Working as a night stocker at Wal-Mart, I used to get sick when I saw the bakers throwing out racks of day-old bread.
The problem was, as I found out as a volunteer at the Salvation Army, they had to trash past-date foods, or risk being sued by people who had time on their hands and smelled a buck.
My wife told me that the Senior Center used to get day-old pastries from Kroger - until some old biddy found a bit of mold on a piece of pie, and rather than just toss it out, complained to Kroger. They immediately stopped the freebies.
“The problem was, as I found out as a volunteer at the Salvation Army, they had to trash past-date foods, or risk being sued by people who had time on their hands and smelled a buck.”
I remember reading here on FR that some California grocery chain had to lock up their trash because they were afraid some scavenger was going to sue them after eating bad food from the bins.