Shankar: Default opt-out gave 12.5M more kids school lunch
Maya Shankar · Maya Shankar: How to make smarter changes | Masters of Scale · Jan 24, 2026 · at 11:06
Cognitive scientist Maya Shankar explains how behavioral economics insights applied under Cass Sunstein changed federal school lunch enrollment.
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“So they changed the school lunch program from an opt-in program to an opt-out program. So now, every kid's automatically enrolled, and parents only have to take an affirmative step if they want to actively unenroll their kid from the school lunch program. As a result, 12 and a half million kids were now eating lunch at school every day who previously weren't.”
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