Here’s the last of my “Hamburgers” media posts. It’s the NPR Fresh Air
interview with Eric Schlosser, author of Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal. (Yeah, this
interview’s old, but it’s still good.)
My quickie notes taken while listening to the interview:
become one of the lowest-paid, in spite of being one of the most
dangerous
minimum-wage-paying industry in the US
poorly-paid poorly-trained workforce than a small well-paid
well-trained workforce.
$8/hr starting wage, managers who get paid an $80K salary and full health and dental coverage for their employees.
Growth of the industry parallels the decline of minimum wage (in real terms) in the US.
rise in the minimum wage
perfect vehicle for Food-borne illnesses”. It used to be that your
burger came from the meat of perhaps one or two cows — now a butger
can come from a large number of cows, which means that one sick cow can
contaminate the meat across the country.
in
the US. A lot of communities have local governments who are unwilling
or unable to spend money building playgrounds; in those places,
McDonald’s is the only alternative. The problem: McDonald’s marketing
— they’re targeting kids and selling htem unhealthy food. The rise of
childhood obesity parallels rise of fast food industry.
places like 7-11, which have implemented practices to keepas much money
as possible in a safe which employees cannot open. The average take
from a 7-11 robbery is $37; you can make thousands if you rob a fast
food place at the right time. Half of fast food robberies are inside jobs.
Most people
in the fast food industry aren’t bad people but business people; give
them business reasons to change their practices and they’ll do it.
influences on the landscape of the industry. The McDonald’s model —
the mass reproduction of a specific retail environment — has inspired
other retailers : The Gap, Sunglass Hut, Banana
Republic. The outskirts of one American community is pretty
indistinguishable from
another
Vegas at a fast food convention. Mikhail Gorbachev was a keynote
speaker. At his keynote, he praised McDonald’s entry into Russia and
asked the fast food executives to invest in Russia. Schlosser says he
was reminded of the old Roman practice of brining leaders of countries
they conquered and putting them on display at circuses.
internalize the costs that they’re imposing left and right on society.”
The interview is in two parts:
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The cover painting says it all.