Schlosser points out that in the year of 2000, Americans spent over $110 billion on fast food alone. This means Americans were spending more money on fast food than on higher education, personal computers, computer software, and new cars. We spent more on fast food than on movies, books, magazines, videos, and recorded music; combined. Schlosser’s work takes readers from the California subdivisions where the business was born to the industrial corridor along the New Jersey Turnpike where many of fast food’s flavors are invented. He recommends that in search of a better way to serve customers, the fast food industry has negatively infused its way into the American culture.
Fast food industries corporate greed took advantage of Americas need for cheap and readily available food. The fast food industry uses shrewd marketing tactics and governmental influences to promote products to the American public, having little or no concern for the people that are put at a disadvantage for the sake of the company making money. Schlosser states that in 1972 Ray Kroc, the founder of McDonald’s, gave the Nixon campaign a $250,000.00 donation. That year Congress and the White House were going to pass new legislation known as the “McDonald’s Bill”. The bill allowed employers to pay young teenagers twenty percent less than minimum wage (37).
Schlosser shows the effects of the fast food revolution on the American economy when he states, “The McDonald's Corporation has become a powerful symbol of America's service economy, which is now responsible for 90 percent of the country's new jobs” (4). “The Founding Fathers” starts off by giving background information on Carl N. Karcher. Carl grew up on a farm Sandusky, Ohio with six brothers and one sister. His father always instilled in him a belief of working hard for a better life. So when Carl got the opportunity to go work for his uncle in Anaheim, California he went for it.
The golden arches are now more widely recognized than the Christian cross” (Schlosser 4-5). Schlosser uses the facts based off the survey to show Americans truly how disturbing this industry has impacted many generations, whether they’re ten years old or sixty. In many other places, Schlosser uses more facts to expose just how awful fast food has become in our lives, “they spend more on fast food than on movies, books, magazines, newspapers, videos, and recorded music- combined” (3). Having a jam packed full introduction filled with all the horrid truth based around the industry makes people think right from the get-go just how badly Americans need to change their lifestyles. Schlosser’s purpose to get society thinking twice on choosing McDonald’s for their next meal was effective; readers are already intrigued and eager to learn more on just how bad the fast food industry
Fast Food Nation Rhetoric (Logos, Pathos, Ethos) The fast food industry is a big part of millions of Americans lives and everyone has had fast food before. Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal is written by Eric Schlosser. Schlosser creates an argument of how the fast food industry influences everything and how they are big and bad. He uses 3 tenets of rhetoric: Logos, Pathos and Ethos. The first tenet is Logos.
It is not those who like to cheat and take the easy way out of things. People are buying cookies, candy, chips, and soda. They also throw big parties for the 4th of July with steaks and shrimp and fill their cart to the brim. Why is the government allowing such absurdity! A couple from Long Island was caught buying more than $120 in caviar with food stamps at a supermarket and then reselling it at a profit!
Or is it that we have such an abundance of food there is no need to be conservative over buying too much at the grocery store (or fast food joint) or saving that last handful of leftover pasta? What about both? Even though efforts are being made to reduce food waste in America, Americans are seemingly creating more of an environmental and economic issue by wasting more food than recycling it. As of 2012 there are over 313 million people in the United States alone (U.S. Census Bureau, 2012). With a number this high, it may not be such a big shock to see how much food is being wasted in America.
McDonald's molded it's marketing tactics on Disney which inspired icons for advertising such as Ronald McDonald. Schlosser also mentions that 80% of sponsored textbooks are biased toward the sponsor and 30% of high schools offer fast food in their cafeterias. Most packaging done for the fast food meat industry is done my the immigrant labor force. Injury for workers who hold these jobs are among the highest of any other occupation in the United States. Many unsanitary and just plain disgusting routine procedures of this industry are unknown to most consumers.
coli O157:H7 . Schlosser also notes that there are more robberies at fast-food restaurants than at banks, gas stations or convenience stores. --> A later section of the book discusses the fast food industry's role in globalization, linking increased obesity in China and Japan with the arrival of fast food. The book also includes a summary of the McLibel Case. In later editions, Schlosser provided an additional section that included reviews of his book, counters to critics who emerged since its first edition, and discussion of the effect that the threat of BSE had on US Federal Government policy towards cattle farming.
In a 2004 study in Health Affairs, conducted by Kenneth Thorpe and colleagues, showed “obesity attributable health care spending increased in the United States between 1987 and 2000, and found that increases in obesity prevalence alone accounted for 12 percent of the increase in health spending; at about $301.” (Dunford) Health care costs in turn become more of a luxury to the middle class, thus less Americans are covered. The setup of the care therefore only jumps into action once people become sick, and not prevent the cause of the disease in the first place. Healthcare becomes directly affected by the food companies make, due to the man-made ingredients and unfair advertising. In the end, we are paying the price. Obesity’s effect on our culture and health costs is only rising, making this problem detrimental for the future for the US.