When I went to school free lunches were not needed then. Now the parents dont earn enough cash on their slave jobs to feed their kids.
When I was little my folks weren't paying for all of us to eat lunch at school. They told us to pack a lunch or my mom packed one when I was younger.
The issue as I see it, is that school lunches are more expensive than a lunch packed at home. Also people already get food stamps if they are poor. They can pack their kids lunch. Wasn't that the point of food stamps?