Nutrition: Fast Food Nation Essay

Submitted By fifi1212
Words: 1118
Pages: 5
Open Document
nutrTiffany Hickey Touro College Nutrition January 3, 20012

Fast food nation by Eric Schlosser is a book about the American way of life. The
Dark Side of the All-American Meal, he argues that today’s slaughterhouses and meatpacking industries are revoltingly unsafe, unsanitary, and employees are treated unfairly and with little or no respect. He gave me as a reader a lot of solid factual material. He did his own research so all of the information came from him. I strongly feel it should be necessary that the food as well as the working conditions be regularly monitored. Fast food restaurant should not be allowed to add so much salt and sugar to their food to make people addicted. I feel like they are targeting young children and adolescents because they are their biggest consumers. The working conditions need to also be watched carefully. People should be able to work in a safe environment and be provided with medical care if they are injured at work. The book is broken down into two sections. In the first section, The American
Way, Schlosser examines the beginnings of the fast food industry in America post-
World War II. The second section, Meat and Potatoes, looks at the specifics of the fast food industry, including the chemical flavoring of food, the production of chicken and cattle, the working conditions within the beef industry and the dangers of eating meat. In the first part of the book, Schlosser discusses how McDonald’s came to be and how Carl Karcher and the McDonalds brothers pioneered the fast-food industry in southern California. He then examines how Ray Kroc and Walt Disney both rose to fame at a when their relationship with each other was complicated. Schlosser also spends time looking at how the food industry makes child friendly advertisement because that is where most of the business comes from.

Schlosser then visits Colorado Springs, CO to see the working conditions of the food employees. He found out that out of all industries, the fast food industry employees has the highest rate of low-wage workers, has the highest employee turnover rates, and pays minimum wage to more of its employees than any other industry. The first section of the book is ended by Schlosser discussing how the enormous success of McDonald’s has generated numerous restraunts trying to imitate them. He discusses how franchises work and how they become successful. Teenaggers play a lead role in our fast food nation. The average kid begins working at 16 doing a very low wage job. These restraunts prefer to hire teenagers because they are easily trained and will do more work than adults. All the fast food chains want is for the food to be prepared faster they do not care about the quality of the service. The teenagers get treated very bad not only by their empolyers who could care less about them but also by the customers who on a daily basis will scream at them for a snadwitch that took to long or to much ketchup on there burger. From my own personal expeirenece I worked at burger king when I was fifteen years old. I worked long hours for $5.15 an hour a thirty minute break if I worked eight hours or a fifteen minute break in I worked less both which I had to punch out my card and I was not paid for. My manager watched me closely all day to ensure I did not stop working for a second and that I moved quickly. The owner watched from the camera at his home. If I didn’t get a order correctly I would get screamed at even if it was not my fault. I also had the expierence of preparing the food in the back, most of the reason I would never recommend anyone to eat at burger king. The bread came in large plastic bags about 6 feet tall and the mice would eat through the bag to get to the bread. The meat was already prepared we just put it through a broiler which I never seened cleaned in the year I worked there. The staff
Show More

Related Documents: Nutrition: Fast Food Nation Essay

Proposal for Research on Fast Foods Essay

Proposal: Change in the fast food industry (we can take a specific restaurant like McDonald’s) to fight obesity Fast food and obesity The relationship between a nation's fast food consumption and its rate of obesity has been studied. Schlosser said "it seems wherever America's fast food chains go, waistlines inevitably start expanding." Schlosser argues that the North America has the highest obesity rate of any industrialized nation. More than half of all adults and about one-quarter of all children…

Words 888 - Pages 4

Obesity Research Paper

featured on the newspapers, television news, or internet. The media pay a huge amount of its attention to this topic. Many industries also has paid their interests to this complex issue. The movie industry, the magazine industry, or even the food industry its self have attempted to issue with obesity. That fact increases the interests of people to the topic as well. People start to be more aware of what they eat, and their health. Most of the time obesity is discussed as the problem of…

Words 2897 - Pages 12

Essay about America's Expanding Waistline

around 2,000 calories on a daily basis. For many this number is greatly exceeded due to poor nutritional choices, and a lack of effort to maintain healthy eating habits. For example, “the average American eats four orders of fast food French fries and three fast food hamburgers weekly” (Grossman). A meal of this mature racks up 1,300 calories at once (“McDonald’s”). That’s almost all of the calories required for an entire day. But, because of our chaotic schedules, convenience is important…

Words 1460 - Pages 6

MRS SHAH Essay

Marketing strategy Multinational fast food restaurant chain Marketing strategy of Subway Offering healthier alternative to traditional fast-food chains Introduction Subway is a multinational fast food chain started in 1965 with annual sales of $6.5 million and more than 30,000 units worldwide. It started by offering healthier, fresh, custom-made sandwich which offered a healthier alternative to that of the traditional fast food chains such as Kentucky fried chicken, McDonald’s, Pizza…

Words 3095 - Pages 13

African-America Documentary

The weight of the nation was shot in Madison County it’s a 4 part serious produce by HBO it’s a documentary focusing on overweight American’s and there weight issues and the enormity of the obesity. The documentary breaks down the most pressing problems of obesity and the cause it has on our country in our future for of well-being in survival of the nation. The most interesting thing that caught my attention in the documentary was the problems that come with being overweight like diabetes and sleep…

Words 570 - Pages 3

Summary: The Epidemic Of Obesity

rising at a frightening pace. Experts have been working to determine the cause of this nationwide epidemic and have discovered several contributing factors are to blame. Throughout the nation, fast food companies have become ubiquitous to the current generation. There promise of cheap, fast, and easily accessible food lures customers in while also ensuring they have a high caloric intake. This along with the huge portions that have become so generic have helped create this epidemic. Likewise, the large…

Words 1455 - Pages 6

Analyze marketing with KFC Essay

and enjoy the fast food. According to the 2003 Technic Top 100 report, editor believed that there is no doubt that more and more fast food’s brand have been occurred. Introduction KFC is one of the most famous fast food brands all over the world. According to the KFC Safe Food Policy White Paper (2004,P.2), its full name is ‘Kentucky Fried Chicken ‘which was invented in the United States, pioneered by Colonel Harland Sanders. Now, KFC has grown to become one of the largest fast food brand, and set…

Words 1345 - Pages 6

Obesity: Obesity and Lower Obesity Rates Essay

A classic meal in the USA is related to our food chains that we’ve created to give us a warm meal away from home. Yet these delicious commodities do not have a great effect on the people’s health. Six Big Macs could later become a Mcheart attack. We still find these types of products in schools all over, and what child would not want to consume a beefy cheeseburger and juicy fries? All those bad habits have caused us to become the country with the highest obesity rate. With 30.3% of obese citizens…

Words 2489 - Pages 10

Essay on Childhood Obesity

entertainment, and personal services that poor nations struggle with. Of course myself being a child at the time, I did not notice most of those things. The only worries I had to concern myself with were playing, eating, and sleeping. The one that stuck out to me the most of those three, and still resonates with me to this day, was eating. I love food. There’s no way around it. It is a fact. Luckily though, my parents always had me exercise and gave me healthy food to eat. I had no idea at the time how much…

Words 662 - Pages 3

Essay on Obesity: Nutrition and Obesity a. Population

slower rate, causing pressure buildup and eventually accumulating fluid in the heart and throughout the body. Heart disease is another common problem among Americans, a class of heart conditions such as heart attack and coronary artery disease. Junk food was probably eaten in moderation. That ability has been taken away from government by banning it in schools, as well taxing these and sweet beverages too. According to Linda Bacon, author of Health at Every Size: The Surprising Truth about Your Weight…

Words 993 - Pages 4