Who's a good dog?

The American Pet Products Manufacturer's Association estimates that $36.3 billion was spent on the care of U.S. pets in 2005. $14.7 billion of that was food alone.

The United States is also home to about 33 million hungry people. If half the money spent on dogs, cats, and other pet animals in the U.S. each year was spent on helping to feed America's hungry humans, there would be no hungry people.

Half the money spent on pets is roughly equal $1.50 per day per hungry person, which might not be much, but makes all the difference when a dog is eating it instead.

In fact, there are more than twice as many well-fed dogs as there are hungry people.

In the U.S. there are:
90,500,000 pet cats
73,900,000 pet dogs
33,000,000 people without sufficient food

If each pet owner fed their animal 20% less, the extra money could feed 5.28 million hungry Americans for a year, about one-sixth of the total. If pet owners bought 50% cheaper food, the savings could feed twice as many.