The measurement of hunger depends in part on its definition. To most people in the developed countries, hunger is a relatively mild, temporary discomfort that might result from missing a meal. Few U.S. citizens will ever experience the severity of hunger endured by victims of famine such as occurred in Somalia in 1992, claiming over 300,000 lives. Hunger of that magnitude seems remote to Americans, existing only as media images of a distant nightmare.

Many commentators insist, however, that hunger of a less dramatic nature is pervasive in American society. In the early 1990s, various organizations published studies purporting that hunger was a serious problem among the nation’s children. In 1991, the Food Research and Action Center (FRAC) concluded that one in eight children under the age of twelve had been hungry at some time during the previous...