Tanner Weaver Professor Vancil History 1018 17 November 2014 Social Problems with a Side of Fries It is everywhere. There is one in most every city. You see it on your television. It has infiltrated a number of different businesses. It is inside of you. It is fast food. But with something as everyday as food, it is hard for many to see the gigantic impact it plays not only on individuals, but also on a nation. Eric Schlosser takes the saying, “You are what you eat,” another step further in his muckraking novel Fast Food Nation. Schlosser examine how the food we consume from fast food industries may be consuming us. Eric Schlosser reveals a darker more grotesque side to the fast food industry with facts harder to swallow than most of the fast …show more content…
Fast food purchase a large majority of the potatoes grown in the United States. However, there are very few buyers of potatoes and a large number of farmers trying to sell their potatoes. Prices are constantly being dragged down by fast food industries to make fries more profitable. When a $1.50 box of fries is sold at a fast food restaurant only two cents goes to the farmer who grew the potatoes, clearly demonstrating how difficult it is to make a profit in the potato fields. Again, in the beef industry, fast food makes it difficult for cattle ranchers to sell their beef at competitive prices. The top four beef industries now control over eighty percent of the cattle being processed. New forms of trusts and confusion on the true worth of beef due to secretive, inside buying techniques have resulted in a large decline in the profitability of the beef industry. Many poultry farmers too have become powerless under the thumbs of fast food. Most poultry farmers cannot even stay in business longer than three years (Schlosser …show more content…
The first issue that is seen in both are trusts. By allowing large industries to combine their corporations and control over a majority of a certain industry makes it easy for a certain business to demonstrate monopolistic behaviors. While, policies like the Sherman Antitrust Act were enacted to eliminate these behaviors, government involvement made it possible for top meatpacking firms to join together. Next, we see how consumer laws in the twentieth-century were altered through writings, such as Upton Sinclair’s exposé on the meatpacking industry. We see how legislation like the Meat Inspection Act was passed then, but has become difficult to enforce and regulate, especially with government cut backs in agencies that work to regulate and inspect these companies. Lastly, a connection between the imperialism of the twentieth-century and the imperialism within fast food can be drawn. As fast food expands overseas, so does the “American” way. Many countries are beginning to become influenced by the American ideas and culture brought by fast food. Similarly, Americans during the Spanish-American War sought to spread their ideas and culture to those who were thought to be lesser, such as the Philippines (Norton, Sheriff, Katzman, Blight, Chudacoff, Logevall, and Bailey