The American Way
What is the first thing that comes to mind when asked: “what is American food?” is it hamburgers, hotdogs, or French fries? Of course, none of these things originated in America, they have just become synonymous with the American ideal; fast food. Eric Schlosser, in his book Fast Food Nation, uncovers the many dark things about the fast food industry that has become so American.
The Worker Ants of the Industry – The Employee
Schlosser writes, “The annual turnover rate in the fast food industry is now about 300-400%” (Schlosser 73). Of course, this was written in 2001, in 8 long years, the annual turnover rate has only dropped to no less than 200%. Schlosser also goes on to say, that a fast food restaurant employee is either fired or quits every 3 - 4 months. And quite frankly, can you blame them?
It’s not hard to see why so many workers disappear; be it for a better job, with better pay; one that doesn’t treat them as second class citizen; or just because they are tired of it all; the reason is clear as day.
Source: http://www.monstermasher.com/store/popup_image.php?pID=28&osCsid=meouvtcoa
“The fast food industry pays the minimum wage to a higher proportion of its workers than any other American industry [other than migrant farm workers]” (Schlosser 73). I find this statement pretty appalling. The fact that we, as hardworking Americans’, subjugate ourselves to work jobs of the same pay grade as migrant farm workers, long hours, manual labor, etc. all for eight dollars an hour . Why do we put up with such low wages? Pretty simple really, as Cynthia Ruff, who was one of 8 different people who wrote their own article on Reasons why people are dissatisfied with their job explains: during hard times, “when an opportunity, any opportunity, arises, they accept it” (Ruff 1). This mindset that you are working at such a dead end job for money is one factor in why the industry has such a high turnover rate, you only work the job so long as you need the money.
Well, although low wages play a crucial role in the fast food industries high turnover rate, working hours is another factor.
McDonalds – The Unsafe Fisherman
One of the biggest problems that McDonalds has as a corporation is there lack of safety. “Roughly 4out of 5 fast food workers are now murdered on the job every month, usually during the course of robbery” (Schlosser 83). The reason why Schlosser pointed out that it was mostly due to robbery is because, a lot of the time, current or former employees are the ones who usually carry out the ordeal, hoping to score a quick fix and to relieve some of the pent up anger and frustration towards their employer(s).
Such occurrences are possible because of the lack of proper safety measures. Most drive through windows only have CCT’s (closed circuit cameras) that record the carnage and are unable to do anything about the situation; dimly lit parking lots, easily accessible cash registers. As seen in the many videos on ABC news’ website, Wrong Order: Fast-food Violence, a large number of individuals are harmed at drive thru windows or at cash registers where the perpetrator has a clear field of view towards the employee. Probably the main reason for the lack of employee safety at fast food restaurants is; big name chains strong opposition to OSHA (The Occupational Safety and Health Administration), which tried to set up guidelines and regulations for stores working at night.
“The restaurant industry has continued to fight not only guidelines . . . but any enforcement of OSHA regulations. . . . [Restaurant industry executives,] concluded that OSHA should become just an information clearinghouse without the authority to impose fines or compel security measures” (Schlosser 85). In my opinion, this statement sums up the true intentions of the fast food industries stand on workplace safety, a slap on the wrist for the criminal and forget about it.
The main problem of the fast food executives, are their lack of compassion for those they employ. If working conditions were better and employees happier, then robberies by their own employees would be less frequent. A tactic that could be used to do this is through stroking (which is feeding the reward system in a person’s brain through praise and acknowledgement), and just making the working environment more fun. But most big chains refuse to go to such lengths for their employee’s because all they care about is lining their own pockets and making big bucks.
Works Citied
Gioia, Carol, Akua Hinds, Barry Marcus, Dina Psichogiopoulos, Cynthia Ruff, Elmica Robert, Lee VanAmee, and Michelle Wilkinson. "Reasons why people are dissatisfied with their job." Helium.com. Web. 14 Sept. 2010. <http://www.helium.com/knowledge/370097-reasons-why-people-are-dissatisfied-with-their-job>.
Schlosser, Eric. Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal. New York: Perennial, 2002. Print.
Smith, Laura. "Fast Food Restaurants Can Be Dangerous Places To Work and Eat." 1 July 2007. Web. 15 Sept. 2010. <http://www.bloggernews.net/18271>.
Wrong Order: Fast-Food Violence. ABC News. n.d. Web. 15 Sept. 2010. <http://abcnews.go.com/US/slideshow/fast-food-restaurant-violence-10269243>.
http://www.elfpack.com/_Monopolies%20of%202007
A Piece of the Pie
By Jacob
After four years of and the cost of six hundred thousand Union and Confederate lives, the Civil war was over. The Fourteenth Amendment is now in place and the slaves are now called freed men. The government frees the slaves but that is about all it does. The freed men did not own land and the best way to take care of ones self is to have land to live off. At the same time the plantation owners need farm hands to take care of the crops. These problems were solved by the idea of sharecropping. The plantation owners share the land with the freed men and the freed men would do all the work. They both would normally split what was made off the land. Now later in the twenty-first century, the new owners of big business have found a way to expand, provide jobs, and at little cost to themselves. The way they do this is by sharing their pie that they have baked because it is too large for only them selves.
Shareshops
The fast food industries have found a way to spread their restaurants across the United States in a similar fashion to sharecropping. These new sharecrops of the future are called franchises. In Eric Schlosser’s book he describes a franchisee as “an odd combination of starting your own business and going to work for someone else.” (Schlosser 94) A franchisee does all the work and pays to start the business and the franchisor only lets go of some part of owning the local company. The franchisor is willing to do this because he “wants to expand an existing company without spending its own funds.” (Schlosser 94) In the end, this new form of business expansion exploded, and it helped the companies get out into the world.
McMasters
With the new techniques of expansion being used by the large fast food companies; the race to monopolize the country was in full gear. From what Americans can observe today is McDonalds was the food chain that perfected the franchising techniques, and they are now very well known. (Schlosser 95) When it comes to humans, sharing is not what they want to do. People are always fighting for more, whether it is power or money they always want more. The franchisees and franchisors can start on common ground “but when things go wrong the arrangement often degenerates into a mismatch battle for power.” (Schlosser 94) If there are problems normally the people with the most money would win the disputes, and the less fortunate end up losing everything.
The Winner is…
In-and-Out has stayed away from the rapid franchising ways of McDonalds and are not as expanded. The food is maybe the best out there but most people on the east coast have never heard of In-and-Out. This shows the effectiveness of the franchises and how even a small company can become big. The franchises ended up helping McDonalds in more ways then one. Many well known ideas like “Ronald McDonald, the Big Mac, the Egg McMuffin, and the Filet-O-Fish sandwich were all developed by local franchisees.” (Schlosser 95) So apparently the franchisors benefit greatly, but what about the franchisees? It depends on the franchisees and their willingness to work with the franchisors.
Who Got a Slice?
Ray Kroc was the man who pushed the franchise idea for McDonalds and is responsible for McDonald’s success. (Schlosser 95) Kroc was willing to work with people, but he “wanted loyalty and utter devotion from his franchisees and in return, he promised to make them rich.” (Schlosser 95-96) This man was fully devoted to the new idea of fast food, and he knew it would make him rich. Many franchisees in the past had done well because “in the 1960s and the 1970s McDonalds was much like Microsoft of the 1990s, creating scores of new millionaires.” (Schlosser 96) It is amazing how large the fast food companies like McDonalds have gotten, and it is all thanks to the franchises.
I See!
I personally am impressed at how well Ray Kroc expanded the company and how he knew how successful it would be. In a way the franchises are creating jobs and allowing franchisees to get rich, if they are willing to follow the rules. The franchisees are people who have found a way to make an investment that feels almost like their own business. Some make the big bucks and others end up falling into debt. I now look at McDonalds as a large pie that is cut into a lot of slices, and the pie is so good that everyone wants a piece.
Work Cited
Schlosser, Eric. Fast Food Nation: The Dark side of the All-American Meal. New York
