Helping out at the food line at the school multi-purpose room on Monday, fifth-grader Hart Ayoob says that he’s been hit by the economic recession as much as anyone else.
“It’s not fair,” he said, one hand on his chin in contemplation. “But since I was 6 years old, I’ve figured that life isn’t fair.”
  
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It doesn’t stop there, he says. The Ayoob family also has stopped buying Oreos, Fig Newtons and other name-brand cookies.
“Sometimes we’ll make cookies instead,” Hart said. “It kind of saves money.”
Sitting next to him on the plastic cafeteria picnic tables, classmate Ellie Henretty nodded in agreement. Her family was dealing with the same problems. The lousy national economy has eaten into the Henretty family’s cereal budget. No longer could her family afford her both Kix and the yogurt-covered Cheerios cereals.
“We have to eat as much cereal as we can before it goes stale,” Ellie said, adding that she’s noticed a disturbing trend in increasing meals of leftovers at the dinner table. “It’s been lots of leftovers!” she said.
(Contacted on Tuesday, Ellie’s mother politely disagrees with her daughter, saying it has always been a Henretty family policy to not waste food — regardless of the state of the economy.)
Other students around the elementary school campus indicated that they were also seeing less of their favorite foods, which by unofficial tally, seemed to be pepperoni pizza.
“If I could eat only one thing, it’d be pepperoni pizza,” said 8-year-old Noaemi Rios. Several second-graders eating lunch outside with Rios shouted out in agreement.
Jerry Shapiro, a professor of counseling psychology at Santa Clara University, says that children are usually keenly aware of the economic situation at their homes, even if they’re not savvy about the specifics.
“They live with it and they read emotions very well,” Shapiro said. “Even infants know when their parents are distracted.”
For a basic essential like food, children certainly can easily tell when parents are cutting costs. But Shapiro says that children usually understand that when times are tough, they might have to sacrifice.
“What parents need to do is say … we all have to get by on less,” Shapiro said. “Kids adapt very quickly if the parents are straightforward with them.”
Hart and Ellie both say they’re doing their part to help their families save money.
But what caused the economic troubles?
“The AIG bonuses — that was a big part!” said Hart.
“We’re shipping jobs overseas!” Ellie said.
Hart said the future doesn’t bode well.
“The economy is like my grandma’s cold sore,” the 10-year-old said. “It’s going to get worse before it gets better.”
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