Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal

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Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2001 - Business & Economics - 356 pages

In celebration of its 25th anniversary, and with a new afterword by the author, a new edition of Pulitzer Prize finalist Eric Schlosser's New York Times bestselling exposé on how America's fast food industry has shaped the landscape of America and the world.

Twenty-five years ago, Fast Food Nation blew the lid off the fast food industry--exposing how they've mauled our landscapes, widened the gap between rich and poor, fueled an epidemic of obesity, and propelled American cultural imperialism abroad. Now with a new afterword Eric Schlosser rings the alarm again, calling attention to the damage wrought by corporate control of America's food system and stressing just how the forces he first identified are even more powerful today.

Schlosser's myth-shattering survey stretches from California's subdivisions, where the business was born, to the industrial corridor along the New Jersey Turnpike, where many of fast food's flavors are concocted. Along the way, he unearths a trove of fascinating, unsettling truths--from the unholy alliance between fast food and Hollywood to the seismic changes the industry has wrought in food production, popular culture, and even real estate.

On its publication, Fast Food Nation changed the way America thinks about the way it eats, and it remains required reading for those concerned about the dramatic impact fast food has on our economy and our health.

 

Contents

III
13
IV
31
V
59
VI
91
VII
109
VIII
111
IX
133
X
149
XII
193
XIII
225
XIV
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XV
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XVI
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XVII
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XVIII
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XIX
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XI
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Page 3 - A nation's diet can be more revealing than its art or literature. On any given day in the United States about one-quarter of the adult population visits a fast food restaurant. During a relatively brief period of time, the fast food industry has helped to transform not only the American diet, but also our landscape, economy, workforce, and popular culture.

About the author (2001)

Eric Schlosser, a contributing editor at the Atlantic Monthly, won a National Magazine Award for an article he wrote on strawberry picking for that magazine. His work has been nominated for several other National Magazine Awards and for the Loeb Award for business journalism.