1: we were like, well, well, we'll release an episode about that.
45:59
Speaker 1: And because it's good. So they have something called America.
46:04
Speaker 1: Let's do lunch dot org. I think it's like a
46:07
Speaker 1: volunteer campaign drive um, and you can also donate to
46:12
Speaker 1: you can do both. You can do one, you can
46:14
Speaker 1: do the other. Who knows, but do something? How about that? Yeah?
46:17
Speaker 1: I mean just go to Meals on Wheels America on
46:19
Speaker 1: the web or America let's do lunch dot org. For sure.
46:24
Speaker 1: There you go and be human? Huh if you uh?
46:29
Speaker 1: Oh wait, no, Chuck, we haven't gotten there yet. Since
46:31
Speaker 1: I said be be human, it's time for listener mail.
46:39
Speaker 1: You know what, let's skip listener mail this week, and
46:41
Speaker 1: let's say use that extra ninety seconds to go to
46:46
Speaker 1: your laptop and just do a little investigating on meals
46:49
Speaker 1: on wheels. Okay, we'll wait, all right. If you want
46:53
Speaker 1: to get in touch with this, especially, let us know
46:56
Speaker 1: about a cool, interesting or crazy meals on we experience.
47:00
Speaker 1: We would love that. You can tweet to us at
47:03
Speaker 1: josh um Clark or s Y s K podcast. You
47:06
Speaker 1: can join us on Facebook dot com, slash Charles W.
47:09
Speaker 1: Chuck Bryant or slash stuff you should know. Oh yeah,
47:12
Speaker 1: you can catch up with Chuck too on Twitter at
47:14
Speaker 1: movie Crush. You can send us all an email to
47:17
Speaker 1: Stuff podcast at how stuff Works dot com and has
47:20
Speaker 1: always joined us at our home on the web, Stuff
47:22
Speaker 1: you Should Know dot com. For more on this and
47:29
Speaker 1: thousands of other topics, is it how stuff works dot
47:31
Speaker 1: com