Custom essay on Fast Food Nation

Over the past decade the fast food industry that originated in Southern California already penetrated into each and every sphere of American life and even went all over the globe. At present fast food is served in restaurants, zoos, schools, colleges, airplanes and Americans spend more money on it than on higher education or computers. Generally, the fast food industry has transformed not only the diet but the way of life, economy, popular culture and what not.
Eric Schlosser who has worked on studying fast food industry for a long period of time and won several awards for business journalism in his non-fiction book “Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal” published in 2001 provides a deep insight into the fast food industry and the rise of McDonald’s, Walt Disney’s, Burger King in particular. He examines the methods that bring them profit and concludes: “The executives who run the fast food industry are not bad. They are businessmen… They will sell whatever sells at a profit”. Schlosser respects their work and cites Carl Karcher’s father: “The harder you work, the luckier you are”.
The book is divided into two parts: “The American Way” and “Meat and Potatoes” and deals with what lies beyond the taste and flavor of the food, what factors influence the US food chain development and what impact it makes on the rest of the world. The topicality of the issues raised cannot be denied as Eric Schlosser’s book concerns a number of social and economic issues including low employee wages, high turnover rates, poor working conditions etc. Schlosser analyses the reasons of the fast food popularity since Soviet Union collapsed and American goods and services gained demand all over the world. Being a non-fiction work, it nevertheless comprises fictive elements as the author keenly and logically arranges the data so that it produces maximum impression on readers of all ages and backgrounds. custom essay
Evidently, a lot has changed since Schlosser wrote “Fast Food Nation”, there appeared supermarkets and farmer’s markets that care for natural and healthy food more. But the message the book bears is truly unique as it tells the customers what is concealed behind the happy face of any fast food industry employee. Having gathered a great amount of statistical data, interviewed a number of people concerned and provided their quotations, as a remarkable investigative journalist Schlosser appeals to cold reason of the consumers, trying to change the way they got used to eat. Revealing the complicated nature of the phenomenon and the ways it is connected to the other every-day activities of ordinary Americans, the author not only shows the clear picture of what is happening but also calls for boycotting fast food and improving the terms for working youth. In a section “What to Do” Schlosser considers the ways government should focus on the problem solution, improving the standards for food safety and changing the consumers’ attitude who should be brought up to “turn and walk out the door” and moderate their appetite bearing in mind the harm the chemicals in junk food may do.
The author did his best to be objective and consider the fast food industry issue from different angles. The book is well-researched and persuasive with a considerable number of credible examples, but the descriptions are verbose and at times contain excessive data that could be substituted with well-developed conclusion. However, despite his propagandistic style Schlosser does not dwell upon concrete solutions and does not give an alternative of fast food to low-income social strata. At present, fast food remains affordable to most vulnerable sections of modern society, so the fast food habit is not that easy to root out as it has already grown into the soil of the society. In any case every-day customer decision-making remains remarkably important, however.