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this post was submitted on 16 Jul 2025
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Obviously we can't pretend that VC funded services like Uber are sustainable nor are the environmental and economic costs. But this aren't new concepts. Pizza delivery has been a thing my entire life (I'm in my 40s) and services for the elderly, disabled, and needy like Meals on Wheels have also existed for a long time.
We should be having a lot of discussions about support for services like meals on wheels, or on sustainable means of making small courier businesses viable (via bikes or scooters maybe). Instead we constantly get sidelined into this "only the Treatler Youth use Uber Eats to feed your hamburger addictions, why can't you just cook healthfully for yourself for every meal?!" version of discourse that doesn't help anyone and doesn't advance the needle on any actual solutions.
Pizza delivery sure, but meals on wheels it's for the disabled and elderly. It's not just food delivery, it's a social call, a check in on those who might not have anyone else to check on them. Meals on Wheels also doesn't deliver one meal. It delivers many in one vehicle.
I'm sure there are things to criticize about the program but most of that is probably a lack of funding not delivering meals and food to those who need it.
Sure, that's kind of my point though. I was discussing with a friend recently what role restaurants would have in the glorious anarchic communist utopia. We hit on the notion that what we call "hot bars" would probably become much more common.
It doesn't make sense for everyone to cook for themselves or be deeply concerned with the logistics of food. It would be efficient for larger kitchens to make regular group meals and you go pick one up when you're ready to eat. Something like Meals on Wheels would still exist for all the reasons you say, probably sourcing from their own kitchen or from one of the larger group ones.
I could even see a case for group meal delivery to save time on everyone having to leave job sites to go get food.
I guess my main point here is that I find it more productive and hopeful to imagine these kinds of futures: where everyone is working together systematically to provide convenience and support for everyone. I also find it much more believable as a possible future than rather some cottage core vision of everyone become subsistence smallhold farmers.
(Happy cake day BTW! I hope that cake wasn't delivered!)
For a couple of years in college, I was part of a food coop of six people who each cooked one night a week for the rest of the group. It worked great, but only because our dorm had a full kitchen which I think is not very common.
My (admittedly limited) understanding of Meals on Wheels is that they would have a bulk load of meals that they delivery to individual homes. This would be more similar to how, for example, a package delivery service would work in contrast to an individual trip for one meal.
Properly organized services that are willing to sacrifice some flexibility can operate with vastly greater efficiency.