More than two-thirds of U.S. schools say they’re unable to afford the cost of student free lunch—and MAHA’s dietary guidelines may make it worse

As more than two-thirds of U.S. public schools say they already can’t sustain free meals for their students, one economist is sounding the alarms and says the Trump administration’s updated dietary guidelines may make these financial troubles even worse.

For the 2023-2024 school year, the government provided 4.8 billion lunches to the nearly 29.4 million students belonging to the National School Lunch Program, at a cost of $17.7 billion, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture data. Part of this sum takes the form of cash reimbursements to schools serving free or reduced-cost food to students, with free lunch costing roughly $4.70 per student per meal.

Many schools, however, say the assistance they receive to feed students the subsidized meals are not enough. A recent survey of more than 1,170 school nutrition directors from the trade group the School Nutrition Association (SNA) found this year, 69.6% reported insufficient reimbursement rates to cover the cost of school lunches, an increase from 67.4% the previous year. More than half of the directors said there is “serious concern” about the financial sustainability of their school nutrition programs over the next three years, up from 46% from the 2024-2025 school year.

Changes to school lunches

These school nutrition directors were surveyed in October 2025, and since then, additional factors may threaten the robustness of school lunch programs. Though reimbursements per meal increase each year alongside rising food costs,........

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