Fast Food Nation

Introduction

Although I did a great deal of firsthand reporting and research for this book, I also benefited from the hard work of others. In these notes I’ve tried to give credit to the many people whose writing and research helped mine. Robert L. Emerson’s The New Economics of Fast Food (New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1990) offers a fine overview of the business. Though many of its statistics are out of date, the book’s analysis of relative labor, marketing, and franchising costs remains useful. Fast Food: Roadside Restaurants in the Automobile Age, by John A. Jakle and Keith A. Sculle (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1999), is less concerned with the workings of the industry than with its impact on the American landscape and “sense of place.” McDonald’s has played a central role in the creation of this industry, and half a dozen books about the company provide a broad perspective of its impact on the world. Ray Kroc’s memoir with Robert Anderson, Grinding It Out: The Making of McDonald’s (New York: St. Martin’s Paperbacks, 1987) conveys the sensibility of its charismatic founder, an outlook that still pervades the chain. John F. Love’s McDonald’s: Behind the Arches (New York: Bantam Books, 1995) is an authorized corporate history, but an unusual one — fascinating, thoughtful, sometimes critical, and extremely well researched. Big Mac: The Unauthorized Story of McDonald’s (New York: E. P. Dutton, 1976), by Max Boas and Steve Chain, looks behind the McDonald’s PR machine and finds a company whose behavior is frequently cynical and manipulative. John Vidal’s McLibel: Burger Culture on Trial (New York: New Press, 1997) uses a narrative of the McLibel case to provide an indictment of McDonald’s and globalization. George Ritzer’s The McDonaldization of Society: An Investigation into the Changing Character of Contemporary Social Life (Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Pine Ridge Press, 1996) applies the theories of Max Weber to contemporary America, tracing the wide-ranging effects of McDonald’s zeal for efficiency and uniformity. McDonaldization Revisited: Critical Essays on Consumer Culture (Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 1998), edited by Mark Alfino, John S. Caputo, and Robin Winyard, attests to the current influence of Ritzer’s work in the field of sociology. With a much less theoretical emphasis, Stan Luxenberg’s Roadside Empires: How the Chains Franchised America (New York: Viking, 1985) examines the fast food industry’s role in helping to create America’s postwar service economy. I found a great deal of interesting material in trade publications such as Restaurant Business, Restaurants and Institutions, Nation’s Restaurant News, and ID: The Voice of Foodservice. For years some of the best reporting on the fast food industry has appeared in the Wall Street Journal.

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1 Cheyenne Mountain sits: The description of Cheyenne Mountain Air Force Station is based upon my visit to the facility, and I am grateful to Major Mike Birmingham of the U.S. Space Command for his subsequent help in obtaining additional information.

3 about $6 billion on fast food… more than $110 billion: Both of these estimates were provided by the National Restaurant Association.

more money on fast food than on higher education: My calculation is based on figures contained in “Personal Consumption Expenditures in Millions of Current Dollars,” U.S. Commerce Department, 2000. According to the Commerce Department, 1999 consumer spending on fast food exceeded spending on higher education ($75.6 billion); personal computers and peripherals ($25.9 billion); computer software ($8.4 billion); new cars ($101 billion); movies ($6.7 billion); books and maps ($29.5 billion); magazines and sheet music ($19 billion); newspapers ($16.7 billion); video rentals ($8.6 billion); and records, tapes, and disks ($12.2 billion).

about one-quarter of the adult population: This is my own estimate, based on the following information from the National Restaurant Association: about half of the adult population visits a restaurant on any given day, and more than half of the restaurant industry’s annual revenues now come from fast food. Since the average check at a fast food restaurant is much lower that that at a full-service restaurant, my estimate may be too conservative (and the actual number of daily fast food visits may be higher).

4 the hourly wage of the average U.S. worker: By “average” I mean workers assigned to nonsupervisory tasks. See “Real Average Weekly and Hourly Earnings of Production and Non-Supervisory Workers, 1967–98 (1998 Dollars),” Economic Policy Institute, 1999; “Average Hourly and Weekly Earnings by Private Industry Group, 1980–1998,” Statistical Abstract of the United States (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Census Bureau, 1999), p. 443.

about one-third of American mothers… today almost two-thirds: See “Labor Force Participation Rates for Wives, Husbands Present, by Age of Own Youngest Child, 1975–1998,” Statistical Abstract, p. 417.

Cameron Lynne Macdonald and Carmen Sirianni: See Working in the Service Society (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1996), edited by Cameron Lynne Macdonald and Carmen Sirianni, p. 2.

A generation ago, three-quarters of the money… Today about half of the money: The comparison is between money spent on food for consumption at home and money spent on foodservice. See Charlene Price, “Fast Food Chains Penetrate New Markets: Industry Overview,” USDA Food Review, January 1993; “Personal Consumption Expenditures,” U.S. Commerce Department.

90 percent of the country’s new jobs: Cited in Macdonald and Sirianni, Service Society, p. 1.

4 An estimated one out of every eight workers in the United States: Cited in “Welcome to McDonald’s,” McDonald’s Corporation, 1996.

annually hires about one million people: This is my own estimate, based on the following: McDonald’s has about 14,000 restaurants in the United States, each employing about 50 crew members; a conservative estimate of the turnover rate among McDonald’s crew members is about 150 percent; having a workforce of roughly 700,000 and an annual turnover rate of 150 percent requires the hiring of about 1 million new workers every year. In its promotional literature, the McDonald’s Corporation claims to have “surpassed the U.S. Army as the nation’s largest training organization.” Given how McDonald’s actually “trains” its workers, I have used the word “hires” as a synonym. See “Welcome to McDonald’s.”

the nation’s largest purchaser of beef, pork, and potatoes… the second largest purchaser of chicken: See Love, Behind the Arches, pp. 3–4; Mark D. Jekanowski, “Causes and Consequences of Fast Food Sales Growth; Statistical Data Included,” USDA Food Review, January 1, 1999. McDonald’s role as the leading pork purchaser was described to me by a pork industry executive who prefers not to be named.

the largest owner of retail property in the world: See Bruce Upbin, “Beyond Burgers,” Forbes, November 1, 1999; Love, Behind the Arches, p. 4.

earns the majority of its profits: McDonald’s has an unusual franchise arrangement, serving as landlord for its franchisees and adjusting lease payments according to sales levels. About 85 percent of the McDonald’s in the United States are operated by franchisees. See Emerson, New Economics of Fast Food, pp. 59-62; Love, Behind the Arches, pp. 154–57; “Welcome to McDonald’s.”

spends more money on advertising and marketing: Interview with Lynn Fava, Competitive Media Reporting.

the world’s most famous brand: See “McDonald’s Wins Top Spot in Global Brand Ratings,” Brand Strategy, November 22, 1996.

more playgrounds than any other private entity: Its nearest rival, Burger King, operates about one-quarter the number of playgrounds.

one of the nation’s largest distributors of toys: According to the British newspaper the Evening Standard, in 1998 McDonald’s purchased 1.3 billion toys from Chinese manufacturers. Cited in Lachlan Colquhoun, “McDonald’s Soars to Success in Chinese Fast Food Market,” Evening Standard, October 21, 1999.

96 percent could identify Ronald McDonald: Cited in “Welcome to McDonald’s.”

The only fictional character with a higher degree: Max Boas and Steve Chain express some reservations about the accuracy of this study, which was conducted by McDonald’s, but I find it credible. A more recent study, conducted by an independent market research firm, found that at least 80 percent of the children in the nine foreign countries surveyed could recognize Ronald McDonald. See Boas and Chain, Big Mac, p. 115; Love, Behind the Arches, p. 2; and “Barbie, McDonald’s Find Common Ground,” Selling to Kids, September 30, 1998.

more widely recognized than the Christian cross: A survey by a marketing firm called Sponsorship Research International — conducted among 7,000 people in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Australia, India, and Japan — found that 88 percent could identify the golden arches and that 54 percent could identify the Christian cross. The most widely recognized symbol was the interlocking rings of the Olympics. See “Golden Arches More Familiar Than the Cross,” Plain Dealer, August 26, 1995.

5 “the McDonaldization of America”: Jim Hightower, Eat Your Heart Out: Food Profiteering in America (New York: Crown, 1975), p. 237.

“bigger is not better”: Ibid., p. 3.

the final remains of one out of every nine Americans: Cited in Erin Kelly, “Death Takes a Holiday,” Fortune, March 15, 1999.

“We have found out… that we cannot trust”: Quoted in Love, Behind the Arches, p. 144.

6 America’s largest private employer: The health care industry employs more workers, but a large proportion of them work at publicly owned and operated facilities. See “Employment by Selected Industry, with Projections 1986–2006,” Statistical Abstract, p. 429.

the real value of wages in the restaurant industry: See Patrick Barta, “Rises in Many Salaries Barely Keep Pace with Inflation,” Wall Street Journal, February 1, 2000.

roughly 3.5 million fast food workers: The figure was supplied by the National Restaurant Association.

by far the largest group of minimum wage earners in the United States: Interview with Alan B. Krueger, professor of politics and economics at Princeton University.

The only Americans who consistently earn: Fast food workers are at the bottom of the restaurant industry’s pay scale, and the industry pays the lowest wages of any nonagricultural endeavor. Similarly, migrant farm workers are at the bottom of the agricultural pay scale. Although some farm laborers earn a decent hourly wage, many are paid the minimum wage — or less. See “Non-Farm Industries — Employees and Earnings, 1980–1998,” Statistical Abstract, p. 436; and Eric Schlosser, “In the Strawberry Fields,” Atlantic Monthly, November 1995.

approximately three hamburgers: My estimate is based on the following: Per capita consumption of ground beef is now about thirty pounds a year, with the vast majority consumed as hamburgers. A regular hamburger patty at McDonald’s weighs 1.6 ounces; using that as a standard, Americans eat about three hundred burgers a year (five to six a week). Using a Quarter Pounder as the standard, Americans eat about 120 hamburgers a year (at least two a week). The consumption figure that I’ve used assumes an average patty weight somewhere between 1.6 and 4 ounces. See “Hamburger Consumption Takes a Hit, But a Reversal of Fortune Is in Offing,” National Provisioner, August 1999.

four orders of french fries every week: Per capita consumption of frozen potato products (a category that is almost entirely french fries) is about 30 pounds a year. A regular order of french fries at McDonald’s weighs 68 grams. Converting the pounds to kilograms and then dividing that number by 68 leaves you with the number of annual french fry servings: 205 (about four per week). See “Potatoes: U.S. Per Capita Utilization by Category, 1991–1999,” USDA Economic Research Service, 2000.

new restaurants are opening there at a faster pace: See “1999 to Mark Eighth Consecutive Year of Growth for Restaurant Industry,” news release, National Restaurant Association, December 22, 1998.

8 “interstate socialism”: Stephen B. Goddard, Getting There: The Epic Struggle between Road and Rail in the American Century (New York: Basic Books, 1994), p. 179.

the inflation-adjusted value of the minimum wage: Between 1968 and and 1989 the real value of the minimum wage fell from $7.21 to $4.24; in 1995, it stood at $4.38. See “Federal Minimum Wage Rates: 1954–1996,” Statistical Abstract, p. 447.

more prison inmates than full-time farmers: Today there are fewer than 1 million full-time farmers in the United States. And there are about 1.3 million people in the nation’s prisons. For the number of full-time farmers, see “Appendix Table 21 — Characteristics of Farms and Their Operators, by Farm Typology Group, 1996,” Rural Conditions and Trends, USDA Economic Research Service, February 1999. For the number of prison inmates, see “Nation’s Prison and Jail Population Reaches 1,860,520,” press release, Bureau of Justice Statistics, April 19, 2000.

9 “the irrationality of rationality”: See Ritzer, The McDonaldization of America, pp. 121–42.

1. The Founding Fathers

I spent an afternoon with Carl Karcher at his Anaheim office. My account of his life is largely based on that interview and on a pair of corporate histories: B. Carolyn Knight, Making It Happen: The Story of Carl Karcher Enterprises (Anaheim, Calif.: Carl Karcher Enterprises, 1981); and Carl Karcher with B. Carolyn Knight, Never Stop Dreaming: 50 Years of Making It Happen (San Marcos, Calif.: Robert Erdmann Publishing, 1991). For the history of Anaheim, I relied on John Westcott, Anaheim: City of Dreams (Chatsworth, Calif.: Windsor Publications, 1990). My view of early Los Angeles has been greatly influenced by the work of Carey McWilliams, one of the twentieth century’s finest and most underappreciated journalists. His Southern California Country (New York: Duell, Sloan & Pearce, 1946) and California: The Great Exception (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999) are still vibrant and insightful, though first published more than fifty years ago. Mike Davis is in many ways carrying forward the aims and ideals of McWilliams; City of Quartz (New York: Vintage Books, 1992), especially the material on San Bernardino and Fontana, was both useful and inspiring. Kevin Starr’s The Dream Endures: California Enters the 1940s (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997) gave me a strong sense of life there before the “fabulous boom.” Richard White’s “It’s Your Misfortune and None of My Own”: A New History of the American West (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1991) provides a good overview of a region where free enterprise has long been celebrated more in theory than in practice. Marc Reisner’s Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing Water (New York: Penguin Books, 1987) aptly describes how water was brought to Los Angeles, and the rest of the arid West, at public expense. “Aerospace Capital of the World: Los Angeles” — a chapter in The Rise of the Gunbelt: The Military Remapping of Industrial America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991), by Ann Markuson et al. — outlines how military spending fueled southern California’s postwar economy. For California’s role in the spread of the car culture, I relied on Kenneth T. Jackson’s classic Crabgrass Frontier: The Suburbanization of the United States (New York: Oxford University Press, 1985). In Getting There, Stephen B. Goddard shows how the free market had little to do with the triumph of the automobile. Jonathan Kwitny’s “The Great Transportation Conspiracy,” published in Harper’s during February of 1981, is a fine piece of investigative journalism.

The fast food memoir is a growing literary genre; in addition to Carl Karcher’s, I relied on Ray Kroc’s Grinding It Out; James W. McLamore, The Burger King: Jim McLamore and the Building of an Empire (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1998); Tom Monaghan, with Robert Anderson, Pizza Tiger (New York: Random House, 1986); Colonel Harland Sanders, Life As I Have Known It Has Been “Finger Lickin’ Good” (Carol Stream, Ill.: Creation House, 1974); R. David Thomas, Dave’s Way: A New Approach to Old-Fashioned Success (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1991). Richard J. McDonald, one of the founders of the chain with that name, contributed the foreword to Ronald J. McDonald’s interesting book, The Complete Hamburger: The History of America’s Favorite Sandwich (New York: Birch Lane Press, 1997). I learned a great deal from two other books that have similar themes and many evocative photographs: Jeffrey Tennyson, Hamburger Heaven: The Illustrated History of the Hamburger (New York: Hyperion, 1993); and Michael Karl Witzel, The American Drive-In: History and Folklore of the Drive-In Restaurant in American Car Culture (Osceola, Wis.: Motor-books International, 1994). Stan Luxenberg’s Roadside Empires has much information on the early days of the fast food industry, as do John Love’s Behind the Arches and Big Mac, by Max Boas and Steve Chain. William Whitworth’s profile of Colonel Sanders, “Kentucky Fried,” published in the New Yorker on February 14, 1970, remains my favorite piece of writing on fast food.

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13 “The harder you work”: Interview with Carl Karcher.

“This is heaven”: Ibid.

the heart of southern California’s citrus belt: See McWilliams, Southern California Country, p. 206. The chapter titled “The Citrus Belt” is a good account of the region’s cultural and economic life.

14 the leading agricultural counties in the United States: Ibid., p. 213. See also Reisner, Cadillac Desert, p. 87.

about 70,000 acres: Cited in Westcott, Anaheim, p. 67.

the acronym “KIGY”: Ibid., p. 54.

15 “I’m in business for myself now”: Karcher interview.

the population of southern California nearly tripled: Cited in McWilliams, Southern California, p. 14.

About 80 percent of the population: Cited ibid., p. 165.

16 about a million cars in Los Angeles: Cited ibid., p. 236.

Lobbyists from the oil, tire, and automobile industries: See Jackson, Crabgrass Frontier, pp. 163–68.

General Motors secretly began to purchase: For the story of the American trolley’s demise, see Kwitny, “The Great Transportation Conspiracy”; Jackson, Crabgrass Frontier, pp. 168–71; and Goddard, Getting There, pp. 120–37. For a contrary view, much more benign toward General Motors, see Martha J. Bianco, “Technological Innovation and the Rise and Fall of Urban Mass Transit,” Journal of Urban History, March 1999.

17 “People with cars are so lazy”: Quoted in Witzel, American Drive-In, p. 24.

“circular meccas of neon”: Ibid., p. 47.

18 “fabulous boom”: McWilliams, The Great Exception, p. 233.

federal government spent nearly $20 billion… federal spending was responsible for nearly half: Cited in White, Your Misfortune, p. 498.

the second-largest manufacturing center: Ibid., p. 498.

the focus of the local economy: Ibid., p. 515.

19 “Worship as you are”: Quoted in Jackson, Crabgrass Frontier, p. 264.

the fastest-growing city: Cited in Wescott, Anaheim, p. 71.

Richard and Maurice McDonald: For the story of the McDonald brothers, I have relied on Kroc, Grinding It Out; McDonald, Complete Hamburger; Love, Behind the Arches; Tennyson, Hamburger Heaven; Boas and Chain, Big Mac.

20 “Imagine — No Car Hops”: The ad is reprinted in Tennyson, Hamburger Heaven, p. 62.

“Working-class families”: Love, Behind the Arches, p. 41.

21 The same year the McDonald brothers opened: For the founding of the Hell’s Angels and the fiftieth anniversary celebration, see Phillip W. Browne, “Ventura Event a ‘Milestone’ for Hell’s Angels,” Ventura County Star, March 15, 1998.

“They get angry when they read”: Hunter S. Thompson, Hell’s Angels: A Strange and Terrible Saga (New York: Ballantine Books, 1995), p. 45.

22 impressed by Adolf Hitler’s Reichsautobahn: See Goddard, Getting There, p. 181;

“1956: Interstate,” Business Week: 100 Years of Innovation, Summer 1999.

46,000 miles of road: “1956: Interstate.”

“Our food was exactly the same”: George Clark, one of the founders of Burger Queen, made this admission. Quoted in Luxenberg, Roadside Empires, p. 76.

William Rosenberg: For the story of Dunkin’ Donuts, see Luxenberg, Roadside Empires, pp. 18–20.

Glenn W. Bell, Jr.: For the story of Taco Bell, see Love, Behind the Arches, pp. 267; Jakle and Sculle, Fast Food, pp. 257–58.

Keith G. Cramer: For the story of Burger King, see McLamore, The Burger King.

Dave Thomas: For the story of Wendy’s, see Thomas, Dave’s Way.

23 Thomas S. Monaghan: For the story of Domino’s, see Monaghan, Pizza Tiger.

Harland Sanders: For the story of KFC, see Sanders, Life As I Have Known It; and Whitworth, “Kentucky Fried.”

“not to call a no-good, lazy”: Sanders, Life As I Have Known It, p. 141.

24 The Motormat: See Witzel, American Drive-In, p. 121.

the Biff-Burger chain: See Tennyson, Hamburger Heaven, p. 73.

“Miracle Insta Machines”: See McLamore, The Burger King, photo insert between pp. 126 and 127.

25 one of the largest privately owned fast food chains: Karcher, Never Stop Dreaming, p. 79.

accused of insider trading: See Karcher, Never Stop Dreaming, pp. 123–24; Bruce Horovitz and Keith Bradsher, “Carl’s Jr. Founder Accused of Insider Trading Scheme,” Los Angeles Times, April 15, 1988; and Richard Martin, “Karchers Pay $664,000 Fine in Stock Case,” Nation’s Restaurant News, August 7, 1989.

25 Carl’s real estate investments proved unwise: My account of Carl Karcher’s financial difficulties is based primarily on my interview with him. I confirmed the details through a variety of printed sources, including “Carl Karcher Board Rejects Founder’s Bid to Take Firm Private,” Wall Street Journal, December 21, 1992; Thomas R. King, “Chairman of Carl Karcher Enterprises May Seek to Oust Some Board Members,” Wall Street Journal, September 2, 1993; Peggy Hesketh, “Karcher’s ‘Godfather’: Board Says Pizza Baron’s Offer Is One It Can Refuse,” Orange County Business Journal, September 20, 1993; David J. Jefferson, “Fast Food Firm Ousts Karcher as Chairman,” Wall Street Journal, October 4, 1993; Jim Gardner, “Foley-Karcher: Tentative Team in Control of CKE,” Orange County Business Journal, December 20, 1993; Richard Martin, “Carl N. Karcher: CKE’s Founder Reflects on His Past, Looks Toward His Future,” Nation’s Restaurant News, August 3, 1998.

2. Your Trusted Friends

For the story of Ray Kroc, I relied mainly on his memoir, Grinding It Out; Max Boas and Steven Chain, Big Mac, and John Love, Behind the Arches. My visit to the Ray A. Kroc museum provided many useful insights into the man. Steven Watts’s The Magic Kingdom: Walt Disney and the American Way of Life (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1997), is by far the best biography of Disney, drawing extensively upon material from the Disney archive and interviews with Disney’s associates. Although I disagree with some of Watts’s conclusions, his research is extraordinary. Richard Schickel’s The Disney Version: The Life, Times, Art, and Commerce of Walt Disney (New York: Avon Books, 1968) remains provocative and highly relevant more than three decades after its publication. Leonard Mosley’s Disney’s World (New York: Stein and Day, 1985) and Marc Eliot’s Walt Disney: Hollywood’s Dark Prince (London: Andre Deutsch, 1993) offer a counterpoint to the hagiographies sponsored by the Walt Disney Company. My view of American attitudes toward technology was greatly influenced by two books: Leo Marx’s The Machine in the Garden: Technology and the Pastoral Ideal in America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1970) and David E. Nye’s American Technological Sublime (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1994).

In the growing literature on marketing to children, three books are worth mentioning for what they (often inadvertently) reveal: Dan S. Acuff with Robert H. Reiher, What Kids Buy and Why: The Psychology of Marketing to Kids (New York: Free Press, 1997); Gene Del Vecchio, Creating Ever-Cool: A Marketer’s Guide to a Kid’s Heart (Gretna, La.: Pelican Publishing, 1998); and James U. McNeal, Kids As Customers: A Handbook of Marketing to Children (New York: Lexington Books, 1992). Some of the articles in children’s marketing journals, such as Selling to Kids and Entertainment Marketing Letter, are remarkable documents for future historians. Two fine reports introduced me to the whole subject of marketing in America’s schools: Consumers Union Education Services, “Captive Kids: A Report on Commercial Pressures on Kids at School,” Consumers Union, 1998; and Alex Molnar, “Sponsored Schools and Commercialized Classrooms: Schoolhouse Commercializing Trends in the 1990s,” Center for the Analysis of Commercialism in Education, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, August 1998. The Center for Science in the Public Interest has been battling for food safety and proper nutrition for more than thirty years. Michael Jacobson’s report “Liquid Candy: How Soft Drinks Are Harming Americans’ Health,” October 1998, is another fine example of the center’s work. The corporate memos from the McDonald’s advertising campaign were given to me by someone who thought I’d find them “enlightening,” and indeed they are.

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32 “One of the highlights of my sixty-first birthday”: Exhibit, Ray A. Kroc Museum.

33 “to order, control, and keep clean”: Schickel, Disney Version, p. 24.

even more famous than Mickey Mouse: According to John Love, Ronald McDonald is the most widely recognized commercial character in the United States. Love, Behind the Arches, p. 222.

34 “That was where I learned”: Kroc, Grinding It Out, p. 17.

“If you believe in it”: Voice recording, Ray A. Kroc Museum.

35 “When I saw it”: Kroc, Grinding It Out, p. 71.

“through the eyes of a salesman”: Ibid., pp. 9–10, 72.

$100,000 a year in profits: Love, Behind the Arches, p. 19.

“This little fellow comes in”: Voice recording, Ray A. Kroc Museum.

“Dear Walt”: Quoted in Leslie Doolittle, “McDonald’s Plan Cooked Up Decades Ago,” Orlando Sentinel, January 8, 1998.

According to one account: See Boas and Chain, Big Mac, p. 25.

36 “He was regarded as a strange duck”: Kroc, Grinding It Out, p. 19.

describes Walt Disney’s efforts: See Watts, Magic Kingdom, pp. 164–74.

“fun factory”: Ibid., p. 167.

“Hundreds of young people were being trained”: Quoted ibid., p. 170.

37 “Don’t forget this”: Quoted ibid., p. 223.

“Look, it is ridiculous to call this an industry”: Quoted in Boas and Chain, Big Mac, pp. 15–16.

gave $250,000 to President Nixon’s reelection campaign: For varying interpretations of Kroc’s donation, see Kroc, Grinding It Out, p. 191–2; Love, Behind the Arches, pp. 357–9; Boas and Chain, Big Mac, pp. 198–206; and Luxenberg, Roadside Empires, pp. 246–48.

“sons of bitches”: Kroc, Grinding It Out, p. 191.

38 more than 90 percent of his studio’s output: See Watts, Magic Kingdom, p. 235.

39 an early and enthusiastic member of the Nazi Party: For von Braun’s political affiliations, the conditions at Dora-Nordhausen, and the American recruitment of Nazi scientists, I have relied on Tom Bower, The Paperclip Conspiracy: The Hunt for Nazi Scientists (Boston: Little, Brown, 1987); Linda Hunt, Secret Agenda: The United States Government, Nazi Scientists, and Project Paperclip, 1945 to 1990 (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1991); Michael J. Neufeld, The Rocket and the Reich: Peenemünde and the Coming of the Ballistic Missile Era (New York: Free Press, 1995); and Dennis Piszkiewicz, Wernher von Braun: The Man Who Sold the Moon (Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 1998).

39 von Braun was giving orders to Disney animators: For a brief account of Disney and von Braun, see the chapter “Disneyland” in Piszkiewicz, von Braun, pp. 83–91.

another key Tomorrowland adviser: I stumbled upon Heinz Haber’s unusual career path while doing research on another project. Haber was a protégé of Dr. Hubertus Strughold, the director of the Luftwaffe Institute for Aviation Medicine. Strughold later became chief scientist at the U.S. Air Force’s Aerospace Medical Division, had a U.S. Air Force library named after him, and was hailed as “the father of U.S. space medicine.” I pieced together Heinz Haber’s wartime behavior from the following: Otto Gauer and Heinz Haber, “Man Under Gravity-Free Conditions,” in German Aviation Medicine, World War II, vol. 1 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Air Force, 1950), pp. 641–43; Henry G. Armstrong, Heinz Haber, and Hubertus Strughold, “Aero Medical Problems of Space Travel” (panel meeting, School of Aviation Medicine), Journal of Aviation Medicine, December 1949; “Clinical Factors: USAF Aerospace Medicine,” in Mae Mills Link, Space Medicine in Project Mercury (NASA SP-4003, 1965); “Beginnings of Space Medicine,” “Zero G,” and “Multiple G,” in Loyds Swenson, Jr., James M. Grimwood, and Charles C. Alexander, This New Ocean: A History of Project Mercury (NASA SP-4201, 1966); “History of Research in Subgravity and Zero-G at the Air Force Missile Development Center 1948–1958,” in History of Research in Space Biology and Biodynamics at the US Air Force Missile Development Center, Holloman Air Force Base, New Mexico, 1946–1958 (Historical Division, Air Force Missile Development Center, Holloman Air Force Base).

the Luftwaffe Institute for Aviation Medicine: Accounts of the concentration camp experiments administered by the Luftwaffe can be found in Bower, Paperclip Conspiracy, pp. 214–32, and Hunt, Secret Agenda, pp. 78–93.

When the Eisenhower administration asked Walt Disney: See Mark Langer, “Disney’s Atomic Fleet,” Animation World Magazine, April 1998.

a popular children’s book: Heinz Haber, The Walt Disney Story of Our Friend the Atom (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1956).

40 Disney had signed seventy licensing deals: See Watts, Magic Kingdom, pp. 161–62.

41 “A child who loves our TV commercials”: Kroc, Grinding It Out, p. 114.

An ad agency designed the outfit: For the story of Willard Scott and Ronald McDonald, see Love, Behind the Arches, pp. 218–22, 244–45.

“If they were drowning to death”: Quoted in Penny Moser, “The McDonald’s Mystique,” Fortune, July 4, 1988.

42 park, tentatively called Western World: For Kroc’s amusement park schemes, see Love, Behind the Arches, pp. 411–13.

43 “the decade of the child consumer”: McNeal, Kids as Customers, p. 6.

as early as the age of two: Cited in “Brand Aware,” Children’s Business, June 2000.

children often recognize a brand logo: See “Brand Consciousness,” IFF on Kids: Kid Focus, no. 3.

a 1991 study… found: Paul Fischer et al., “Brand Logo Recognition by Children Aged 3 to 6 Years: Mickey Mouse and Old Joe the Camel,” Journal of the American Medical Association, December 11, 1991.

43 Another study found: See Judann Dagnoli, “JAMA Lights New Fire Under Camel’s Ads,” Advertising Age, December 16, 1991.

the CME KidCom Ad Traction Study II: Cited in “Market Research Ages 6–17: Talking Chihuahua Strikes Chord with Kids,” Selling to Kids, February 3, 1999.

“It’s not just getting kids to whine”: Quoted in “Market Research: The Old Nagging Game Can Pay off for Marketers,” Selling to Kids, April 15, 1998.

Vance Packard described children as “surrogate salesmen”: See Boas and Chain, Big Mac, p. 127; Vance Packard, The Hidden Persuaders (New York: D. McKay, 1957), pp. 158–61.

44 “children’s requesting styles and appeals”: McNeal, Kids as Customers, pp. 72–75. “Kid Kustomers”: Ibid., p. 4.

“The key is getting children to see a firm”: Ibid., p. 98.

learn about their tastes: For a sense of the techniques now being used by marketers, see Tom McGee, “Getting Inside Kids’ Heads,” American Demographics, January 1997.

45 roughly 80 percent of children’s dreams: Cited in Acuff, What Kids Buy and Why, pp. 45–46.

“Marketing messages sent through a club”: McNeal, Kids As Customers, p. 175.

increased the sales of children’s meals: Cited in Karen Benezra, “Keeping Burger King on a Roll,” Brandweek, January 15, 1996.

a federal investigation of Web sites aimed at children: Cited in “Children’s Online Privacy Proposed Rule Issued by FTC,” press release, Federal Trade Commission, April 20, 1999.

“the ultimate authority in everything”: Quoted in “Is Your Kid Caught Up in the Web?” Consumer Reports, May 1997.

The site encouraged kids: See Matthew McAllester, “Life in Cyberspace: What’s McDonald’s Doing with Kids’ E-mail Responses?” Newsday, July 20, 1997.

46 “They cannot protect themselves”: Quoted in Linda E. Demkovich, “Pulling the Sweet Tooth of Children’s TV Advertising,” National Journal, January 7, 1978.

“We are delighted by the FTC’s reasonable recommendation”: Quoted in A. O. Sulzberger, Jr., “FTC Staff Urges End to Child-TV Ad Study,” New York Times, April 3, 1981.

about 80 percent of all television viewing by kids: Cited in Steve McClellan and Richard Tedesco, “Children’s TV Market May Be Played Out,” Broadcasting & Cable, March 1, 1999.

about twenty-one hours a week: Cited in “Policy Statement: Media Education,” American Academy of Pediatrics, August 1999.

more time watching television than doing: Cited in “Policy Statement: Children, Adolescents, and Television,” American Academy of Pediatrics, October 1995.

more than thirty thousand TV commercials: Cited in Mary C. Martin, “Children’s Understanding of the Intent of Advertising: A Meta-Analysis,” Journal of Public Policy & Marketing, Fall 1997one-quarter of American children: Cited in Lisa Jennings, “Baby, Hand Me the Remote,” Scripps Howard News Service, October 13, 1999.

47 annually spend about $3 billion on television: Interview with Lynn Fava, Competitive Media Reporting.

47 now operates more than eight thousand playgrounds… Burger King has more than two thousand: Cited in “Fast Food and Playgrounds: A Natural Combination,” promotional material, Playlandservices, Inc.

“Playlands bring in children”: Ibid.

about 90 percent of American children: Cited in Rod Taylor, “The Beanie Factor,” Brandweek, June 16, 1997.

“But when it gets down to brass tacks”: Sam Bradley and Betsey Spethmann, “Subway’s Kid Pack: The Ties That Sell,” Brandweek, October 10, 1994.

According to a publication called Tomart’s: Meredith Williams, Tomart’s Price Guide to McDonald’s Happy Meal Collectibles (Dayton, Ohio: Tomart Publications, 1995).

one of the most successful promotions: The story of McDonald’s Teenie Beanie Baby promotion can be found in Taylor, “The Beanie Factor.”

48 “We see this as a great opportunity”: Quoted in “McDonald’s Launches Second Animated Video in Series Starring Ronald McDonald,” press release, McDonald’s Corporation, January 21, 1999.

Ball told the Hollywood Reporter: See T. L. Stanley, Hollywood Reporter, May 26, 1998.

49 Some industry observers thought Disney: See Thomas R. King, “Mickey May Be the Big Winner in Disney-McDonal’s Alliance,” Wall Street Journal, May 24, 1996.

the McDonald’s Corporation had turned away offers: See Monci Jo Williams, “McDonald’s Refuses to Plateau,” Fortune, November 12, 1984.

“A lot of people can’t get used to the fact”: Quoted in James Bates, “You Want First-Run Features with Those Fries?” Newsday, May 11, 1997.

51 gaining it just $37,500 a year: Cited in Eric Dexheimer, “Class Warfare,” Denver Westword, February 6, 1997.

For $12,000, a company got… Within a year, DeRose had nearly tripled: Ibid.

52 “Discover your own river of revenue”: Quoted in Molnar, “Sponsored Schools and Commercialized Classrooms,” p. 28.

“if it weren’t for the acute need for funds”: Quoted in Brian McTaggart, “Selling Our Schools,” Houston Chronicle, August 10, 1997.

53 “You’ve reached Grapevine-Colleyville”: Quoted in G. Chambers Williams III, “Fliers May Be Seeing Ads on Roofs of Grapevine-Colleyville Schools,” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, March 4, 1997.

Dan DeRose tells reporters: See “The Art of the Deal,” Food Management, February 1998.

“In Kansas City they were getting 67 cents a kid”: Quoted in Constance L. Hays, “Today’s Lesson: Soda Rights,” New York Times, May 21, 1999.

“There are critics to penicillin”: Quoted in Tracy Correa, “Campus Market: Corporate America Is Coming to Fresno-Area Schools with Ads That Target Children and Their Parents,” Fresno Bee, November 9, 1998.

Thus far, DeRose has been responsible for: Voice mail from Dan DeRose.

control 90.3 percent of the U.S. market: Cited in G. Pascal Zachary, “Let’s Play Oligopoly! Why Giants Like Having Other Giants Around,” Wall Street Journal, March 8, 1999.

53 about fifty-six gallons per person: Cited in Greg W. Prince, “The Year of Living Dangerously,” Beverage World, March 15, 2000.

Coca-Cola has set itself the goal: See Dean Foust, “Man on the Spot: Nowadays Things Go Tougher at Coke,” Business Week, May 3, 1999.

“Influencing elementary school students”: Kent Steinriede, “Sponsorship scorecard 1999,” Beverage Industry, January 1999.

54 “We at McDonald’s are thankful”: Quoted in Ernest Holsendorph, “Keeping McDonald’s Out in Front: ‘Gas’ Is No Problem; Chicken May Be Served,” New York Times, December 30, 1973.

McDonald’s sells more Coca-Cola: Cited in “Welcome to McDonald’s.”

about $4.25 a gallon: According to Business Week, Burger King annually pays Coke $170 million for 40 million gallons of syrup. That works out to a cost of about $4.25 a gallon — or 3.3 cents an ounce. It is safe to assume that McDonald’s, an even larger customer, buys its syrup at a price that is equivalent, if not lower. See Foust, “Man on the Spot.”

A medium Coke that sells for $1.29: The standard soft drink ratio is one part syrup to five parts carbonated water. A small Coke at McDonald’s contains about 2.6 ounces of syrup; a medium Coke, about 3.5 ounces. For the composition of soft drinks, see Lauren Curtis, “Pop Art,” Food Product Design, January 1998.

55 A 1997 study: Cited in Jacobson, “Liquid Candy,” p. 10.

“It’s our responsibility to make it clear”: Quoted in Martha Groves, “Serving Kids… Up to Marketers,” Los Angeles Times, July 14, 1999.

The principal said Cameron could have been suspended: See Frank Swoboda, “Pepsi Prank Fizzles at School’s Coke Day,” Washington Post, March 26, 1998.

“I don’t consider this a prank”: Quoted ibid.

“the earth could benefit rather than be harmed”: Quoted in Consumers Union, “Captive Kids.”

56 About twenty million elementary school students: Cited in “Pizza Hut Book It! Awards $50,000 to Elementary Schools,” PR Newswire, June 6, 2000.

The group claims that its publications: See Consumers Union, “Captive Kids.”

“Now you can enter the classroom”: Quoted in Alex Molnar, “Advertising in the Classroom,” San Diego Union-Tribune, March 10, 1993.

“Through these materials, your product”: Quoted in Consumers Union, “Captive Kids.”

eight million of the nations middle, junior, and high school: Cited in “Prepared Testimony of Ralph Nader before the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions,” Federal New Service, May 20, 1999.

At least twenty school districts: Cited in Diane Brockett, “School Cafeterias Selling Brand-Name Junk Food,” Education Digest, October 1, 1998.

The American School Food Service Association estimates: Cited in Dan Morse, “School Cafeterias are Enrolling as Fast-Food Franchisees,” Wall Street Journal, July 28, 1998.

“We try to be more like the fast food places”: Quoted in Janet Bingham, “Corporate Curriculum: And Now a Word, Lesson, Lunch, from a Sponsor,” Denver Post, February 22, 1998.

57 The Coca-Cola deal that DD Marketing negotiated: For the story of District 11’s shortfall, see Cara DeGette, “The Real Thing: Corporate Welfare Comes to the Classroom,” Colorado Springs Independent, November 25-December 1, 1998.

3. Behind the Counter

For the history of the Pikes Peak region, I relied on Carl Ubbelohde, Maxine Benson, and Duane A. Smith, A Colorado History (Boulder, Colo.: Pruett Publishing, 1995); Patricia Farris Skolout, Colorado Springs History A to Z (Colorado Springs: Patricia Farris Skolout, 1992); Judith Reid Finley, Time Capsule 1900: Colorado Springs a Century Ago (Colorado Springs: Pastword Publishing, 1998); and two entertaining books by Marshall Sprague, Money Mountain: The Story of Cripple Creek Gold (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1979), and Newport in the Rockies: The Life and Good Times of Colorado Springs (Athens, Ohio: Swallow Press, 1987). Markusen et al., The Rise of the Gunbelt, contains an excellent chapter entitled “Space Mountain: Generals and Boosters Build Colorado Springs,” pp. 174–210.

For the driving forces behind sprawl, I relied principally on: F. Caid Benfield, Matthew D. Raimi, Donald D. T. Chen, Once There Were Greenfields: How Urban Sprawl Is Undermining America’s Environment, Economy, and Social Fabric (Washington, D.C.: National Resources Defense Council, 1999); James Howard Kunstler, The Geography of Nowhere: The Rise and Decline of America’s Man-Made Landscape (New York: Touchstone, 1994); Philip Langdon, A Better Place to Live: Reshaping the American Suburb (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1994). John C. Melaniphy’s Restaurant and Fast Food Site Selection (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1992) helped me see how the economic needs of the fast food chains have directly contributed to the nationwide spread of sprawl. Two site selection experts explained how the latest geographic information systems combine satellite data, census data, and market research to determine the best location for a new fast food restaurant: Libby Duane, the marketing director at SRC LLC, whose “Site Analyzer” is used by Church’s Chicken and Popeye’s, among other chains; and Elliott Olson, the chairman of the Dakota Worldwide Corporation, which distributes a PC version of the Quintillion software developed by McDonald’s. Mr. Olson was kind enough to send me a demonstration disk of Quintillion.

Space does not permit me to list all of the people whom I interviewed about the economic, cultural, and social life of Colorado Springs today. Some people, however, were especially helpful or insightful: guidance counselors Cheryl Griesinger at Cheyenne Mountain High School, Mike Foreman and Nancy Martinez at Manitou Springs High School, Jane Trogdon at Harrison High School, and Chris Christian at Palmer High School; Elisa, Carlos, and Cynthia Zamot; the architect Morey Bean; Richard Conway of Conway’s Red Top Restaurant; Richard and Judy Noyes at the Chinook Bookshop; Rocky Scott, president of the Greater Colorado Springs Economic Development Corporation; Cara DeGette, news editor of the Colorado Springs Independent; Amy D. Haimerl, editor of the Colorado Springs Business Journal; Major Mike Birmingham at the U.S. Space Command; Joe Brady, co-owner of The Hide & Seek; Toast and Marcea, proprietors of the Holey Rollers Tattoo Parlor; and the lovely elderly woman who gave me a guided tour of the Focus on the Family headquarters complex, whose name I will not mention. For a sense of James Dobson’s philosophy, I read his child-rearing guide The New Dare to Discipline (Wheaton, Ill.: Tyndale House Publishers, 1992) and Gil Alexander-Moegerle, James Dobson’s War on America (Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 1997).

Robert Emerson’s The New Economics of Fast Food has useful material on the labor costs and policies of the major chains, as do John Love’s Behind the Arches and Big Mac, by Max Boas and Steve Chain. Robin Leidner and Ester Reiter are sociologists who worked at chain restaurants in order to write about the nature of such employment. Reiter’s Making Fast Food: From the Frying Pan into the Fryer (Montreal: McGill–Queen’s University Press, 1991) focuses on Burger King, while Leidner’s Fast Food, Fast Talk: Service Work and the Routinization of Everyday Life (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993) looks at McDonald’s. Quick Service that Sells!: The Art of Profitable Hospitality for Quick-Service Restaurants (Denver: Pencom International, 1997), written by Phil “Zoom” Roberts and Christopher O’Donnell, reveals some motivational tricks of the trade.

Working in the Service Society, edited by Lynn Macdonald and Carmen Sirianni, suggests how the labor policies of the fast food industry are now being adopted throughout the American economy. Alan B. Krueger, a professor of economics and public affairs at Princeton University, outlined for me some of his research on the fast food industry and the minimum wage. I also found the book that he wrote with David Card, Myth and Measurement: The New Economics of the Minimum Wage (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995), to be useful. A recent study by the USDA Economic Research Service cogently refutes the argument that higher wages will harm the fast food industry. The study, written by Chinkook Lee and Brian O’Roark, is titled “The Impact of Minimum Wage Increases on Food and Kindred Products Prices: An Analysis of Price Pass-Through” (Washington, D.C.: Food and Rural Economics Division, USDA Economic Research Service, Technical Bulletin No. 1877, July 1999). A report by the Institute of Medicine’s Committee on the Health and Safety Implications of Child Labor — Protecting Youth at Work: Health, Safety, and Development of Working Children and Adolescents in the United States (Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1998) — outlines the social consequences of a teenage workforce. Many of its conclusions were foreshadowed by a National Safe Workplace Institute report, Sacrificing America’s Youth: The Problem of Child Labor and the Response of Government (Chicago: National Safe Workplace Institute, 1992). Two other reports were useful: Janice Windau, Eric Sygnatur, and Guy Toscano, “Profile of Work Injuries Incurred by Young Workers,” Monthly Labor Review, June 1, 1999; and Report on the Youth Labor Force (Washington, D.C., U.S. Department of Labor, June 2000). For the section on fast food crime, I interviewed law enforcement officers in Colorado Springs, Los Angeles, and Omaha — as well as Joseph A. Kinney, president of the National Safe Workplace Institute, and Jerald Greenberg, an expert on workplace theft and a professor of ethics and business management at the University of Ohio.

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61 About a third of the city’s inhabitants: Cited in “Colorado Springs Facts,” Colorado Springs Chamber of Commerce.

the population of the Colorado Springs metropolitan area: See “Colorado Springs Fact Sheet,” Greater Colorado Springs Economic Development Corporation, June 1998; and “Metropolitan Area Population Estimates for July 1, 1998, and Population Change for April 1990 to July 1998,” U.S. Census Bureau, September 30, 1999.

61 Denver’s population is about four times larger: See “Metropolitan Area Population Estimates,” and Terry Cotten, “Springs Council Adopts Budget,” Denver Post, November 29, 1999.

about one-fifth of the city’s housing sat vacant: Cited in Markusen et al., Rise of the Gunbelt, p. 178.

a direct capital investment of $30 million: Ibid., p. 178.

62 nearly half the jobs in Colorado Springs: Interview with Rocky Scott, president of the Greater Colorado Springs Economic Development Corporation.

“In Your Face from Outer Space”: The unit is the U.S. Air Force Space Warfare Center.

the rate of union membership: Cited in “Colorado Springs: The Pikes Peak Region,” Greater Colorado Springs Development Agency, 1997.

Hoiles was politically conservative: See James S. Granelli, “The Fight for Freedom Newspapers,” Los Angeles Times, November 17, 1985.

advocates spanking disobedient children: See Dobson, The New Dare to Discipline, pp. 1–7, 50, 64.

generates much larger annual revenues: See Alexander-Moegerle, Dobson’s War on America, p. 13.

64 more staunchly Republican than the American South: See Valerie Richardson, “Population Flow Upends West’s Politics,” Washington Times, February 28, 1999.

approximately one million people: Cited in William H. Frey, “Immigrant and Native Migrant Magnets,” American Demographics, November 1996. See also William G. Deming, “A decade of economic change and population shifts in U.S. regions,” Monthly Labor Review, November 1996.

“the new white flight”: William H. Frey, “The New White Flight,” American Demographics, April 1994.

about 100,000 people: Cited in Donald Blount, “Colorado’s Pace of Growth Likely to Taper Off in 1999,” Denver Post, February 7, 1999.

ranked forty-ninth in the nation: The ranking, by Education Week magazine in 1998, took into account the state’s per capita spending on schools, cost of living, and personal income. Cited in Janet Bingham, “Schools Get Lower Marks,” Denver Post, January 8, 1999.

three times the number of cars: Cited in Terri Cotten, “Colorado Springs: City Grapples with Gridlock,” Denver Post, May 23, 1999.

annual surplus of about $700 million: Cited in Burt Hubbard, “Tax Cut Feeding Frenzy,” Rocky Mountain News, April 18, 1999.

one-third of the surface area: See White, It’s Your Misfortune, p. 550.

65 the largest private employer in the state today: Cited in “1998 Menu of Facts,” Colorado Restaurant Association.

restaurant industry has grown much faster than the population: To determine the rate of growth, I counted the number of restaurants listed in the Colorado Springs Yellow Pages in 1967 and 1997.

66 more than 70 percent of fast food visits: Cited in J. P. Donlon, “Quinlan Fries Harder: Interview with McDonald’s CEO Michael Quinlan,” Chief Executive, January 11, 1998. See also Judith Waldrop, “Most Restaurant Meals Are Bought on Impulse,” American Demographics, February 1994.

66 Ray Kroc flew in a Cessna… McDonald’s later used helicopters: See Kroc, Grinding It Out, p. 176.

one of the world’s leading purchasers of commercial satellite: Interview with Elliott Olson.

“spy on their customers”: William Dunn, “Skycams Drain Floods, Save Lives, Sell Burgers,” American Demographics, July 1992.

68 two-thirds of the nation’s fast food workers: Cited in Robert W. Van Giezen, “Occupational Wages in the Fast Food Industry,” Monthly Labor Review, August 1994; and Alan Liddle, “Diversity at Work: Teenagers,” Nation’s Restaurant News, May 24, 1999.

Business historian Alfred D. Chandler has argued: Alfred D. Chandler, Jr., The Visible Hand: The Managerial Revolution in American Business (Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1977), pp. 241–42.

69 The guacamole isn’t made by workers: See Joel Millman, “These Days, Mexico Serves as a Giant Offshore Kitchen,” Wall Street Journal, January 19, 2000.

70 “Smile with a greeting”: Quoted in Reiter, Making Fast Food, p. 85.

“When management determines exactly”: Leidner, Fast Food, Fast Talk, p. 3.

English is now the second language: Cited in Rita Rousseau, “Employing the New America,” Restaurants and Institutions, March 15, 1997.

71 a 1999 conference on foodservice equipment: The conference was COEX ’99, the Twenty-sixth Annual Chain Operators Exchange. The panel was Breakout Session C: “Too Many Cooks… Cutting Labor Cost in the Kitchen.” The participants were Larry Behm, vice president, restaurant systems engineering, Taco Bell Corporation; Dave Brewer, vice president, engineering KFC-Tricon; Jane Gannaway, vice president, restaurant planning, design and procurement, Hardee’s; Jerry Sus, home office director, equipment systems engineering, McDonald’s Corporation; and John Reckert, director of strategic operations and research & development, Burger King Corporation. The session was recorded by Convention Tapes International, Miami, Florida.

72 an investigation by the U.S. Department of Labor: Cited in L. M. Sixel, “Giving Tax Break a Second Chance; Credit to Hire Disadvantaged Returns,” Houston Chronicle, October 16, 1996. See also Ben Wildavsky, “Taking Credit,” National Journal, March 29, 1997.

as much as $385 million in subsidies: Cited in Sixel, “Giving Tax Break a Second Chance.”

“They’ve got to crawl”: Quoted ibid.

about 1 million migrant farm workers: See Schlosser, “In the Strawberry Fields.”

73 about 300 to 400 percent: The lower figure is cited in Jennifer Waters, “R&I Executive of the Year: Robert Nugent,” Restaurants and Institutions, July 1, 1998. The higher figure, remarkably, comes from Denise Fugo, treasurer of the National Restaurant Association, quoted in Lornet Turnbull, “Restaurants Feeding Off Fit Economy,” February 23, 1999.

a higher proportion of its workers: Interview with Alan B. Krueger.

73 the real value of the U.S. minimum wage: See Krueger, Myth and Measurement, p. 6.

In the late 1990s, the real value: Cited in Aaron Bernstein, “A Perfect Time to Raise the Minimum Wage,” Business Week, May 17, 1999.

a federal guest worker program: See Jerd Smith, “Undocumented Workers Enliven State’s Economy, But at What Costs to Other Residents and Agencies?” Rocky Mountain News, April 18, 1999.

a 1997 survey in Nation’s Restaurant News: Alan Liddle, “Demand Fuels Salary, Bonus Surge; Wages Still Lag,” Nation’s Restaurant News, August 18, 1997.

Increasing the federal minimum wage by a dollar: According to economists Chinkook Lee and Brian O’Roark, every fifty cent increase in the minimum wage leads to a 1 percent price increase at restaurants. A McDonald’s hamburger costs 99 cents; a 2 percent increase in price is about 2 cents. See Lee and O’Roark, “Impact of Minimum Wage Increases.”

Roughly 90 percent of the nation’s fast food workers: Of the roughly fifty to sixty employees at a a typical McDonald’s, only four or five are full-time, salaried managers. See Leidner, Fast Food, Fast Talk, p. 50–54.

74 an average of thirty hours a week: Cited in Robert W. Van Giezen, “Occupational Wages in the Fast-Food Restaurant Industry,” Monthly Labor Review, August 1994.

earn about $23,000 a year: Cited in Liddle, “Demand Fuels Salary, Bonus Surge.”

training in “transactional analysis”: See Boas and Chain, Big Mac, pp. 91–93; Ben Wildavsky, “McJobs: Inside America’s Largest Youth Training Program,” Policy Review, Summer 1989.

75 forced to clean restaurants… compensated with food: See Gillian Flynn, “Pizza As Pay? Compensation Gets Too Creative,” Workforce, August 1998.

As many as 16,000 current and former employees… a high school dropout named Regina Jones: See E. Scott Reckard, “Jury: Taco Bell Short-changed Its Employees,” Los Angeles Times, April 9, 1997; Steve Miletich, “Taco Bell Is Found Guilty of Worker Abuses,” Seattle Post-Intelligencer, April 9, 1997; Stephanie Armour, “One Woman’s Story: More and More Workers Are Being Asked to Work Overtime Without Pay,” USA Today, April 22, 1998.

the trait most valued: Reiter, Making Fast Food, p. 129.

76 A “flying squad” of experienced managers: See Love, Behind the Arches, pp. 394–95; Boas and Chain, Big Mac, pp. 94–112.

amid a bitter organizing drive in San Francisco: For the events in San Francisco, see Boas and Chain, Big Mac, pp. 104–12

77 employed fifteen attorneys: Cited in Bill Tieleman, “Did Somebody Say McUnion? Not If They Want to Keep Their McJob,” National Post, March 29, 1999.

“one of the most anti-union companies on the planet”: Quoted in Mike King, “McDonald’s Workers Win the Union War But Lose Jobs,” Ottawa Citizen, March 3, 1998.

a money-loser: See Mike King, “McDonald’s to Go,” Montreal Gazette, February 15, 1998.

77 about 300 to 1: Roughly three McDonald’s closed per year in Canada during the early 1990s, while about eighty new ones annually opened. Cited in King, “McDonald’s to Go.”

“Did somebody say McUnion?”: Tieleman, “McUnion?”

80 Numerous studies have found:” See Protecting Youth at Work, pp. 225–26. Teenage boys who work longer hours: Ibid., p. 132.

“IT’S TIME FOR BRINGING IN THE GREEN!”: The ad appeared in the Colorado Springs Gazette on March 20, 1999. My account of the working conditions at FutureCall is based on conversations with former employees. For more on FutureCall, see Jeremy Simon, “Telemarketing,” Colorado Springs Gazette, February 15, 1999.

82 George, a former Taco Bell employee: Whenever a person is identified only by a first name in this book, the name is a pseudonym. All of the people described really exist; none is a composite.

83 The injury rate of teenage workers: Cited in Protecting Youth at Work, p. 4. about 200,000 are injured on the job: Ibid., p. 68.

Roughly four or five fast food workers are now murdered… more restaurant workers were murdered on the job: In 1998, the most recent year for which figures are available, fifty-two police officers and detectives were murdered on the job — and sixty-nine restaurant workers were murdered on the job, mainly during robberies. The vast majority of restaurant robberies occur at fast food restaurants, because they are open late, staffed by teenagers, full of cash, and convenient. The homicide figures are cited in Eric F. Sygnatur and Guy A. Toscano, “Work-Related Homicides: The Facts,” Compensation and Working Conditions, Spring 2000.

more attractive to armed robbers than convenience stores: See Laurie Grossman, “Easy Marks: Fast-Food Industry is Slow to Take Action Against Growing Crime,” Wall Street Journal, September 22, 1994; Kerry Lydon, “Prime Crime Targets; Highly Publicized Restaurant Crimes Have Drawn Both Criminal and Customer Attention to Security Lapses,” Restaurants and Institutions, June 15, 1995; Milford Prewitt, Naomi R. Kooker, Alan J. Liddle, and Robin Lee Allen, “Taking Aim at Crime: Barbaric to Bizarre, Crime Robs Operators’ Peace of Mind, Profits,” Nation’s Restaurant News, May 22, 2000.

at 7–Eleven stores the average robbery: Cited in Scot Lins and Rosemary J. Erickson, “Stores Learn to Inconvenience Robbers: 7–Eleven Shares Many of Its Robbery Deterrence Strategies,” Security Management, November 1998.

84 about two-thirds of the robberies at fast food restaurants: Cited in Grossman, “Easy Marks”; and Lydon, “Prime Crime Targets.”

about half of all restaurant workers: Cited in Ed Rubinstein, “High-Tech Systems Look to Head Off Restaurant Shrinkage,” Nation’s Restaurant News, January 11, 1999.

The typical employee stole about $218: Cited in “NCS Reports Employee Theft Doubled in Restaurant/Fast Food Industry,” press release, NCS and National Food Service Security Council, July 9, 1999.

“It may be common sense”: Interview with Jerald Greenberg.

OSHA was prompted: See Ralph Vartabedian, “Big Business, Big Bucks: The Rising Tide of Corporate Political Donations,” Los Angeles Times, September 23, 1997; Joan Oleck, “Who’s Afraid of OSHA?” Restaurant Business, February 10, 1995.

84 OSHA recommended: See “Recommendations for Workplace Violence Prevention Programs in Late-Night Retail Establishments,” U.S. Department of Labor, OSHA 3153, 199885

“Who would oppose putting out guidelines”: Quoted in Vartabedian, “Big Business.”

“potentially damaging” robbery statistics: Quoted in Jack Hayes, “Industry Execs Nix OSHA Guidelines at ‘Security Summit,’” Nation’s Restaurant News, May 19, 1997.

“No other American industry”: Interview with Joseph A. Kinney.

86 Hundreds of fast food restaurants are robbed: This is my own estimate. The Los Angeles Police Department is one law enforcement agency that does track restaurant robberies, of which the vast majority are fast food robberies. The population of Los Angeles is about one-eightieth the total U.S. population. In 1998, 520 L.A. restaurants were robbed. Even if you assume, conservatively, that L.A. restaurants are four times more likely to be robbed than restaurants elsewhere in the country, that still leaves an estimated 10,000 U.S. restaurant robberies every year. The actual number is most likely higher. The FBI does compile statistics on convenience store robberies, and during the mid-1990s about 28,000 of them were robbed every year (more than 500 a week). According to the LAPD’s 1998 robbery statistics, restaurants were robbed nearly twice as often as minimarts. See “Restaurant Robberies in L.A. from 01/01/98 to 12/31/98” and “Mini-Mart Robberies in L.A. from 01/01/98 to 12/31/98,” Los Angeles Police Department; and Greg Warchoi, “Workplace Violence, 1992–96,” Bureau of Labor Statistics Special Report, July 1998.

88 “Cynics need to be in some other industry”: The speeches and panel discussions at the Thirty-eighth Annual Multi-Unit Foodserver Operator Conference were tape-recorded by the Sound of Knowledge, Inc., San Diego, California.

4. Success

Mahmood A. Khan’s Restaurant Franchising (New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1992) provides a straightforward examination of the subject, much like a textbook. Stan Luxenberg’s Roadside Empires is less thorough but much more interesting, examining the franchise boom in the context of American postwar culture. Big Mac, by Max Boas and Steven Chain, John Love’s Behind the Arches, and Ray Kroc’s Grinding It Out also contain good material on the early days of franchising in the fast food industry. A number of articles published in academic journals helped me understand some of franchising’s finer details: Francine Lafontaine, “Pricing Decisions in Franchised Chains: A Look at the Restaurant and Fast-Food Industry,” Working Paper 5247, National Bureau of Economic Research, September 1995; Scott A. Shane, “Hybrid Organizational Arrangements and their Implications for Firm Growth and Survival: A Study of New Franchisors,” Academy of Management Journal, February 1996; H. G. Parsa, “Franchisee-Franchisor Relationships in Quick-Service-Restaurant Systems,” Cornell Hotel & Restaurant Administration Quarterly, June 1996; Scott A. Shane and Chester Spell, “Factors for New Franchise Success,” Sloan Management Review, March 22, 1998; Robert W. Emerson, “Franchise Terminations: Legal Rights and Practical Effects When Franchisees Claim the Franchisor Discriminates,” American Business Law Journal, June 22, 1998. The Franchise Opportunities Guide, published annually by the International Franchise Association, gives a rosy view of “the success story of the 1990s.” The Franchise Fraud: How to Protect Yourself Before and After You Invest (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1994), by Robert L. Purvin, Jr., regards the promises of franchisors with more suspicion. Mr. Purvin — an attorney who serves as chairman of the board of trustees of the American Association of Franchisees and Dealers — helped to ensure the accuracy of my legal analysis. Susan Kezios, president of the American Franchisee Association, spoke with me at length about the legislative reforms being sought by her organization. Richard Adams, the president of Consortium Members, Inc., an alliance of disgruntled McDonald’s franchisees, described some of the franchising practices of the world’s largest fast food chain. Rieva Lesonsky, the editorial director of Entrepreneur magazine (which annually publishes the “Franchise 500: Best Franchises to Start Now!”) gave me a much brighter view of the industry. Peter Lowe took time from his hectic schedule to discuss success. In addition to Dave Feamster, I interviewed a number of other fast food franchisees who shall remain unnamed. I am grateful to Feamster not only for giving me free rein at his restaurant, but also for allowing me to spend an evening delivering Little Caesars pizzas in Pueblo.

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94 “Instead of the company paying the salesmen”: Luxenberg, Roadside Empires, p. 13.

95 often earned more money than the company’s founder: See Emerson, Economics of Fast Food, p. 59; Love, Behind the Arches, pp. 171–75.

“common sense”: Kroc, Grinding It Out, p. 111.

“any unusual aptitude or intellect”: Ibid., p. 111.

96 “We are not basically in the food business”: Quoted in Love, Behind the Arches, p. 199. See also Kroc, Grinding It Out, p. 109.

more than $180 million a year: By 1998, the year of Richard McDonald’s death, the annual system-wide sales of McDonald’s exceeded $36 billion. Cited in “The Annual,” McDonald’s Corporation 1998 Annual Report.

“grinding it out”: Kroc, Grinding It Out, p. 123.

97 “Eventually I opened a McDonald’s”: Ibid., p. 123.

The distinctive architecture of each chain: For the use of chain architecture as “packaging” and Louis Cheskin’s advice to McDonald’s, see Thomas Hines, The Total Package: The Evolution and Secret Meanings of Boxes, Bottles, Cans, and Tubes (New York: Little, Brown, 1995), pp. 121–24.

98 “mother McDonald’s breasts”: Quoted in “Brand Iconography: The Secret to Creating Lasting Brands?” Brand Strategy, February 20, 1999.

an IFA survey claimed that 92 percent: Cited in Dan Morse and Jeffrey A. Tannenbaum, “Poll on High Success Rate for Franchises Raises Eyebrows,” Wall Street Journal, March 17, 1998. For the results of a similar, equally dubious IFA poll, see Joan Oleck, “The Numbers Game: Retail Franchise Failure Rates,” Restaurant Business, June 10, 1993.

98 38.1 percent of new franchised businesses: Cited in testimony of Dr. Timothy Bates to the Subcommittee on Commercial and Administrative Law, Judiciary Committee, U.S. House of Representatives, June 24, 1999.

According to another study: Despite the high failure rate, the study’s author, Scott A. Shane, believes that franchising is still the best way to expand a company quickly, though the financial risks are often understated. See Scott A. Shane, “Hybrid Organizational Arrangements and Their Implications for Firm Growth and Survival: A Study of New Franchisors,” Academy of Management Journal, February 1996.

“In short”: Testimony of Dr. Timothy Bates.

99 Ralston-Purina once terminated: See Boas and Chain, Big Mac, pp. 162–63.

100 more legal disputes with franchisees: Cited in Richard Behar, “Why Subway Is ‘The Biggest Problem in Franchising,’” Fortune, March 16, 1998.

the “worst” franchise in America: Quoted in Jennifer Lanthier, “Subway Bites,” Financial Post, November 25, 1995. For other accounts of Subway’s questionable business practices, see Barbara Marsh, “Franchise Realities: Sandwich Shop Chain Surges, but to Run One Can Take Heroic Effort,” Wall Street Journal, September 16, 1992; Jeffrey A. Tannenbaum, “Right to Retake Subway Shops Spurs Outcry,” Wall Street Journal, February 2, 1995.

“Subway is the biggest problem in franchising”: Quoted in Behar, “Subway.”

“almost as geared to selling franchises”: Lanthier, “Subway Bites.”

A top Subway executive has acknowledged: See Behar, “Subway.”

101 30 to 50 percent of Subway’s new franchisees: Cited ibid.

Coble’s bill would for the first time: For a detailed analysis of the legislation and strong criticism of its proposals, see Harold Brown, “The Proposed Federal Legislation in 1999,” New York Law Journal, January 28, 1999; Rochelle B. Spandorf, “Federal Regulating Legislation,” Franchising Business and Law Alert, November 1999.

“We are not seeking to penalize anyone”: Testimony of Howard Coble to the Subcommittee on Commercial and Administrative Law, House Judiciary Committee, June 29, 1999.

“whiny butts”: For this quote and Ireland’s views on franchise reform, see Kirk Victor, “Franchising Fracas,” National Journal, September 26, 1992; Deirdre Shesgreen, “Franchisees Seek Protection on Hill,” Legal Times, January 4, 1999.

“free enterprise contract negotiations”: Quoted in “Small Business Franchise Partnerships Feared Endangered if Federal Government Muscles In,” PR Newswire, July 1, 1999.

“Small businesses and franchising succeed”: Quoted ibid.

102 A 1981 study by the General Accounting Office: For the GAO study and the congressional investigation that prompted it, see Luxenberg, Roadside Empires, pp. 256–59.

The chain was “experimenting”: Quoted ibid., p. 258.

a recent study by the Heritage Foundation: See Scott A. Hodge, “For Big Franchisers, Money to Go: Is the SBA Dispensing Corporate Welfare?” Washington Post, November 30, 1997.

5. Why the Fries Taste Good

Food: A Culinary History (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999), edited by Jean-Louis Flandrin and Massimo Montanari, traces the cultural and technological changes in food preparation from prehistoric campfires to the kitchens at McDonald’s. A good account of the history of American food processing can be found in John M. Connor and William A. Schiek, Food Processing: An Industrial Powerhouse in Transition (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1997). Harvey Levenstein’s Paradox of Plenty: A Social History of Eating in Modern America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993) has a fine chapter on the implications of postwar advances in food processing. For consolidation in the food processing industry and its effects on American farmers, I learned a great deal from the following sources: Charles R. Handy and Alden C. Manchester, “Structure and Performance of the Food System Beyond the Farm Gate,” Commodities Economics Division White Paper, USDA Economic Research Service, April 1990; Alden C. Manchester, “The Transformation of U.S. Food Marketing,” in Food and Agricultural Markets: The Quiet Revolution, edited by Lyle P. Schertz and Lynn M. Daff (Washington, D.C.: National Planning Association, 1994); Concentration in Agriculture, A Report of the USDA Advisory Committee on Agricultural Concentration (Washington, D.C.: USDA Agricultural Marketing Service, June 1996); A Time to Act: Report of the USDA National Commission on Small Farms (Washington, D.C.: United States Department of Agriculture, 1998); and William Heffernan, “Consolidation in the Food and Agriculture System,” Report to the National Farmers Union, February 5, 1999. A telephone interview, extending for hours, with J. R. Simplot provided much information on the details of his life and the origins of the potato industry in Idaho. Simplot was blunt, charismatic, entertaining, and seemingly tireless. Fred Zerza, the vice president for public and government relations at the J. R. Simplot Company, helped confirm the accuracy of Simplot’s remarks. I also relied on “Origins of the J. R. Simplot Company,” J. R. Simplot Company, 1997; and James W. Davis, Aristocrat in Burlap: A History of the Potato in Idaho (Boise: Idaho Potato Commission, 1992). Paul Patterson, an extension professor of agricultural economics at the University of Idaho, graciously explained to me how potatoes are grown, processed, and sold today. Bert Moulton, at the Potato Growers of Idaho, gave me a sense of the challenges that farmers in his state must now confront. I am grateful to Ben Strand, at the Simplot Food Group, and Bud Mandeville, at Lamb Weston, for giving me tours of their french fry facilities.

The reference books on flavor technology were a pleasure to read; they reminded me of medieval texts on the black arts. Among the works I consulted were Fenaroli’s Handbook of Flavor Ingredients, vol. 2 (Ann Arbor, Mich.: CRC Press, 1995); Henry B. Heath, Source Book of Flavors (Westport, Conn.: Avi Publishing, 1981); Martin S. Peterson and Arnold H. Johnson, Encyclopedia of Food Science (Westport, Conn.: Avi Publishing, 1978); Y. H. Hui, Encyclopedia of Food Science and Technology, vol. 2 (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1992); Carl W. Hall, A. W. Farrall, and A. L. Rippen, Encyclopedia of Food Engineering (Westport, Conn.: Avi Publishing, 1986); Flavor Science: Sensible Principles and Techniques, edited by Terry E. Acree and Roy Teranishi (Washington, D.C.: American Chemical Scoiety, 1993); Biotechnology for Improved Foods and Flavors, edited by Gary R. Takeoka, Roy Teranishi, Patrick J. Williams, and Akio Kobayashi (Washington, D.C.: American Chemical Society, 1995); Flavor Analysis: Developments in Isolation and Characterization, edited by Cynthia J. Mussinan and Michael J. Novello (Washington, D.C.: American Chemical Society, 1998). I found many useful articles on the flavor industry in journals such as Food Product Design, Food Engineering, Food Processing, Food Manufacture, Chemistry and Industry, Chemical Market Reporter, and Soap-Cosmetics-Chemical Specialties (now published as Soap & Cosmetics). A good overview of the flavor business can be found in Industry and Trade Summary: Flavor and Fragrance Materials (Washington, D.C.: U.S. International Trade Commission, USITC Publication 3162, March 1999). Ellen Ruppel Shell wrote a fine article on the work of flavorists more than a decade ago: “Chemists Whip Up a Tasty Mess of Artificial Flavors,” Smithsonian, May 1986. Terry Acree, a professor of food science technology at Cornell University, was a wonderful resource on the subjects of smell, taste, flavor, and the flavor industry. Bob Bauer, executive director of the National Association of Fruits, Flavors, and Syrups, outlined when and where the flavor industry settled in New Jersey. At International Flavors & Fragrances, I am grateful to Nancy Ciancaglini, Diane Mora, and Brian Grainger, who patiently answered many questions. The flavorists at other firms whom I interviewed shall remain anonymous.

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113 “gold dust”: Interview with J. R. Simplot.

“the Golden Age of Food Processing”: Levenstein’s chapter on the postwar era is entitled “The Golden Age of Food Processing: Miracle Whip Über Alles,” in Levenstein, Paradox of Plenty, pp. 104–18.

114 “Potato salad from a package!”: Quoted ibid.

tableside microwave ovens: Cited ibid., p. 128.

Although Thomas Jefferson had brought the Parisian recipe: See “The French Fries,” a chapter in Elizabeth Rozin’s The Primal Cheeseburger (New York: Penguin Books, 1994), pp. 133–52.

“That’s a helluva thing”: Simplot interview.

“The french fry [was]… almost sacrosanct”: Kroc, Grinding It Out, p. 10.

115 thinly sliced Russet Burbanks in special fryers: See Love, Behind the Arches, p. 123.

about 175 different local suppliers: Ibid., p. 329.

the typical American ate eighty-one pounds: The figures on fresh potato and french fry consumption come from the USDA Economic Research Service.

Ninety percent of those fries: Potato statistics, USDA Economic Research Service.

the most widely sold foodservice item: Cited in Lisa Bocchino, “Frozen Potato Products,” ID: The Voice of Foodservice Distribution, January 1995.

116 bigger than the state of Delaware: Delaware has about 1.6 million acres of land.

“It’s big and it’s real”: Simplot interview.

the J. R. Simplot Company supplies the majority: Interview with Fred Zerza.

117 Simplot, Lamb Weston, and McCain now control: This is a conservative estimate, based on discussions with a variety of industry sources.

a $70 million advertising campaign: See Constance L. Hays, “Burger King Campaign Is Promoting New Fries,” New York Times, December 11, 1997.

Idaho’s potato output surpassed Maine’s: Potato Statistics, Economic Research Service, USDA.

117 Since 1980, the tonnage of potatoes grown in Idaho: Figures for 1980 courtesy of Paul Patterson; 1999 figures from the National Agricultural Statistical Service.

Out of every $1.50 spent: A large order of fries weighs about one-quarter of a pound. It takes about a half pound of fresh potatoes to make a quarter pound of fries. A typical farm price for fresh processing potatoes is $4 to $5 per hundredweight — or 4 to 5 cents a pound.

It costs about $1,500 an acre: Interview with Paul Patterson.

118 needs to receive about $5 per hundredweight: Ibid.

as low as $1.50 per hundredweight: Ibid.

Idaho has lost about half: Interview with Bert Moulton.

the amount of land devoted to potatoes: Idaho Agricultural Statistics Service.

119 roughly 1,100 potato farmers: Bert Moulton estimates there are between 1,000 and 1,200; Don Gehrhardt, at the Idaho Agricultural Statistics Service, believes there are about 1,100.

120 America’s agricultural economy now resembles: See Heffernan, “Consolidation in the Food and Agricultural System,” p. 1.

The taste of McDonald’s french fries: Since the publication of Fast Food Nation, the McDonald’s Corporation has been more forthcoming about the ingredients in their fries. For the origins of the new policy, see pages 278–80 of the Afterword.

James Beard loved McDonald’s fries: See Elizabeth Mehren, “From Whisks to Molds, James Beard’s Personal Possessions to Be Auctioned,” Los Angeles Times, September 12, 1985.

The taste of a fast food fry is largely determined: See Olivia Wu, “Fats and Oils in a New Light,” Restaurants and Institutions, January 15, 1997; and Candy Sagon, “Fry, Fry Again: The Secret of Great French Fries? Frying and more Frying,” Washington Post, July 9, 1997.

more saturated beef fat per ounce: A small McDonald’s hamburger weighed 102 grams and had 3.6 grams of saturated fat; a small order of fries weighed 68 grams and had 5.05 grams of saturated fat. See “Where’s the Fat,” USA Today, April 5, 1990; Marian Burros, “The Slimming of Fat Fast Food,” New York Times, July 25, 1990; and Michael F. Jacobson and Sarah Fritscher, The Completely Revised and Updated Fast-Food Guide (New York: Workman Publishing, 1991).

A look at the ingredients now used: See “McDonald’s Nutrition Facts,” McDonald’s Corporation, July 1997.

About 90 percent of the money that Americans spend on food: See “Personal Consumption Expenditures Table, 1999,” Bureau of Economic Analysis, U.S. Department of Commerce.

the area produces about two-thirds of the flavor additives: Cited in Joyce Jones, “Labs Conjure Up Fragrances and Flavors to Add Allure,” New York Times, December 26, 1993.

122 six of the ten best-selling fine perfumes… the smell of Estée Lauder’s Beautiful: Interview with Nancy Ciancaglini, International Flavors & Fragrances.

The aroma of a food can be responsible: Cited in Ruth Sambrook, “Do You Smell What I Smell? The Science of Smell and Taste,” Institute of Food Research, March 1999.

123 a rich and full sense of deliciousness: See Marilynn Larkin, “Truncated Glutamate Receptor Holds Key to the Fifth Primary Taste,” Lancet, January 29, 2000; and Andy Coghlan, “In Good Taste,” New Scientist, January 29, 2000.

Babies like sweet tastes: See Julie A. Mennella and Gary K. Beauchamp, “Early Flavor Experiences: When Do They Start?” Nutrition Today, September 1994.

like those of the chain’s “heavy users”: See Jennifer Ordonez, “Hamburger Joints Call Them ‘Heavy Users’ — But Not to Their Faces,” Wall Street Journal, January 12, 2000.

124 annual revenues of about $1.4 billion: Interview with Nancy Ciancaglini.

Approximately ten thousand new processed food products: Cited in Susan Carroll, “Flavors Market Is Poised for Recovery This Year,” Chemical Market Report, July 19, 1999.

And about nine out of every ten… fail: Cited in Andrew Bary, “Take a Whiff: Why International Flavors & Fragrances Looks Tempting Right Now,” Barron’s, July 20, 1998.

125 Its annual revenues have grown almost fifteenfold: IFF’s sales were about $103 million in 1970 and about $1.4 billion in 1999. The first figure comes from “Company History,” IFF Advertising and Public Relations. The second is cited in Catherine Curan, “Perfume Company Banks on CEO’s Nose for Business,” Crain’s NY Business, June 26, 2000.

the dominant flavor of bell pepper: The chemical is isobutylmethoxy pyrazine. Its minute taste recognition threshold is noted in “Flavor Chemistry Seminar,” International Flavors & Fragrances.

The flavor in a twelve-ounce can of Coke: An industry source, who shall go unnamed, provided me with the cost of the flavor in a six-pack of Coke, and I did the rest of the math.

A typical artificial strawberry flavor: This recipe comes from Fenaroli’s Handbook of Flavor Ingredients, vol. 2, p. 831.

127 “A natural flavor”: Interview with Terry Acree.

“consumer likeability”: Quoted in “What Is Flavor? An IFF Consumer Insights Perspective.”

128 The TA.XT2i Texture Analyzer: For a description of similar devices, see Ray Marsili, “Texture and Mouthfeel: Making Rheology Real,” Food Product Design, August 1993.

the ones being synthesized by funguses: See Leticia Mancini, “Expanding Flavor Horizons,” Food Engineering, November 1991; and Kitty Kevin, “A Brave New World: Capturing the Flavor Bug: Flavors from Microorganisms,” Food Processing, March 1995.

McDonald’s did acknowledge: See Jeanne-Marie Bartas, “Vegan Menu Items at Fast Food and Family-Style Restaurants — Part 2,” Vegetarian Journal, January/ February 1998.

Wendy’s Grilled Chicken Sandwich: See “Wendy’s Nutrition/Ingredient Guide,” Wendy’s International, Inc., 1997.

Burger Kings BK Broiler: See “Nutritional Information,” Burger King, 1999.

6. On the Range

Sam Bingham, The Last Ranch: A Colorado Community and the Coming Desert (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1996), and Peter R. Decker, Old Fences, New Neighbors (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1998), are two fine books about the current struggles of Colorado ranchers. “The Rancher’s Code,” a chapter in Charles F. Wilkinson’s Crossing the Next Meridian (Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 1992), outlines the steps progressive ranchers are taking both to preserve and to remain profitably on the land. Among the many interviews I conducted in the ranching community, a number deserve mention. Dave Carlson, at the Resource Analysis Section of the Colorado Department of agriculture, helped me understand the economic forces now changing the state’s landscape. Dave Carter, president of the Rocky Mountain Farmer’s Union, outlined many of the development pressures and well-entrenched political interests that ranchers now confront. Dean Preston, the Pueblo Chieftain’s agriculture correspondent for nearly three decades, described the changes he’s witnessed in rural Colorado. Lee Pitts, the editor of Livestock Market Digest, helped place the experience of Rocky Mountain ranchers in a broader national perspective. Over the years his work for the Digest has represented independent American journalism at its finest.

For the history of cattle ranching and the Beef Trust I relied mainly upon Willard F. Williams and Thomas T. Stout, Economics of the Livestock-Meat Industry (New York, Macmillan, 1964); Mary Yeager, Competition and Regulation: The Development of Oligopoly in the Meat Packing Industry (Greenwich, Conn.: Jai Press, 1981); and Jimmy M. Skaggs, Prime Cut: Livestock Raising and Meatpacking in the United States, 1607-1983 (College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 1986). John Crabtree, at the Center for Rural Affairs in Walt Hill, Nebraska, helped me see today’s formula pricing arangements in the proper historical context. Two of the center’s publications were especially useful: Competition and the Livestock Market (April 1990) and From the Carcass to the Kitchen: Competition and the Wholesale Meat Market (November 1995), the latter written by Marty Strange and Annette Higby. Concentration in Agriculture, A Report of the USDA Advisory Committee on Agricultural Concentration (Washington, D.C.: USDA Agricultural Marketing Service, June 1996) is an official and belated acknowledgment of the problems faced by American ranchers and farmers. A Time to Act, the report of the USDA’s National Commission on Small Farms, does an even better job of portraying the harms of concentrated power in agriculture.

Mike Callicrate, one of the plaintiffs in Pickett v. IBP, Inc., provided a great deal of information about the misbehavior of the large meatpacking firms and the rural unrest now growing in response to it. And Dave Domina, one of the attorneys representing Callicrate et al., explained the legal basis for the case and supplied hundreds of pages of documents. Industry and Trade Summary: Poultry (Washington, D.C.: U.S. International Trade Commission, USITC Publication 3148, December 1998) gives a thorough overview of the American poultry industry. Marc Linder, a professor at the University of Iowa Law School, introduced me to the subject of poultry growers, poultry workers, and their misfortunes. Linder’s article “I Gave My Employer a Chicken That Had No Bone: Joint Firm-State Responsibility for Line-Speed-Related Occupational Injuries,” Case Western Reserve Law Review 46, no. 1 (Fall 1995), contains an excellent history of the industry and its labor relations. Steve Bjerklie’s three-part article on contract poultry growing, which appeared in Meat & Poultry (August, October, and December 1994), is a scathing indictment of the large processors by a longtime observer of the industry. The investigative reports by Dan Fesperman and Kate Shatzin, published by the Baltimore Sun in February and March of 1999, chronicle the latest processor abuses. For the story of the McNugget, I largely relied on Laura Konrad Jereski’s account in “McDonald’s Strikes Gold with Chicken McNuggets,” Marketing and Media Decisions, March 22, 1985; Timothey K. Smith, “Changing Tastes: By End of the Year Poultry Will Surpass Beef in the U.S. Diet; Price, Health Concerns Propel Move Toward Chicken; The Impact of McNuggets,” Wall Street Journal, September 17, 1987; and John F. Love, Behind the Arches, pp. 338–43.

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133 Hank was the first person: At the request of Hank’s family, I have not used his real name.

136 about half a million ranchers sold off: Based on numbers provided by the National Agricultural Statistics Service.

In 1968, McDonald’s bought ground beef: For the consolidation of the chain’s beef purchasing, see Love, Behind the Arches, pp. 333–38.

137 at the height of the Beef Trust: Cited in Competition and the Livestock Market, Report of a Task Force Commissioned by the Center for Rural Affairs (Walt Hill, Neb.: April 1990), p. 31.

In 1970 the top four meatpacking firms: Cited ibid., p. 31.

Today the top four meatpacking firms: The figure comes from a USDA study, cited in George Anthan, “2 Reports Focus on Packers’ Profits,” Des Moines Register, May 30, 1999.

138 the rancher’s share of every retail dollar: Estimate cited in “Prepared Statement of Keith Collins, Chief Economist, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Before the House Committee on Agriculture,” Federal News Service, February 10, 1999.

control about 20 percent of the live cattle in the United States: 1997 estimate of the Grain Inspection, Packers and Stockyards Administration, cited in “Prepared Statement of Keith Collins.” See also “Captive Supplies — Who, What, When, Where and Why,” Colorado Farmer, October 1997.

as much as 80 percent of the cattle being exchanged: Cited in Concentration in Agriculture, p. 31.

“A free market requires”: Competition and the Livestock Market, p. v.

139 Eight chicken processors now control: Cited in Industry and Trade Summary: Poultry, p. 8.

Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, and Mississippi now produce: Ibid., p. A-3.

“I have an idea”: Quoted in Monci Jo Williams, “McDonald’s Refuses to Plateau,” Fortune, November 12, 1984.

140 a new breed of chicken: See Love, Behind the Arches, p. 342.

the second-largest purchaser of chicken: Cited in Williams, “McDonald’s Refuses to Plateau.”

A chemical analysis of McNuggets: The researcher was Dr. Frank Sacks, assistant professor of medicine at the Harvard University Medical School, and he utilized gas chromatography to analyze McNuggets for Science Digest. See “Study Raises Beef over Fast-Food Frying,” Chicago Tribune, March 11, 1986, and Irvin Molotsky, “Risk Seen in Saturated Fats Used in Fast Foods,” New York Times, November 15, 1985.

140 still derive much of their flavor from beef additives: The ingredients and fat profile of McNuggets can be found in “McDonald’s Nutrition Facts,” McDonald’s Corporation, 1997.

“The impact of McNuggets”: Quoted in Smith, “Changing Tastes.”

Twenty years ago, most chicken was sold whole: Industry and Trade Summary: Poultry, p. 21.

In 1992 American consumption of chicken: Cited in Linder, “I Gave My Employer a Chicken That Had No Bone,” p. 53.

Tyson now manufactures: Cited in Sheila Edmundson, “Real Home of the McNugget Is Tyson,” Memphis Business Journal, July 9, 1999.

and sells chicken to ninety of the one hundred largest restaurant chains: Cited in Douglas McInnis, “Super Chicken,” Beef, February 2000.

A Tyson chicken grower never owns: Interview with Larry Holder, executive director of the National Contract Poultry Growing Association.

141 Most growers must borrow: See Steven Bjerklie, “Dark Passage,” Meat & Poultry, (August 1994), as well as Dan Fesperman and Kate Shatzkin, “The Plucking of the American Chicken Farmer; From the Big Poultry Companies Comes a New Twist on Capitalism,” Baltimore Sun, February 28, 1999.

A 1995 survey by Louisiana Tech: “Economic Returns for U.S. Broiler Producers,” National Contract Growers Institute study, completed with cooperation of researchers in the Department of Agricultural Sciences, Louisiana Tech University, October 11, 1995.

About half of the nation’s chicken growers: Cited in Sheri Venena, “Growing Pains,” Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, October 18, 1998.

“We get the check first”: Quoted ibid.

when the United States had dozens of poultry firms: See Marj Charlier, “Chicken Economics: The Broiler Industry Consolidates, and That Is Bad News to Farmers,” Wall Street Journal, January 4, 1990.

142 “Our relationship with our growers”: Quoted in Venena, “Growing Pains.”

A number of studies by the U.S. Department of Agriculture: The most recent study, issued by the USDA’s Economic Research Service in May 1999, found “no evidence… that increasing [packer] concentration results in lower farm prices” — a finding considered absurd and ridiculed by a number of ranchers and economists. Quoted in Anthan, “2 Reports Focus on Packers’ Profits.” See also “Meatpacking: Where’s the Big Beef?” Bismarck Tribune, May 9, 1999.

Annual beef consumption in the United States: See Chris Bastian and Glen Whipple, “Trends in Supply and Demand of Beef,” Western Beef Producer, October 1997.

A pound of chicken costs: Cited in Industry and Trade Summary: Poultry, p. 19.

“alternative methods for selling fed cattle”: Quoted in Alan Guebert, “Chew on This: USDA, Congress, Take on Meatpackers with Little Success,” Pantagraph, June 7, 1998.

143 Three of Archer Daniels Midland’s top officials: For the prison terms, see Sharon Walsh, “Three Former Officials at ADM Get Jail Terms,” Washington Post, July 10, 1999. For the cost to farmers, see Sharon Walsh, “ADM Officials Found Guilty of Price Fixing,” Washington Post, September 18, 1998. For a detailed account of the conspiracy, see Angela Wissman, “ADM Execs Nailed on Price-Fixing, May Do Time, Government Gets Watershed Convictions, But Company Still Dominates Lysine Market,” Illinois Legal Times, October 1998.

143 “We have a saying at this company”: Quoted in Kurt Eichenwald, “Videotapes Take Star Role at Archers Daniels Midland Trial,” New York Times, August 4, 1998.

many ranchers were afraid to testify: See Concentration in Agriculture, pp. 7, 29–30.

144 “It makes no sense for us”: Quoted in Kevin O’ Hanlon, “Judge Clears Way for Alabama Lawsuit Against Nation’s Largest Meatpacker,” Associated Press, May 4, 1999.

Colorado has lost roughly 1.5 million acres: Cited in “A Report on the Conversion of Agricultural Land in Colorado,” Colorado Department of Agriculture and the Governor’s Task Force on Agricultural Lands, 1997.

eight of the nation’s top ten TV shows: Cited in White, It’s Your Misfortune and None of My Own, p. 613.

145 The median age of Colorado’s ranchers and farmers: Cited in Sam Bingham, “Cattlemen Organize Land Trust: Ranchers’ Group Works to Keep Colorado Properties Agricultural,” Denver Post, June 22, 1997.

thus far protected about 40,000 acres: Interview with Lynne Sherrod, executive director, Colorado Cattlemen’s Agricultural Land Trust.

vanishing at the rate of about 90,000 acres a year: Cited in “Loss of Agricultural Land Figures for Colorado,” Memorandum by David Carlson, resource analyst, Colorado Department of Agriculture, January 8, 1998.

146 The suicide rate among ranchers and farmers: The statistic comes from Florence Williams, “Farmed Out,” New Republic, August 16, 1999.

147 “To fail several generations of relatives”: Osha Gray Davidson, Broken Heartland: The Rise of America’s Rural Ghetto (Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 1996), p. 95.

7. Cogs in the Great Machine

Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle (1906; reprint, New York: Bantam Books, 1981) unfortunately remains the essential starting point for an understanding of America’s meatpacking industry today. Nearly a century after the book’s publication, many of the descriptive passages still ring true. Sinclair’s prescription for reform, however — his call for a centralized, socialized, highly industrialized agriculture — shows how even the best of intentions can lead to disaster. For a contemporary view of nineteenth-century meatpacking, I relied mainly on Yeager, Competition and Regulation and Skaggs, Prime Cut. For the struggle to improve working conditions in Chicago’s Packingtown, see Unionizing the Jungles: Labor and Community in the Twentieth Century Meatpacking Industry, edited by Shelton Stromquist and Marvin Bergman (Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 1997). One of the essays in the book, “The Swift Difference,” by Paul Street, gives a strong sense of the corporate paternalism and decent working conditions that were later eliminated by the “IBP revolution.” For an account of that revolution’s leadership, see Jonathan Kwitny, Vicious Circles: The Mafia in the Marketplace (New York: W. W. Norton, 1979); James Cook and Jane Carmichael, “The Mob’s Legitimate Connections,” Forbes, November 24, 1980; and James Cook, “Those Simple, Barefoot Boys from Iowa Beef,” Forbes, June 22, 1981. Also see the inadvertently revealing corporate history by Jane E. Limprecht, ConAgra Who? $15 Billion and Growing (Omaha: ConAgra, 1989). Jeremy Rifkin’s Beyond Beef: The Rise and Fall of the Cattle Culture (New York: Penguin, 1993) is a provocative diatribe against “the industrialization of beef.” Kathleen Meister’s response to Rifkin, “The Beef Controversy,” American Council on Science and Health Special Reports, August 31, 1993, is less convincing, but makes a number of good points. Osha Gray Davidson’s Broken Heartland does a fine job of explaining the root causes and social implications of the rising poverty in America’s meatpacking towns. Carol Andreas’s Meatpackers and Beef Barons: Company Town in a Global Economy (Niwot: University Press of Colorado, 1994) examines the recent transformation of Greeley. I am grateful to Ms. Andreas for discussing her work at length with me.

In Greeley, many former and current Monfort employees — some at the managerial level — shared their perspective on changes at the company after its sale to ConAgra; at their request, I have not included their names. I am grateful to Javier and Ruben Ramirez for the many hours they spent with me discussing the labor histories of Greeley and Chicago. For a straightforward analysis of structural changes in the cattle business, see James M. MacDonald and Michael Ollinger, “U.S. Meat Slaughter Consolidating Rapidly,” USDA Food Review, May 1, 1997. The best book on today’s meatpacking industry is Any Way You Cut It: Meat Processing and Small-Town America (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1995), edited by Donald D. Stull, Michael J. Broadway, and David Griffith. The essays by Lourdes Gouveia, Donald D. Stull, Mark Grey, and Steve Bjerklie were especially useful to me. I am indebted to Ms. Gouveia, a professor of sociology at the University of Nebraska–Omaha, whose work on the recent changes in Lexington, Nebraska, is exemplary and who helped me contact people there. Her essay “Global Strategies and Local Linkages: The Case of the U.S. Meatpacking Industry” is well worth reading, as is the rest of the book in which it appears: From Columbus to ConAgra: The Globalization of Agriculture and Food, edited by Alessandro Bonanno, Lawrence Busch, William H. Friedland, Lourdes Gouveia, and Enzo Mingione (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1994). For a government report that belatedly confirms many of the findings made by Stull, Grey, Davidson, Gouveia, and others, see “Community Development: Changes in Nebraska’s and Iowa’s Counties With Large Meatpacking Plant Workforces,” Report to Congressional Requesters, United States General Accounting Office, February 1998. Milo Muungard, the executive director of Nebraska’s Appleseed Center, gave me useful material on the social and environmental effects of a migrant industrial workforce. Greg Lauby, an attorney whose family has lived in Lexington, Nebraska, for generations, graciously shared his knowledge of the town’s history, its residents, its recent changes — and the reasons for its smell. I am particularly grateful to the many IBP workers who invited me into their homes and told me their stories.

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150 earns more money every year from livestock products: 1997 Census of Agriculture (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Commerce), p. 36.

150 the largest private employer in Weld County: Indeed, a recent study by two Colorado State University economists found that ConAgra’s facilities are “practically synonymous with Greeley and Weld County.” Andrew Seidl and Stephan Weiler, “The Estimated Value of ConAgra Packing Plants in Weld County, CO,” Agricultural and Resource Policy Report, Colorado State University Cooperative Extension, Fort Collins, February 2000, p. 3.

A typical steer will consume: Interview with Mike Callicrate, Kansas feedlot operator.

deposits about fifty pounds of manure: The figure was determined by researchers at Colorado State University. Cited in Mark Obmascik, “As Greeley Ponders Tax, Cows Keep On Doing Their Thing,” Denver Post, July 29, 1995.

produce more excrement than the cities: According to O. W. Charles, of the Extension Poultry Science Department of the University of Georgia, one head of cattle generates the same amount of waste as 16.4 people. Cited in Eric R. Haapapuro, Neal D. Barnard, and Michele Simon, “Animal Waste Used as Livestock Feed: Dangers to Human Health,” Preventive Medicine, September/October 1997. Using that ratio, the roughly 200,000 cattle in Monfort’s two Weld County feedlots produce an amount of waste equivalent to that of about 3.2 million people. The combined populations of Denver (about 500,000), Boston (about 550,000), Atlanta (about 400,000), and St. Louis (about 375,00) produce much less execrement than Greeley’s cattle.

it was a utopian community: My account of early Greeley is based on Mike Peters, “Meeker Killed on Western Slope,” Greeley Tribune, 1998; Mike Peters, “Controversy over Cattle Ranches Leads to ‘The Fence,’” Greeley Tribune, 1998; and Carl Ubbelohde, Maxine Benson, Duane A. Smith, A Colorado History (Boulder, Colo.: Pruett Publishing Company, 1995), pp. 123–32.

151 started his business in the 1930s with eighteen head: See Curt Olsen, “Monforts: Changing the Way the World Is Fed,” National Cattlemen, August 1997.

a place on President Nixon’s “enemies list”: See “Beef Baron,” Rocky Mountain News Sunday Magazine, May 3, 1987.

“If I can ever be of help”: Quoted in Andreas, Meatpackers and Beef Barons, p. 37.

152 “the greatest aggregation”: Sinclair, Jungle, p. 40.

“cogs in the great packing machine”: Ibid., p. 78.

“conditions that are entirely unnecessary”: Quoted in Yeager, Competition and Regulation, p. 200.

153 “I aimed for the public’s heart”: Quoted in Skaggs, Prime Cut, p. 118.

paid the industry’s highest wages: See Stromquist and Bergman, Unionizing the Jungles, pp. 25–33.

154 “We’ve tried to take the skill out”: Quoted in Stull et al., Any Way You Cut It, p. 19.

as though it were waging war: Holman is quoted in Christopher Drew, “A Chain of Setbacks for Meat Workers,” Chicago Tribune, October 25, 1988.

close ties with La Cosa Nostra: Steinman was a central figure in New York City’s meat business, dominated at the time by the Lucchese and Gambino crime families. See Kwitny, Vicious Circles, pp. 252–53.

155 a five-cent “commission”: The arrangement, technically, was a fifty-cent commission for every hundred pounds. Ibid., p. 301.

155 “knew virtually nothing about the meat business”: Quoted ibid., p. 375.

investigations by Forbes and the Wall Street Journal: Jonathan Kwitny, the Journal reporter, and James Cook and Jane Carmichael, writing for Forbes, drew somewhat different conclusions about the meaning of the IBP case. Kwitny was outraged, arguing that it was as though “the Mafia had moved into… the oil industry, bringing Exxon to its knees.” Cook and Carmichael were more detached and pragmatic. “The ordeal of Iowa Beef Processors shows as clearly as anything can,” they wrote, “how legitimate business can become linked with organized crime, to their mutual benefit.” Kwitny, Vicious Circles, p. 252; Cook and Carmichael, “Mob’s Legitimate Connections.”

wages that were sometimes more than 50 percent lower: While Swift and Armour were paying $17 to $18 an hour, IBP was paying just $8. See Winston Williams, “An Upheaval in Meatpacking,” New York Times, June 20, 1983. See also Cook, “Those Simple, Barefoot Boys.”

once employed 40,000 people: According to Erin Troya of the Chicago Historical Society, Packingtown employed about 40,000 workers at its peak during the 1920s. The current estimate of 2,000 comes from Ruben Ramirez. Dot McGrier, at the U.S. Census Bureau, says that Chicago now has a total of 6,000 meatpacking workers, but most of them are employed in the Watermarket area on the western edge of the city.

157 a sweetheart deal with the National Maritime Union: See Bill Saporito, “Unions Fight the Corporate Sell-Off,” Fortune, July 11, 1983; Jim Morris, “Easy Prey: Harsh work for Immigrants,” Houston Chronicle, June 26, 1995; Andreas, Meatpackers and Beef Barons, p. 68.

158 wages that had been cut by 40 percent: Andreas, Meatpackers and Beef Barons, p. 98.

“if the industry was going to be concentrated”: Quoted ibid., p. 76.

the largest foodservice supplier: Interview with Karen Savinski, director of corporate communications, ConAgra.

159 annual revenues of about $500 million: Cited in Limprecht, ConAgra Who?, p. 98.

the market value of its stock: Ibid., p. 7.

“Harper told each general manager”: Quoted ibid., p. 12.

“Patience, my ass”: Ibid., p. 120.

45,256 truckloads: See Tom Hughes, “Alabama Growers’ Court Settlement Not Chicken Feed,” Montgomery Advertiser, October 7, 1992. See also Richard Gibson, “ConAgra Settles Case of Cheating By Bird Weighers,” Wall Street Journal, October 9, 1992.

ConAgra agreed to pay $13.6 million: Cited in Richard Gibson, “ConAgra, Hormel Pay a Pretty Penny in an Ugly Catfish Price-Fixing Case,” Wall Street Journal, December 29, 1995.

ConAgra paid $8.3 million in fines: See “ConAgra Pays $8.3 Million in Penalties for Fraud Scheme,” Federal Department and Agency Documents, March 19, 1997. See also Scott Kilman, “ConAgra to Pay $8.3 Million to Settle Fraud Charges in Grain-Handling Case,” Wall Street Journal, March 20, 1997.

160 more than five thousand different people were employed: Cited in “Here’s the Beef: Underreporting of Injuries, OSHA’s Policy of Exempting Companies from Programmed Inspections Based on Injury Records, and Unsafe Conditions in the Meatpacking Industry,” Forty-Second Report by the Committee on Government and Operations (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1988), p. 12.

160 roughly two-thirds of the workers at the beef plant: Interview with Javier Ramirez, former president of UFCW Local 990, Greeley, Colorado.

A spokesman for ConAgra recently acknowledged: Interview with Brett Fox, director of industry affairs and media relations, ConAgra Beef Company.

“There is a 100 percent turnover rate annually”: Quoted in James M. Burcke, “1994 Risk Manager of the Year: Meatpacker’s Losses Trimmed Down to Size,” Business Insurance, April 18, 1994.

161 Arden Walker, the head of labor relations at IBP: Quoted in “Here’s the Beef,” p. 11.

162 Picking strawberries in California pays: For the role and the wages of Latino migrants in California agriculture, see Schlosser, “In the Strawberry Fields.”

refugees and asylum-seekers… homeless people living at shelters: See “IBP; Meat Processing Plant Fails to Uphold Social Contract with Waterloo, Iowa; Crime and Homelessness Increase,” 60 Minutes, CBS News transcripts, March 9, 1997; “IBP’s Hiring Reflects Evolution of Meatpacking Industry,” Quad-City Times, June 30, 1997; Marc Cooper, “The Heartland’s Raw Deal: How Meatpacking Is Creating a New Immigrant Underclass,” Nation, February 3, 1997; and George Rodrigue, “Packing Them In: Meat Processing Firm’s Hiring of Ex-Welfare Recipients Questioned,” Dallas Morning News, September 25, 1997.

a labor office in Mexico City: See Laurie Cohen, “Free Ride: With Help from INS, U.S. Meatpacker Taps Mexican Work Force,” Wall Street Journal, October 15, 1998.

one-quarter of all meatpacking workers in Iowa: Cited in “Changes in Nebraska’s and Iowa’s Counties with Large Meatpacking Plant Workforces,” GAO Reports, p. 15.

Spokesmen for IBP and the ConAgra Beef Company: Fox interview; interview with Gary Mickelson, IBP Public Affairs Department.

“If they’ve got a pulse”: Quoted in Rick Ruggles, “INS: Undocumented Workers Face New Meat-Plant Tactics,” Omaha World-Herald, September 11, 1998.

In September of 1994, GFI America: See Joe Rigert and Richard Meryhew, “Food Company Takes Hired Workers to Homeless Shelter,” Minneapolis Star Tribune, September 14, 1994; Tony Kennedy, “International Dairy Queen to Review Its Relationship with Meat Supplier GFI,” Minneapolis Star-Tribune, September 15, 1994; and “GFI’s Frugal Ways Led to Problems for Some Workers,” Minneapolis Star-Tribune, December 9, 1994.

163 “Our job is not to provide”: Quoted in Rigert and Meryhew, “Food Company Takes Hired Workers.”

Mike Harper personally stood to gain: Cited in “Capital Gains Exclusion Would Benefit Key Backers,” UPI, April 19, 1987.

164 called Harper’s demands “blackmail”: See Limprecht, ConAgra Who?, p. 269.

“Some Friday night, we turn out the lights”: Quoted in Dennis Farney, “Nebraska, Hungry of Jobs, Grants Big Business Big Tax Breaks Despite Charges of ‘Blackmail,’” Wall Street Journal, June 23, 1987.

164 after the revision of the state’s tax code: See Henry J. Cordes, “Did It Prime the Pump? Report Questions Economic Incentives,” Omaha World-Herald, December 28, 1997. Ernie Goss, an economist at Creighton University, thinks the estimate of $13,000 to $23,000 is fair. Interview with Ernie Goss.

like giving his employees a 7 percent raise… “The move shows you how ungrateful”: Quoted in John Taylor, “IBP’s Move Prompts Look at Tax Policy,” Omaha World-Herald, June 13, 1996.

a $300,000 loan: See Kenneth B. Noble, “Signs of Violence in Meat Plant’s Lockout,” New York Times, January 18, 1987.

165 the highest crime rate in the state of Nebraska: See Robert A. Hackenberg, David Griffith, Donald Stull, and Lourdes Gouveia, “Creating a Disposable Labor Force,” Aspen Institute Quarterly 5, no. 2 (Spring 1993), p. 92.

the number of serious crimes doubled: Cited in “Changes in Nebraska’s and Iowa’s Counties with Large Meatpacking Plant Workforces,” GAO Report, p. 39.

the number of Medicaid cases nearly doubled: Ibid., p. 36.

a major distribution center for illegal drugs; gang members appeared in town: See Richard A. Serrano, “Mexican Drug Cartels Target U.S. Heartland: Officials Say Illegal Immigrants are Using Interstates as Pipeline to Bring Cocaine, Methamphetamines to Midwest and Rocky Mountain Areas Where Abuse Is Burgeoning,” Los Angeles Times, December 10, 1997; Jennifer Dukes Lee, “Meatpacking Towns Seen As Key Funnel for Meth,” Des Moines Register, March 7, 1999.

the majority of Lexington’s white inhabitants… the proportion of Latino inhabitants: Lexington is the principal city in Dawson County, and in 1990, 4.7 percent of the county’s population was Latino, according to census figures. A recount in 1993 found the Latino population to be almost 30 percent and expected to reach 50 percent within three years. Cited in Lourdes Gouveia, “From the Beet Fields to the Kill Floors: Latinos in Nebraska’s Meatpacking Communities,” unpublished manuscript.

“Mexington”: For some of the positive effects of the new immigration wave, see Edwin Garcia and Ben Stocking, “Latinos on the Move to a New Promised Land,” San Jose Mercury News, August 16, 1998.

“We have three odors”: Quoted in Melody M. Loughry, “Issues Now,” North Platte Resident, January 15, 1996.

the Justice Department sued IBP: See Elliot Blair Smith, “Stench Chokes Meatpacking Towns,” USA Today, February 14, 2000; “U.S. Sues Meatpacking Giant for Violating Numerous Environmental Laws in Midwest,” press release, Environmental Protection Agency, January 12, 2000.

“This agreement means”: Quoted in “Meatpacker Must Cut Hydrogen Sulfide Emissions at Nebraska Plant,” press release, Environmental Protection Agency, May 24, 2000.

166 The transcript of this meeting: “Presenting IBP, Inc., to Lexington, Nebraska: A Public Forum Conducted by the Dawson County Council for Economic Development, July 7, 1988, at the Junior High School Auditorium,” transcription by the staff of the Lauby Law Office, Lexington, Nebraska.

8. The Most Dangerous Job

This chapter is based largely on interviews that I conducted with dozens of Latino meatpacking workers in Colorado and Nebraska. I also interviewed a former slaughterhouse safety director, a former slaughterhouse nurse, former plant supervisors, and a physician whose medical practice was for years devoted to the treatment of slaughterhouse workers. All of these managerial personnel had left the meatpacking industry by choice; none had been fired; and their reluctance to use their real names in this book stems from the widespread fear of the meatpackers in rural communities where they operate. I am grateful to those who spoke with me and showed me around.

Deborah E. Berkowitz, the former director of health and safety at the UFCW, was an invaluable source of information about the workings of a modern slaughterhouse and the dangers that workers face there. Her article on meatpacking and meat processing in The Encyclopaedia of Occupational Health and Safety (Geneva, Switzerland: International Labour Organization, 1998), cowritten with Michael J. Fagel, is a good introduction to the subject. Curt Brandt, the president of UFCW Local 22 in Fremont, Nebraska, described the various tactics he’s seen meatpacking firms use over the years to avoid compensating injured workers. Two Colorado attorneys, Joseph Goldhammer and Dennis E. Valentine, helped me understand the intricacies of their state’s workers’ comp law and described their work on behalf of injured Monfort employees. Rod Rehm, an attorney based in Lincoln, Nebraska, spent many hours depicting the conditions in his state and arranged for me to meet some of his clients. Rehm is an outspoken advocate for poor Latinos in a state where they have few political allies. Bruce L. Braley, one of the attorneys in Ferrell v. IBP, told me a great deal about the company’s behavior and sent me stacks of documents pertaining to the case. “Killing Them Softly: Work in Meatpacking Plants and What It Does to Workers,” by Donald D. Stull and Michael J. Broadway, in Any Way You Cut It, is one of the best published accounts of America’s most dangerous job. “Here’s the Beef: Underreporting of Injuries, OSHA’s Policy of Exempting Companies from Programmed Inspections Based on Injury Record, and Unsafe Conditions in the Meatpacking Industry,” Forty-Second Report by the Committee on Government Operations (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1988), shows the extraordinary abuses that can occur when an industry is allowed to regulate itself. After the congressional investigation, Christopher Drew wrote a terrific series of articles on meatpacking, published by the Chicago Tribune in October of 1988. The fact that working conditions have changed little since then is remarkably depressing. Gail A. Eisnitz’s Slaughterhouse: The Shocking Story of Greed, Neglect, and Inhumane Treatment Inside the U.S. Meat Industry (Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 1997), suggests that many cattle are needlessly brutalized prior to slaughter. Nothing that these sources reveal would come as a surprise to readers of Upton Sinclair.

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172 The injury rate in a slaughterhouse: In 1999, the most recent year for which statistics are available, the injury and illness rate in the nation’s meatpacking industry was 26.7 per 100 hundred workers. For the rest of U.S. manufacturing, it was 9.2 per hundred workers. See “Industries with the Highest Nonfatal Total Cases, Incidence Rates for Injuries and Illnesses, Private Industry, 1999,” Bureau of Labor Statistics, December 2000; and “Incidence Rates of Nonfatal Occupational Injuries and Illnesses by Selected Industries and Case Types, 1999,” Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, December 2000.

172 roughly forty thousand men and women: The meatpacking industry now has about 147,600 workers, and at least 26.7 percent of them suffer workplace injuries and illnesses. See “Industries with the Highest Nonfatal Total Cases.”

Thousands of additional injuries and illnesses: At some plants, as many as half of the workers may be hurt each year. You need spend only an hour or so with a roomful of poor Latino meatpacking workers to get a sense of how many serious injuries are never reported.

Poultry plants can be largely mechanized: Despite the higher level of mechanization, workers in the poultry industry have one of the nation’s highest rates of injury and illness, largely due to the repetitive nature of the work and the speed of the production line.

173 roughly thirty-three times higher than the national average: In 1999 the incidence of repeated trauma injuries in private industry was 27.3 per 10,000 workers; in the poultry industry the rate was 337.1; and in the meatpacking industry it was 912.5. See “Industries with the Highest Nonfatal Illness Incidence Rate of Disorders Associated with Repeated Trauma and the Number of Cases in These Industries,” Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, December 2000.

adds up to about 10,000 cuts: According to Berkowitz and Fagel, some production jobs can require 20,000 cuts a day. Berkowitz and Fagel, Enclyclopaedia of Occupational Health and Safety, p. 67.14.

174 beef slaughterhouses often operate at profit margins: According to Steve Bjerklie, the profit margin for slaughter is about 1 percent, with additional earnings from processing and the sale of byproducts. See Steve Bjerklie, “On the Horns of a Dilemma,” in Any Way You Cut It, p. 42.

widespread methamphetamine use: Many workers told me stories about methamphetamine use. See also Lee, “Meatpacking towns seen as key funnel for meth.”

only one-third of IBP’s workers belong to a union: Cited in Cohen, “Free Ride with Help from INS.”

176 awarded $2.4 million to a female employee… “screamed obscenities and rubbed their bodies”: A federal judge later reduced the award to $1.75 million. See Lynn Hicks, “IBP Worker Awarded $2.4 Million by Jury,” Des Moines Register, February 27, 1999; Lynn Hicks, “Worker: Sexism, Racism at IBP,” Des Moines Register, February 3, 1999; “IBP Told to Pay Attorney’s Fees,” Des Moines Register, December 30, 1999.

the company paid the women $900,000: See “Monfort Beef to Pay $900,000 to Settle Sexual Harassment Suit,” Houston Chronicle, September 1, 1999.

pressured them for dates and sex: Ibid.

They are considered “independent contractors”: As a result, the meatpacking firms are not liable for the work-related injuries of the slaughterhouse employees who face the greatest risks. When OSHA tried to penalize IBP for the death of a sanitation worker, IBP appealed the decision, with the backing of the National Association of Manufacturers, before a federal appeals court in 1998 — and won. Although the meatpackers own the slaughterhouses and the slaughterhouse equipment, they are not legally responsible for the immigrants who clean them. See Stephan C. Yohay and Arthur G. Sapper, “Liability on Multi-Employer Worksites,” Occupational Hazards, October 1998.

178 Richard Skala was beheaded: See Jim Morris, “Easy Prey: Harsh Work for Immigrants,” Houston Chronicle, June 26, 1995.

Carlos Vincente: See “Guatemalan Man Dies after Falling into Machinery of Beef Processing Plant,” AP, November 3, 1998; “Ft. Morgan Firm Faces $350,000 in OSHA Fines,” AP, May 4, 1999.

Lorenzo Marin, Sr.: See Mark P. Couch, “IBP Told to Pay Damages to Family,” Des Moines Register, June 7, 1995.

Another employee of DCS Sanitation… The same machine: See Jim Rasmussen, “Company Expecting Fines Today; Death at IBP Plant May Cost Ohio Firm,” Omaha World-Herald, October 7, 1993.

Homer Stull climbed into a blood-collection tank: See Allen Freedman, “Workers Stiffed: Death and Injury Rates among American Workers Soar, and the Government Has Never Cared Less,” Washington Monthly, November 1992.

Henry Wolf had been overcome: See “Liberal Packing Plant Fined $960,” UPI, October 19, 1983.

179 its 1,300 inspectors: See Kenneth B. Noble, “The Long Tug-of-War over What Is How Hazardous; For OSHA, Balance Is Hard to Find,” New York Times, January 10, 1988; and Christopher Drew, “Regulators Slow Down as Packers Speed Up,” Chicago Tribune, October 26, 1988.

more than 5 million workplaces: Cited in “Here’s the Beef,” p. 4.

A typical American employer: Cited in Susannah Zak Figura, “The New OSHA,” Government Executive, May 1997.

The number of OSHA inspectors: See Noble, “The Long Tug of War”; and Drew, “Regulators Slow Down.”

a new policy of “voluntary compliance”: See “Here’s the Beef,” p. 3.

While the number of serious injuries rose: See Christopher Drew, “A Chain of Setbacks for Meat Workers,” Chicago Tribune, October 25, 1988.

“appear amazingly stupid to you”… “I know very well that you know”: Quoted in Drew, “Regulators Slow Down.”

“to understate injuries, to falsify records”: “Here’s the Beef,” p. 21.

180 every injury and illness at the slaughterhouse: Ibid., pp. 3, 14.

the first log recorded 1,800 injuries… The OSHA log: Ibid., p. 14.

denied under oath: Ibid., p. 15. See also Philip Shabecoff, “OSHA Seeks $2.59 Million Fine for Meatpacker’s Injury Reports,” New York Times, July 22, 1987.

“the best of the best”: Quoted in “Here’s the Beef,” p. 9.

as much as one-third higher: Ibid., p. 9.

investigators also discovered: Ibid., p. 21.

Another leading meatpacking company: Ibid., pp. 21–22.

“serious injuries such as fractures”: Ibid., p. 8.

180 “one of the most irresponsible and reckless”: Quoted in Donald Woutat, “Meatpacker IBP Fined $3.1 Million in Safety Action; Health Problem Disabled More than 600, OSHA Says,” Los Angeles Times, May 12, 1988.

“the worst example of underreporting”: Assistant Labor Secretary John A. Pendergrass, quoted in Shabecoff, “OSHA Seeks $2.59 Million Fine.”

difficult to prove “conclusively”: “Here’s the Beef,” p. 19.

fined $2.6 million by OSHA: Shabecoff, “OSHA Seeks $2.59 Million.”

fined an additional $3.1 million: Woutat, “Meatpacker IBP Fined $3.1 Million.”

fines were reduced to $975,000: See Christopher Drew, “IBP Agrees to Injury Plan,” Chicago Tribune, November 23, 1988; Marianne Lavelle, “When Fines Collapse: Critics Target OSHA’s Settlements,” National Law Journal, December 4, 1989.

about one one-hundredth of a percent: According to Robert L. Peterson, IBP’s revenues that year were about $8.8 billion. “IBP’s Presentation at the New York Society of Security Analysts,” Business Wire, October 28, 1988.

a worker named Kevin Wilson: My account of the Wilson case is based upon John Taylor, “Ex-IBP Worker Gets $15 Million in Damage Award,” Omaha World-Herald, December 3, 1994; “Opinion,” Kevin Wilson v IBP, Inc., and Diane Arndt, Supreme Court of Iowa, no. 258/95–477, February 14, 1997; “$2 Million Punitive Award Won by Injured Employee,” Managing Risk, March 1997; and “IBP’s Appeal of $2 Million Punitive Award Rejected,” Omaha World-Herald, October 7, 1997

181 The IBP nurse called them “idiots” and “jerks”: Quoted in Wilson v IBP and Arndt, Iowa Supreme Court.

182 The company later paid him an undisclosed sum: See Morris, “Easy Prey.”

“The first commandment is that only production counts”: A transcript of Murphy’s testimony appears in Andreas, Meatpackers and Beef Barons, pp. 171–83.

little has changed since IBP was caught: For Ferrell’s side of the case, I have relied upon “Plaintiff’s Statement of Specific Disputed Facts and Additional Material Facts,” Michael D. Ferrell v IBP, Inc., United States District Court for the Northern District of Iowa, Western Division, May 7, 1999.

183 IBP disputes this version: For IBP’s version of events, I have relied upon “Statement of Undisputed Facts in Support of Defendant’s Motion for Summary Judgment,” Michael D. Ferrell v IBP, Inc., United States District Court for the Northern District of Iowa, Western Division, March 6, 1999.

“numerous, pervasive, and outrageous”: Quoted in “Labor Board Charges Monfort with Discrimination; Orders Reinstatement, Back Pay, and Union Election,” PR Newswire, April 12, 1990. See also James M. Biers, “Monfort Flouted Labor Laws,” Denver Post, November 4, 1995.

184 Colorado was one of the first states: See Ben Wear, “Lawmakers Seek Cure, Not Band-Aid; All Sides Cry Foul in Fight to Protect Interests,” Colorado Springs Gazette Telegraph, February 3, 1991; Karen Bowers, “The Big Hurt: Truth Is the First Casualty in the Political War over Amendment 11,” Denver Westword, October 19, 1994; and Stuart Steers, “Injured Workers Have Borne the Brunt of Workers’ Comp ‘Reform’ in Colorado,” Denver Westword, July 19, 1996.

185 Under Colorado’s new law: The figures on missing digits and other injuries are from the 1999 Workers’ Compensation Act, State of Colorado.

Congressman Cass Ballenger: See “Congressman Argues for an Overhaul of OSHA,” Business Insurance, July 10, 1995; David Maraniss and Michael Weisskopf, “OSHA’s Enemies Find Themselves in High Places,” Washington Post, July 24, 1995; and Figura, “New OSHA.”

by the late 1990s had already reached an all-time low: See “Study Finds Decline in Workplace Inspections,” AP, September 5, 1998.

The plant had never been inspected by OSHA: See Maraniss and Weisskopf, “OSHA’s Enemies.”

Congressman Joel Hefley: See “Congressman Argues for an Overhaul”; “Hutchison, Hefley Introduce Proposals in House, Senate to Overhaul OSHA,” Asbestos and Lead Abatement Report, April 7, 1997; and Erin Emery, “Political Novice Alford Faces Hefley,” Denver Post, October 14, 1998.

9. What’s in the Meat

Interviews with two of the nation’s leading experts on Shiga toxin-producing E. coli — Dr. David Acheson, an associate professor of medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Tufts University Medical School, and Dr. Patricia M. Griffin, chief of the Foodborne Diseases Epidemiology Section, Foodborne and Diarrheal Diseases Branch, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — helped me understand some of the distinctive characteristics and potential dangers of these organisms. A pair of journal articles greatly influenced my view of the role of the fast food and meatpacking industries in spreading disease: Gregory L. Armstrong, Jill Hollingsworth, and J. Glenn Morris, Jr., “Emerging Foodborne Pathogens: Escherichia coli 0157:H7 as a Model of Entry of a New Pathogen into the Food Supply of the Developed World,” Epidemiologic Reviews 18, no. 1 (1996); and Robert V. Tauxe, “Emerging Foodborne Diseases: An Evolving Public Health Challenge,” Emerging Infectious Diseases 3, no. 4 (October/December 1997). Tauxe is the chief of the Foodborne and Diarrheal Diseases Branch at the CDC. Throughout this chapter, the figures on the annual incidence of various foodborne pathogens — as well as on the number of deaths, hospitalizations, and so on — come from the most thorough nationwide study of food poisonings to date: Paul S. Mead, Laurence Slutsker, Vance Dietz, Linda F. McCaig, Joseph S. Bresee, Craig Shapiro, Patricia M. Griffin, and Robert V. Tauxe, “Food-Related Illness and Death in the United States,” Emerging Infectious Diseases 5, no. 5 (September/October 1999).

For the general reader, the two best books on foodborne pathogens are Spoiled: The Dangerous Truth about a Food Chain Gone Haywire (New York: Basic Books, 1997) and It Was Probably Something You Ate: A Practical Guide to Avoiding and Surviving Foodborne Illness (New York: Penguin, 1999). Nicols Fox is the author of both, and she was extremely generous about sharing her unsettling knowledge with me. Dr. Neal D. Bernard, at the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, told me in gruesome detail what America’s livestock are being fed today. I am grateful to Lee Harding, Nancy Donley, and Mary Heersink — three people whose lives were changed in varying degrees by E. coli 0157:H7 — for speaking to me about their experiences. Donna Rosenbaum, one of the founders of Safe Tables Our Priority, provided much useful information about the meatpacking industry’s role in outbreaks. Heather Klinkhamer, the former program director at STOP, graciously let me rummage through her files and borrow literally hundreds of them.

David Theno and Tim Biela spent a day with me, explaining how currently available technology has helped Jack in the Box reduce the threat of foodborne illness. Steve Bjerklie shared his expertise on the meat industry’s response to food safety issues. For the Hudson Beef outbreak and federal meat recall policy, I relied heavily on the transcripts of two USDA meetings: the National Advisory Committee on Meat and Poultry Inspection meeting held in Washington, D.C., September 10, 1997, and the FSIS Recall Policy Public Meeting held in Arlington, Virginia, September 24, 1997. Jan Sharp, one of the U.S. attorneys in the Hudson Foods case, and Steve Kay, the editor of Cattle Buyers Weekly, were also helpful. David Kroeger, the president of the Midwest Council of the National Joint Council of Food Inspection Locals, spoke to me about the effects of the Streamlined Inspection System during the late 1980s and of the reduced inspections under today’s new HACCP plans. The other USDA meat inspectors that I interviewed were equally informative but preferred not to be named. Felicia Nestor, at the Government Accountability Project, sent me a thick stack of USDA inspection reports given to her by federal whistleblowers. A straightforward account of the effort to create a science-based system of meat inspection can be found in Food Safety: Risk-Based Inspections and Microbial Monitoring Needed for Meat and Poultry (GAO Reports, June 1, 1994). The Center for Public Integrity has done a fine job investigating the meatpacking industry’s close ties to members of Congress. One of its reports, Safety Last: The Politics of E. coli and other Food-Borne Pathogens (Washington, D.C.: Center for Public Integrity, 1998) outlines how public health measures have in recent years been framed to suit the needs of well-funded private interests.

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193 called Sandra Gallegos: For the investigation of Harding’s illness, I relied on interviews with Lee Harding and Sandra Gallegos, as well as on Julie Collins, “Hudson Beef Recall: How the Link Was Discovered,” Journal of Environmental Health, December 1, 1997; Tom Kenworthy, “Friendly Barbecue May Have Led to Meat Recall,” Washington Post, August 24, 1997; Tom Morgenthau, “Health Pros’ Detective Work Helps Arrest Villain E. coli,” Portland Oregonian, August 31, 1997; Ann Schrader, “Tracing E. coli to Meat Earns Awards for Workers,” Denver Post, September 18, 1997; and the transcript of the NAC Meat and Poultry Inspection Hearing, September 10, 1997.

194 Colorado was one of only six states: Meat and Poultry Inspection Hearing transcript, p. 396.

primarily to supply hamburgers for the Burger King chain: See Melanie Warner, “How Tyson Ate Hudson,” Fortune, October 27, 1997.

Roughly 35 million pounds of ground beef: See Steve Kay, “Hudson Recall Was Larger Than Reported,” Cattle Buyers Weekly, September 29, 1997. Kay’s estimate may in fact be too conservative, since it is based on a production rate of 400,000 pounds a day. The Hudson Beef plant could actually produce twice that amount daily.

195 roughly 200,000 people are sickened: Derived from the annual numbers cited in Mead et al., “Food-Related Illness and Death”: 76 million illnesses, 325,000 hospitalizations, and 5,000 deaths.

more than a quarter of the American population: Ibid.

can precipitate long-term ailments: See James A. Lindsay, “Chronic Sequelae of Foodborne Disease,” Emerging Infectious Diseases 3, no. 4 (October/December 1997).

entirely new kinds of outbreaks are now occurring: See Tauxe, “Emerging Food-borne Diseases.”

196 a newly emerged pathogen: See Armstrong et al., “Emerging Foodborne Pathogens.”

thirteen large packinghouses now slaughter: Cited in James M. MacDonald and Michael Ollinger, “U.S. Meat Slaughter Consolidating Rapidly,” USDA Food Review, May 1, 1997.

more than a dozen other new foodborne pathogens: Cited in Tauxe, “Emerging Foodborne Diseases.”

infectious agents that have not yet been identified: See “Food-Related Illness and Death.”

defective softball bats, sneakers, stuffed animals: See Consumer Product Safety Commission, press releases, June 1997–June 1999.

197 7.5 percent of the ground beef samples: The figures on ground beef contamination are from “Nationwide Federal Plant Raw Ground Beef Microbiological Survey, August 1993–March 1994,” United States Deartment of Agriculture, Food Safety and Inspection Service, Science and Technology, Microbiology Division, April 1996.

fatal in about one out of… cases: Mead et al., “Food-Related Illness and Death.”

“a food for the poor”: David Gerard Hogan, Selling ’Em by the Sack (New York: New York University Press, 1997), p. 22.

“The hamburger habit is just about as safe”: Quoted ibid., p. 32.

198 “nothing but White Castle Hamburgers and water”: By the end of the experiment the student was eating up to two dozen hamburgers a day. Quoted ibid., p. 33; Tennyson, Hamburger Heaven, p. 24.

pork had been the most popular: Interview with James Ratchford, American Meat Institute.

almost half of the employment in American agriculture… annual revenues generated by beef: National Cattlemen’s Beef Association Fact Sheet.

More than two-thirds of those hamburgers were bought: Cited in David Theno, “Raising the Bar to Ensure Safer Burgers,” San Diego Union-Tribune, August 27, 1997.

children between the ages of seven and thirteen ate: A survey by McDonald’s once found that children under the age of seven ate 1.7 hamburgers a week; those from seven to thirteen ate 6.2. People from thirteen to thirty ate 5.2; from thirty to thirty-five, 3.3; from thirty-five to sixty, 2.6; and over sixty, 1.3. Cited in Boas and Chain, Big Mac, p. 218.

more than seven hundred people in at least four states: See “Update: Multistate Outbreak of Escherichia coli 0157:H7 Infections from Hamburgers — Western United States, 1992–1993,” Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, April 16, 1993; and Fox, Spoiled, pp. 246–68.

199 In 1982 dozens of children were sickened: Nicols Fox offers the best account of this outbreak. See Fox, Spoiled, pp. 220–29.

“the possibility of a statistical association”: Quoted ibid., p. 227.

In the eight years since the Jack in the Box outbreak: I have taken the annual E. coli 0157:H7 numbers from Mead et al., “Food-Related Illness and Death” — 73,480 illnesses; 2,168 hospitalizations; 61 deaths — and multiplied them by 8.

In about 4 percent of reported E. coli 0157:H7 cases: Cited in Mead et al., “Food-related Illness and Death.”

About 5 percent of the children who develop HUS: Interview with Dr. Patricia Griffin.

200 the leading cause of kidney failure among children: Cited in “Isolation of E. coli 0157:H7 from Sporadic Cases of Hemorrhagic Colitis — United States,” Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, August 1, 1997.

201 as few as five organisms: Interview with Dr. David Acheson.

The most common cause of foodborne outbreaks has been: See “Outbreak — Georgia and Tennessee.”

the feces of deer, dogs, horses, and flies: See Armstrong et al., “Foodborne Pathogens.”did not eat a contaminated burger: See “Update: Multistate Outbreak.”remains contagious for about two weeks: See Armstrong et al., “Foodborne Pathogens.”

202 E. coli 0157:H7 can replicate in cattle troughs: See Paul Hammel and Henry J. Cordes, “Holes in the Research: E. coli Prompts Few Changes on the Farm from Farm to Fork,” Omaha World-Herald, December 15, 1997.

About 75 percent of the cattle in the United States: Cited in Mitchell Satchell and Stephen J. Hedges, “The Next Bad Beef Scandal? Cattle Feed Now Contains Things Like Chicken Manure and Dead Cats,” U.S. News & World Report, September 1, 1997.

millions of dead cats and dead dogs: Ibid.

cattle blood is still put into the feed: For the unsettling details of what livestock are now fed, see “Substances Prohibited from Use in Animal Food or Feed; Animal Proteins Prohibited in Ruminant Food; Final Rule,” Part II, Federal Register, June 5, 1997; Ellen Ruppel Shell, “Could Mad-Cow Disease Happen Here?” Atlantic Monthly, September 1998; and Rebecca Osvath, “Some Feed and Manufacturing Facilities Not Complying with Rules to Prevent BSE, Survey Finds,” Food Chemical News, April 3,2000.

A study published a few years ago: Eric R. Haapapuro, Neal D. Barnard, and Michele Simon, “Review — Animal Waste Used as Livestock Feed: Dangers to Human Health,” Preventive Medicine, September/October 1997.

203 during the winter about I percent of the cattle… as much as 50 percent during the summer: The study was conducted by the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service. Cited in “Study Urges Pre-Processed Beef Test for E. coli,” Health Letter on the CDC, March 13, 2000.

204 can contaminate 32,000 pounds: Cited in Armstrong et al., “Foodborne Pathogens.”

204 the animals used to make about one-quarter: See “Relative Ground Beef Contribution to the United States Beef Supply — Final Report,” The American Meat Institute Foundation, in cooperation with the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association,” May 1996.

dozens or even hundreds of different cattle: Cited in Armstrong et al., “Foodborne Pathogens.”

“This is no fairy story and no joke”: Sinclair, Jungle, p. 135.

205 “Meat and food products, generally speaking”: Quoted in Skaggs, Prime Cut, p. 123.

“Men are men”: Quoted in Yeager, Competition and Regulation, p. 208.

“we are paying all we care to pay”: Quoted ibid., p. 205.

A panel appointed by the National Academy of Sciences… another National Academy of Sciences panel: The findings of the first panel were published in a report entitled Meat and Poultry Inspection: The Scientific Basis of the Nation’s Program (Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1985). The findings of the second panel appeared as The Future of Public Health (Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1988).

206 “Who knows what crisis will be next?”: The chairman of the panel was Richard Remington, professor of preventive medicine and environmental health at the University of Iowa. Quoted in Gregory Byrne, “Panel Laments ‘Disarray’ in Public Health System; Institute of Medicine Panel,” Science, September 23, 1988.

five major slaughterhouses that supplied about one-fifth: Cited in Daniel P. Puzo, “Does Streamlined Beef Inspection Work?” Los Angeles Times, June 18, 1992.

number of federal meat inspectors would be cut by half: See Knight-Ridder News Service, “Meat Policy Changed: Plants Won’t Be Inspected As Often,” The Record, November 4, 1988.

A 1992 USDA study of the Streamlined Inspection System: See Don Kendall, “Report Calls for Streamlining Federal Meat Inspections,” AP, September 17, 1990.

207 the accuracy of that study was thrown into doubt: On April 30, 1992, the ABC News show PrimeTime Live broadcast an investigation of the Streamlined Inspection System for Cattle. ABC had obtained corporate documents showing that some USDA visits were known in advance. The show also included footage of meat covered in feces being processed at the Monfort plant in Greeley. For more on conditions at the Greeley plant, see Kelly Richmond, “Unhappy Meals: Colorado Meat Plant Blasted for Disease and Filth,” States New Service, June 11, 1992. For more on the lapses of the SIS-C and the lack of surprise during USDA visits, see Guy Gugliotta, “USDA Is Sued: Where’s the Beef Report? Public Interest Group Charges System Lets Dirtier, More Dangerous Meat Reach Consumers,” Washington Post, July 10, 1990.

some of the meat used by Jack in the Box: See Terry McDermott, “The Jack in the Box Poisonings — Why Inspection of Meat Fails,” Seattle Times, January 31, 1993; Frank Green, “Foodmaker, Suppliers Settle E. coli Claims,” San Diego Union-Tribune, February 25, 1998.

“This recent outbreak sheds light”: Quoted in “Meat Institute Urges Federal and State Agencies to Adopt Industry Guidelines Proven to Prevent E. coli 0157:H7 in Hamburgers,” PR Newswire, February 4, 1993.

“The presence of bacteria in raw meat”: Quoted in Fox, Spoiled, p. 252.

208 had waited a week before acknowledging: See Robert Goff, “Coming Clean: After Its Tragic Outbreak of E. coli, Jack in the Box Quickly Fixed Its Food Handling,” Forbes, May 17, 1999.

210 A study of campaign contributions: See “The Captive Congress,” a chapter in Safety Last, as well as the statistical tables, pp. 9–21, 76–90.

212 prosecutors claimed… Both men were later found innocent: See Scott Bauer, “Prosecutors: Former Hudson Foods Officials Lied about Meat Recall,” AP, November 10, 1999; “Tyson Unit Acquitted of Lying in Beef Recall; Hudson Quality Control Director Also Cleared,” Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, December 4, 1999.

health officials in Nevada did not learn from the company: FSIS Recall Policy Public Meeting.

“had not been fully tested”: Quoted in Elliot Jaspin and Scott Montgomery, “U.S. Mum on Fast Food Recalls,” Cox News Service, August 18, 1997, Jaspin and Montgomery have written a number of fine investigative pieces on the USDA and the meatpacking industry.

“We live in a very litigious society”: Quoted ibid.

213 The USDA now informs the public: Interview with Elizabeth Gaston, USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service.

“Its very frustrating for us”: Quoted in Allison Young and Jeff Taylor, “Stealthy Meat Recalls Leave Consumers in Dark,” Denver Post, May 13, 1999. See also Allison Beers, “Recalls Present Tough Decisions for Food Companies,” Food Chemical News, May 4, 1998; and Pan Demetrakakes, “Backlash: Recalls,” Food Processing August 1, 1999.

“Press releases will not identify”: Quoted in “Recall of Meat and Poultry Products,” FSIS Directive, January 19, 2000.

A recent IBP press release: “Ground Beef Product Recall,” IBP news release, June 23, 2000.

214 Nowhere does the press release mention: The story of the outbreak at Tiger Harry’s is based on interviews with officials at the Arkansas Department of Health, including Dennis Berry, an epidemiologist; John Kraft, a field investigator; and Dr. David Bourne, medical director of the Preventive Health Section. See also “21 Ill, 11 Hospitalized for E. coli; Outbreak May Be Tied to Restaurant,” Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, June 3, 2000; “266,000 Pounds of Bad Beef Recalled,” Capital Times, June 24, 2000; “Health Department Finds No Further Cases of E. coli Infection; USDA Investigating Ground Beef,” press release, Arkansas Department of Health, June 16, 2000.

“We can fine circuses for mistreating elephants”: Quoted in Carol Smith, “Overhaul in Meat Inspection No Small Potatoes, Official Says,” Seattle Post-Intelligencer, January 29, 1998.

215 demoralized and understaffed: See Allison Beers, “Plant Staffing Shortages Exacerbated by Excessive Absences, Low Morale,” Food Chemical News, August 16, 1999.

the USDA had 12,000 meat inspectors: See Jake Thompson, “Meat Inspectors’ Role Scrutinized: Critics Say That Despite a New Safety Program, There Are Too Few People to Monitor Plants,” Omaha World-Herald, August 24, 1997; “Industry Forum: State of the Union,” Meat & Poultry, March 1998; and “Beefing Up Inspection,” Government Executive, February 1999.

215 the new HACCP plans are only as good: For a strong critique of the current system from an unexpected source, see “Food Safety and Inspection Service: Implementation of the Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point System,” U.S. Department of Agriculture, Office of Inspector General, Food Safety Initiative, Meat and Poultry Products, Report no. 24001–3-At, June 2000.

216 She routinely falsified her checklist: Gary Mickelson, a spokesman for IBP, told me that an employee who falsifies such documentation is subject to disciplinary action by the company. He also told me that IBP employees have in fact been terminated for such behavior.

220-degree steam: The number comes from “SPS 400: Information Update,” a manual published by Frigoscandia Equipment, the manufacturer of steam pasteurization units.

by about 90 percent: Ibid.

“We have been informed that carcasses”: IBP memo from Dean Danilson to Leo Lang re: outrail cattle, May 19, 1997.

217 The dirtiest meat was to be shipped out: When the memo leaked in June of 1998, IBP denied that it was shipping contaminated meat to outside suppliers, claimed its unusual outrail policy had been devised solely to address shelf-life concerns — and said that, in any event, the policy was no longer in effect. Gary Mickelson, an IBP spokesman, repeated the same assertions to me, adding that “IBP’s quality and food safety programs… are considered by many to be the ‘best’ in the industry. We will not sell any products — whether it be boxed beef or beef carcasses that we do not believe are safe for human consumption.” See also “Ground Beef Guidelines Are Insufficient, STOP Says,” Food Chemical News, June 8, 1998.

research for the Star Wars antimissile program: See “Titan to Put Whammy on Food Bacteria,” San Diego Union-Tribune, May 18, 1999.

get rid of the word “irradiation”: See “Beef Industry Recommends Irradiation Rule Include Ready-to-Eat Meats,” Food Labeling News, June 23, 1999; Rick Lingle, “Food Irradiation Acceleration,” Packaging Digest, July 1, 1999; and Steven F. Grover, “Pasteurized Foods in Your Future?” Food Management, October 1999. Grover is a vice president of the National Restaurant Association.

A 1983 investigation by NBC News: For the story of Rudy “Butch” Stanko, see Wayne Slater, “Domestic News,” AP, September 19, 1983; “Agriculture to Investigate a Meat Plant in Denver,” New York Times, September 20, 1983; Judy Harrington, “Packing Company, Owner, Guilty of Selling Bad Meat to Government,” AP, September 15, 1984; and Neal Karlen with Jeff P. Copeland, “A ‘Mystery Meat’ Scandal,” Newsweek, September 24, 1984.

219 an eleven-year-old-boy became seriously ill: For the Bauer Meat story, see Patricia Guthrie, “Government Says Bauer Meats Are Unfit to Eat,” Atlanta Journal, October 14, 1998; “Bauer Meat ‘Unfit for Human Consumption,’” Meat Processing, November 1, 1998; “Bacteria Wars: How 3 Processors Responded,” St. Petersburg Times, February 14, 1999; Robert Trigaux, “Tougher Standards Battle Meat Bacteria,” St. Petersburg Times, February 14, 1999; and “E. Coli Suit Principals Confer; Child’s Family Sues Florida Company,” Florida Times-Union, May 15, 1999.

a dozen children in Finley, Washington: For the Northern States Beef story, see Elliott Jaspin and Scott Montgomery, “Feds Buy Bad Beef for Low Bid; E. coli Outbreak Results from School Lunch Program Supply System,” Atlanta Journal, March 28, 1999; and “Tainted School Tacos,” Seattle Times, May 8, 1999.

219 as much as 47 percent of the company’s ground beef: See Bill Lodge, “Dallas Beef Plant That Failed Salmonella Tests Challenges Screening System,” Dallas Morning News, December 10, 1999; and Tiara Ellis and Michael Saul, “Dallas Meat Processor Recalls Beef After USDA Detects E. coli,” Dallas Morning News, December 26, 1999.

about 1.4 million illnesses: Mead et al., “Food-Related Illness and Death.”

the USDA continued to purchase thousands of tons: See Scott Montgomery and Elliot Jaspin, “USDA Purchased Meat from Texas Plant after Contamination Cited,” Atlanta Journal, Decmber 4, 1999.

annually providing as much as 45 percent: Cited in “USDA Has a Valid Beef in Dallas,” Chicago Tribune, December 14, 1999.

220 the USDA resumed its purchases: See “USDA Satisfied with Changes in Meat Plant It Tried to Shut Down,” AP, February 15,2000.

Judge Fish issued a decision: For the implications of the Supreme Beef case, see Marc Kaufman, “Texas Ruling Threatens USDA Meat Inspections,” Washington Post, May 26,2000; Todd Bensman, “Judge Rebuffs USDA; Agency Tried to Close Dallas Plant,” Dallas Morning News, May 26, 2000; and John Taylor, “Court Ruling Won’t Alter IBP Methods,” Omaha World-Herald, May 27, 2000.

much of the beef used… repeatedly failed USDA tests: See Allison Beers, “Meat Groups Petition USDA to Change HACCP Regulations,” Food Chemical News, January 10, 2000.

221 The meatpacking industry immediately opposed: See “AMS Says It Will Continue with New Standards,” National Meat Association Newsletter, August 7, 2000.

“You’d be better off eating a carrot stick”: Quoted in Usha Lee McFarling, “Homey Kitchens Become Killers Before Our Eyes,” Austin American-Statesman, August 12, 1998.

sixty to one hundred other mutant E. coli organisms… Perhaps a third of them cause illnesses: Interview with Dr. David Acheson.

222 roughly 37,000 Americans suffer: Mead et al., “Food-Related Illness and Death.”

A 1997 undercover investigation by KCBS-TV: See Richard Martin, “L.A. County Cracks Down on Food-Safety Violators,” Nation’s Restaurant News, December 1, 1997.

three teenage employees at a Burger King: See “Police Say Two Teens Tampered with Food,” AP, May 10, 2000, and “Burger King Employees Charged,” AP, May 11, 2000.

10. Global Realization

Few West Germans are familiar with the unusual history of Plauen, though it is abundantly detailed in a number of locally published books. Plauen: auf historischen Postkarten (Plauen, Germany: Plauen Verlag, 1991), by Frank Weiss, uses old postcards to illustrate the history of the city during its most prosperous era. Plauen: 1933-1945 (Plauen: Vogtländischer Heimatverlag Neupert, 1995) is an oversized book, full of photographs, that traces the effects of the Great Depression and the rise of the Nazi Party. The Allied bombing of the city is vividly documented through before-and-after photographs in Plauen 1944/1945: Eine Stadt wird zerstört (Plauen: Vogtländischer Heimatverlag Neupert, 1995), by Rudolf Laser, Joachim Mensdorf, and Johannes Richter. For life near the East German border, I relied on Ingolf Hermann’s Die Deutsch-Deutsch Grenze (Plauen: Vogtländischer Heimatverlag Neupert, 1998). Plauen’s 1989 uprising is chronicled in Rolf Schwanitz’s Zivilcourage: Die friedliche Revolution in Plauen anhand von Stasi-Akten (Plauen, Vogtländischer Heimatverlag Neupert, 1998). Plauen: Ein Rundgang Durch die Stadt (Plauen: Militzke Verlag, 1992) gives a sense of the city after the Wall came down.

John Connelly, an assistant professor of history at the University of California, Berkeley, is one of the few American academics who has both visited and written about postwar Plauen. Professor Connelly shared his recollection of the city with me and sent me the fine article he wrote about its rebellion: “Moment of Revolution: Plauen (Vogtland), October 7, 1989,” German Politics & Society, Summer 1990. Thomas Küttler, the hero of that uprising, told me how it unfolded and shared his thoughts about its legacy. I am grateful to Cordula Franz for help in arranging interviews in Plauen and to Sybille Unterdoifel for introducing me to The Ranch. Frieder Stephan, the owner of The Ranch, helped me fathom the local youth culture and explained his musical journey from rock to disco to country and western. Christian Pöllmann, who helps run a theater company in Plauen, as well as the German Social Union Party, gave me a strong sense of life under Communism and of the hunger for all things American. The photographer Franziska Heinze and journalist Markus Schneider helped me gather information about their home town. Siegfried Pater — filmmaker, environmentalist, and author of Zum Beispiel McDonald’s (Göttingen: Lamuv Verlag, 1994) — described some of McDonald’s misbehavior in Germany. Barbara Distil, the curator of the Dachau Museum, spoke to me about the controversy surrounding the local McDonald’s. For the history of the camp, I relied on a book that she edited with Ruth Jakusch: Concentration Camp Dachau 1933–1945 (Brussels: Comité International de Dachau, 1978).

The Illustrated History of Las Vegas (Edison, N.J.: Chartwell Books, 1997), by Bill Yenne, conveys how the city has been radically transformed in recent years. The Players: The Men Who Made Las Vegas (Reno: University of Nevada Press, 1997), edited by Jack Sheehan, provides a good deal of insight into the unique culture that emerged there. Timothy O’Brien’s Bad Bet: The Inside Story of the Glamour, Glitz, and Danger of America’s Gambling Industry (New York: Times Business, 1998) explains precisely how the casinos make their money.

Much of my information on obesity comes from articles in Science, the Journal of the American Medical Association, and the New England Journal of Medicine. The nutritionist Jane Kirby placed many of the claims and counterclaims about diet into a calm and reasonable perspective for me. Greg Critser’s “Let Them Eat Fat: The Heavy Truths about American Obesity,” Harper’s, March 2000, is a provocative essay on fast food and the poor.

My account of the McLibel trial is based on interviews with the two principals, Helen Steel and Dave Morris, and on the transcripts of the trial (which were available, along with other interesting material, at the anti-McDonald’s Web site www.mcspotlight.org). Franny Armstrong — the director of an excellent documentary, McLibel: Two Worlds Collide — was extremely helpful. John Vidal’s book, McLibel, tells the whole, extraordinary story of the trial. The essays collected in Golden Arches East: McDonald’s in East Asia (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1997), edited by James L. Watson, reveal some of the unpredictable ways in which fast food is now being embraced by other cultures.

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226 the city’s population roughly tripled: See Weiss, Plauen: Postkarten, pp. 3–4.

the most millionaires… and the most suicides: Interview with Thomas Küttler. Also cited in Connelly, “Moment of Revolution.”

the highest unemployment rate: In 1933 the unemployment rate in Plauen was 15.6 percent, the highest in Germany. Cited in Plauen 1933–1945, p. 55.

227 More bombs were dropped on Plauen: About 63.2 tons of explosives were dropped on each square kilometer of Dresden; about 185.4 tons per square kilometer struck Plauen. Cited in Laser et al., Plauen 1944/1945, p. 14.

about 75 percent of Plauen lay in ruins: Küttler interview.

lost one-third of its prewar population: Cited in Weiss, Plauen: Postkarten, p. 4.

an “unusually low quality of life”: Connelly, “Plauen: Moment of Revolution.”

228 “We want freedom”: Küttler interview.

229 “McDonald’s and similar abnormal garbage-makers”: Quoted in “Ban the ‘Big Mac’ from East Germany, Parliamentarian Demands,” Reuters, July 26, 1990.

“global realization”: Quoted in “Blue Chip Blues,” Economist, September 26, 1998.

Within the next decade: See “Some Things Old, Some Things New,” Franchising World, November–December 1999.

earns the majority of its profits: See “The McDonald’s Corporation 1999 Annual Report”; Charlene C. Price, “The U.S. Foodservice Industry Looks Abroad,” USDA Food Review, May–August 1996.

the most widely recognized brand in the world: See “McDonald’s wins top spot in global brand ratings,” Brand Strategy, November 22, 1996.

“McWorld”: See Benjamin R. Barber, “Jihad vs. McWorld,” Atlantic Monthly, March 1992.

when McDonald’s opened its first restaurant in Turkey: See Gulsun Bilgen-Konuray, “Turkey — Franchising Market,” Industry Sector Analysis, U.S. Foreign and Commercial Service, U.S. State Department, August 24, 1999.

230 “Americana and the promise of modernization”: Watson, Golden Arches East, p. 41.

earning $200,000 in a single week during Ramadan: Cited in Bill McDowall, “The Global Market Challenge,” Restaurants & Institutions, November 1, 1994.

In Brazil, McDonald’s has become: See “McDonald’s Employs 33,000 in Brazil,” AP, August 1, 1999.

“Sorry, No McDonald’s”: Quoted in George Lazurus, “You Won’t Find a McDonald’s on Unspoiled Tahiti,” Adweek, January 13, 1986.

“A McDonald’s restaurant is just the window”: Quoted in Latha Venkatraman, “Keeping That Lettuce Crisp,” Business Line, July 5, 1999.

231 “It’s a great little country”: Simplot interview.

“Kids are the same regarding”: Quoted in “Barbie, McDonald’s Find Common Ground,” Selling to Kids, September 30, 1998.

231 the number of fast food restaurants roughly tripled: Cited in Richard Martin, “Special Report: Down Under’s Bloomin’ Dining Wonders,” Nation’s Restaurant News, October 7, 1996.

Ronald McDonald knew: Cited in Kay M. Hammond, Allan Wylie, and Sally Casswell, “The Extent and Nature of Televised Food Advertising to New Zealand Children and Adolescents,” Australian & New Zealand Journal of Public Health, February 1999.

“funny, gentle, kind”: Quoted in Golden Arches East, p. 64.

Coca-Cola is now the favorite drink… McDonald’s serves their favorite food: Cited in “Developmental, Cultural Issues Key in Marketing to Kids Globally,” Selling to Kids, April 1, 1998.

“If we eat McDonald’s hamburgers and potatoes”: Quoted in Vidal, McLibel, p. 42.

In addition to being the McDonald’s Corporation’s partner in Japan, Den Fujita is the author of best-selling books such as Stupid People Lose Money, How to Become Number One in Business, and How to Blow the Rich Man’s Bugle Like the Jews Do. See James Sterngold, “Den Fujita, Japan’s Mr. Joint Venture,” New York Times, March 22, 1992.

232 “For a child growing up in the turmoil”: Christa Maerker, “The Federal Republic of Germany: Second-hand Culture with Borrowed Dreams,” Schatzkammer, Spring 1990.

Americans with German ancestors: Cited in Tim Bovee, “German-Americans Largest U.S. Ethnic Group,” AP, December 16, 1992.

less than one-third of the German foodservice market: Cited in Rupert Spies and Gretel Weiss, “Is Germany’s Traditional Restaurant a Dying Breed?” Cornell Hotel & Restaurant Administration Quarterly, June 1998.

the biggest restaurant company in Germany: See Richard Martin, “Germany Shows Appetite for ‘Fun’ Themes and Foreign Flavors,” Nation’s Restaurant News, April 17, 1995.

233 It battles labor unions: Interview with Siegfried Pater.

the number of franchised outlets: See “Germany-Franchising Market,” Industry Sector Analysis, U.S. Foreign & Commercial Service, U.S. State Department, July 7, 1998.

“The partnership scheme will undoubtedly be”: Quoted in “German Wal-Mart Stores to Feature McDonald’s Restaurants,” Evening Standard, August 12, 1999.

The McDonald’s Corporation denied: See Steve Nichol, “Protesters Lambaste McDonald’s; Picketers Say Restaurant Is Trivializing Holocaust,” Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel, January 28, 1997.

After the curator of the Dachau Museum complained: Interview with Barbara Distil.

“Welcome to Dachau”: Ibid.

The McDonald’s at Dachau is one-third of a mile: According to the odometer on my rental car.

234 Las Vegas is the fastest-growing major city: See “Metropolitan Area Population Estimates for July 1, 1998, and Population Change for April 1, 1990, to July 1, 1998,” U.S. Census Bureau, September 30, 1999.

235 Over the past twenty years the population: In 1980, the population of the Las Vegas metropolitan area was 528,000; today it approaches 1.5 million. See “Large Metropolitan Areas — Population: 1980 to 1996,” Statistical Abstract of the U.S., p. 41; “Metropolitan Area Population Estimates… Population Change.”

235 legally protected against the workings of the free market: For a fascinating account of the Nevada Gaming Control Board and its powers, see “A Peculiar Institution,” by Sergio Lalli, in Sheehan, The Players, pp. 1–22.

236 about two-thirds of a typical casino’s profits… a profit rate of as much as 20 percent: See O’Brien, Bad Bet, pp. 40–44.

“Those who hope we shall move”: Mikhail Gorbachev, Perestroika: New Thinking for Our Country and the World (New York: Harper & Row, 1987), p. 36.

237 “And the merry clowns”: George Cohon, To Russia with Fries (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1999), p. xi.

He reportedly earned $160,000: Cited in Maura Reynolds, “Russians Watch Gorbachev Pizza Ad,” AP, December 23, 1997.

“all my money is gone”: The German publication was Bunte. Quoted in James Meek, “How Last Soviet Leader Lost His Roubles,” Guardian (London), December 30, 1998.

a fee of $150,000 and the use of a private jet: Cited in Margaret Coker, “Siegfried and Gorby?” Business Week, February 15, 1999.

“As if things weren’t good enough”: The executive was Bob O’Brien, president of NPD Foodservice Information Group.

“sensory evaluation specialist”: The speaker was Richard Popper, vice president of Peryam & Kroll Marketing Sensory Research.

238 “A growing number of groups”: Mr. Nugent’s speech, as well as all the others, was recorded by Convention Tapes International, Miami, Florida.

240 the highest obesity rate: Cited in Elizabeth Gleick, “Land of the Fat,” Time International Edition, October 25, 1999.

More than half of all American adults and about one-quarter of all American children: Cited in James O. Hill and James C. Peters, “Environmental Contributions to the Obesity Epidemic,” Science, May 29, 1998.

The rate of obesity among American adults… among American children: See Gary Taubes, “Demographics: As Obesity Rates Rise, Experts Struggle to Explain Why,” Science, May 29, 1998.

“We’ve got the fattest, least fit”: Quoted in Maggie Fox, “U.S.: Obesity Will Be Hard to Treat, Experts Say,” AAP Newsfeed, May 29, 1998.

about 44 million American adults are obese… 6 million are “super-obese”: The adult population of the United States is about 200 million. Twenty-two percent of the nation’s adults are obese and 3 percent are super-obese. See Jeffrey P. Koplon and William H. Dietz, “Caloric Imbalance and Public Health Policy,” Journal of the American Medical Society, October 27, 1999; “Resident Population Projections, by Age and Sex,” Statistical Abstract, p. 17.

A recent study: Ali H. Mokdad, Mary K. Serdula, William H. Dietz, Barbara A. Bowman, James S. Marks, Jeffrey P. Koplon, “The Spread of the Obesity Epidemic in the United States, 1991–1998,” Journal of the American Medical Association, October 27, 1999.

when people eat more and move less: See Hill and Peters, “Environmental Contributions”; Eric Ravussian and Elliot Danforth, Jr., “Human Physiology: Beyond Sloth — Physical Activity and Weight Gain,” Science, January 8, 1999.

241 per capita consumption of carbonated soft drinks: Cited in Jacobson, “Liquid Candy.”

During the late 1950s the typical soft drink order: Cited in Judy Putnam, “U.S. Food Supply Providing More Food and Calories,” USDA Food Review, October 1, 1999.

more fat than ten of the chain’s milk shakes: See “Nutritional Information,” CKE Restaurants.

“Consumers savor the flavor”: Kate MacArthur, “Fast Feeders Find Sizzle by Bringing on the Bacon,” Advertising Age, March 27, 2000. See also Michael Pearson, “Lower Production, Higher Demand for Fast Food Bacon Restores Profitability to Hog Farming,” AP, April 20, 2000.

A decade ago, restaurants sold about 20 percent: Ibid.

second only to smoking: See Koplon and Dietz, “Caloric Imbalance.”

about 280,000 Americans die every year: Cited in Joyce Howard Price, “Fat Chance: The Goverment’s War on Obesity,” Washington Post, January 30, 2000.

242 now approach $240 billion: See Maggie Fox, “Obesity Costs U.S. $238 Billion a Year — Survey,” Reuters, September 15, 1999.

$33 billion on various weight-loss schemes: Cited in Robert Jablon, “Studies Show Obesity on Rise in U.S.,” AP, October 26, 1999.

Obesity has been linked to: See William C. Willett, William H. Dietz, and Graham A. Colditz, “Guidelines for Healthy Weight,” New England Journal of Medicine, August 5, 1999; Aviva Must, Jennifer Spadano, Eugenie H. Coakley, Allison E. Field, Graham Colditz, and William H. Dietz, “The Disease Burden Associated with Overweight and Obesity,” Journal of the American Medical Association, October 27, 1999.

A 1999 study by the American Cancer Society: See Katherine Webster, “Study: Obesity Can Shorten Lifespan,” AP, October 6, 1999.

“The message is we’re too fat”: The researcher is Eugenia Calle, quoted ibid.

Severely obese American children: See Dennis Michael Styne, “Childhood Obesity: Time for Action, Not Complacency,” American Family Physician, February 15, 1999.

the number of fast food restaurants in Great Britain: Cited in Gleick, “Land of the Fat.”

and so did the obesity rate among adults: Cited in Gary Taubes, “Demographics: Weight Increases Worldwide?” Science, May 29, 1998The British now eat more fast food: Cited in Kate Watson Smyth, “Britons Eating 7M Pounds of Fast Food Every Day,” Independent, May 13, 1999.

They also have the highest obesity rate: Cited in Gleick, “Land of the Fat.”

less of a problem in Italy and Spain: Ibid.

where spending on fast food is relatively low: See Smyth, “Britons Eating 7M Pounds”; “Fast Food Is Taking Over the World,” USA Today Magazine, May 1, 1999; Dita Smith, “What on Earth? Fast-Food Feast,” Washington Post, May 27, 2000.

In China, the proportion of overweight teenagers: Cited in Simon Pollock, “China’s Biggest ‘Little Emperors’ Struggle to Tone Up,” Japan Economic Newswire, August 18, 1999.

In Japan, eating hamburgers: For a good account of how eating habits were transformed in Japan, see Mark Hammond and Jacqueline Ruyak, “The Decline of the Japanese Diet: MacArthur to McDonald’s,” East West, October 1990.

242 the sale of fast food in Japan more than doubled: Ibid.

the rate of obesity among children: The statistic comes from the Japanese Education Ministry. Cited in “Western Fast Food Is Blamed for Overweight Children,” Food Labeling News, May 13, 1998.

about one-third of all Japanese men in their thirties: See Joseph Coleman, “More Japanese Men Are Overweight,” AP, June 15, 1998; “Time to Trim the Fat of the Land,” Japan Times, November 14, 1999.

243 a study of middle-aged Japanese men: The Ni-Hon-San Study is described in Hammond and Ruyack, “MacArthur to McDonald.” See also Jeanette G. Kernicki, “A Multicultural Perspective on Cardiovascular Disease,” Journal of Cardiovascular Nurses, July 1997.

American children now get about one-quarter: Cited in Janet McConnaughey, “Chips, Fries Big Part of Kids’ Diet,” AP, September 5, 1999.

A survey of children’s advertising: See “A Spoonful of Sugar — Television Food Advertising Aimed at Children: An International Comparative Survey,” Consumers International, London, November 1996; “Advertising to Children: UK the Worst in Europe,” Food Magazine, January/March 1997.

“Resist America beginning with Cola”: Quoted in Philip F. Zeidman, “Globalization: A Hard Pill to Swallow?” Franchising World, July/August 1999.

“Maybe they think it’s Italian”: Quoted in “U.S. Companies in China Keeping Low Profile,” Colorado Springs Gazette, May 11, 1999.

“lousy food”: The French phrase for what Bove scorns is “la malbouffe.” See Sophie Meunier, “The French Exception,” Foreign Affairs, August 2000.

244 largest purchaser of agricultural commodities in France: Cited in Carla Power, “McParadox,” Newsweek International, July 10, 2000.

“servile slaves at the service of agribusiness”: Quoted in John Lloyd, “The Trial of Jose Bove,” Financial Times, July 1, 2000.

“Non à McMerde”: Quoted in John Lichfield, “St. Jose Makes His Stand Against the Chicken ‘McMerde,’” Independent, July 1, 2000.

“epitomises everything we despise”: Quoted in Christopher Dunkley, “The Greens Take a Bite at Big Mac,” Financial Times, May 17, 1997.

245 “What’s Wrong with McDonald’s?”: See “What’s Wrong with McDonald’s? Everything They Don’t Want You to Know,” London Greenpeace, 1986.

246 McDonald’s threatened to sue at least fifty: See Vidal, McLibel, pp. 46–47.

about $18 billion: “McDonald’s History Listing,” McDonald’s Corporation, 1996.

the court record included 40,000 pages of documents: Cited in Colleen Graffy, “Big Mac Bited Back,” American Bar Association Journal, August 1997.

247 McDonald’s did “exploit” children: Quoted in Dick Beveridge, “McDonald’s Wins Marathon Libel Case, but Loses Publicity Battle,” AP, June 19, 1997.

“McDonald’s don’t deserve a penny”: Quoted ibid.

248 During the trial, Sidney Nicholson… officers belonging to Special Branch: See testimony of Sidney Nicholson, McDonald’s, McDonald’s Restaurants, Ltd., v Helen Steel, David Morris, Day 249, May 14, 1996, pp. 32–38.

“At no time did I believe they were dangerous”: Quoted in “Interview: McDonald’s Spy Fran Tiller on Infiltration and Subterfuge, Big Mac Style,” www.McSpotlight.org.

248 For Dave Morris, perhaps the most disturbing moment: Interview with Dave Morris.

249 some of the similarities between Dave Morris and Ray Kroc: See Vidal, McLibel, pp 58–62.

“Fitting into a finely working machine”: Quoted in Nick Hasell, “McDonald’s Long March,” Management Today, September 1994.

250 Plauen has lost about 10 percent of its population: Interview with Markus Schneider.

251 Plauen’s unemployment rate is about 20 percent: Ibid.

“It was dumb luck”: Quoted in Roger Thurow, “For East German Pair, McDonald’s Serves Up an Economic Parable,” Wall Street Journal, November 8, 1999.

a third of the young people in eastern Germany: Cited in Leonard Ziskin, “Fa and Antifa in the Fatherland,” Nation, October 5, 1998.

Epilogue: Have It Your Way

My views on how to restructure the nation’s food safety system were influenced by a recent report by the National Academy of Science’s Institute of Medicine. Ensuring Safe Food: From Production to Consumption (Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1998) contains many reasonable recommendations that should not be — as so much of the previous food safety advice from National Academy of Sciences has been — ignored. Dale Lasater was a gracious host during many of my visits to Colorado. His ranch is a national treasure. The family’s role in the southwestern cattle industry is eloquently described in Dale Lasater’s Falfurrias: Ed C. Lasater and the Development of South Texas (College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 1985). Laurence M. Lasater’s The Lasater Philosophy of Cattle Raising (El Paso: Texas Western Press, 1972) outlines a holistic system of range management that treats both the animals and the land with respect. The Shortgrass Prairie (Boulder, Colo.: Pruett Publishing, 1988), by Ruth Carol Cushman and Stephan R. Jones, conveys through text and photographs the beauty of an American landscape that is largely unappreciated.

I am grateful to the Conway family, who allowed me to poke around their restaurants and hang out in the kitchens. The last hamburger I ate was served at the Conway’s Red Top on South Nevada in Colorado Springs. It was as good as it gets.

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255 “Nature is smart as hell”: Interview with Dale Lasater.

257 Recent findings that grass-fed cattle: See Francisco Diez Gonzalez, Todd R. Callaway, Menas G. Kizoulis, and James B. Russell, “Grain Feeding and the Dissemination of Acid-Resistant Escherichia coli from Cattle,” Science, September 11, 1998.

259 one of America’s most profitable fast food chains: It is difficult to gauge In-N-Out’s financial details because the company is privately owned. Nevertheless, a decade ago the financial analyst Robert L. Emerson speculated that “In-N-Out enjoys the highest level of return on invested capital in the fast-food industry.” See Emerson, Economics of Fast Food, p. 94.

259 generating more than $150 million in annual revenues: The estimate of $150 milion comes from a recent Los Angeles Times article on the chain and its future after Esther Snyder. The actual figure may be as much as two times higher; in 1990 Emerson claimed that individual In-N-Out restaurants had annual revenues of $1.7 million. See Greg Hernandez, “Family-Owned In-N-Out at Crossroads,” Los Angeles Times, July 2, 2000; Emerson, Economics of Fast Food, p. 93.

The starting wage of a part-time worker: Representatives of In-N-Out declined my requests for an interview, citing the Snyder family’s wariness of the press. The information on the chain’s wages and food preparation techniques come from the In-N-Out Web site and from the following articles: Greg Johnson, “More Than Fare: A Simple Menu, Customer Service, and a Familial Touch Prove to Be a Recipe That Is Working for In-N-Out,” Los Angeles Times, August 15, 1997; Deborah Silver, “Burger Worship: In-N-Out — the Small Fast Food Chain with the Big Following,” Restaurants and Institutions, November 1, 1999; Hernandez, “Family-Owned In-N-Out at a Crossroads.”

260 In-N-Out ranked first: See Deborah Silver, “Primary Choices,” Restaurants and Institutions, March 1, 2000.

the lowest-quality food of any major hamburger chain: Ibid.

262 “advertising directed at children”: Quoted in Harry Berkowitz, “Pediatricians Want Check on Kids’ Ads,” Newsday, February 9, 1995. See also “Policy Statement: Children, Adolescents, and Television,” American Academy of Pediatrics, October 1995.

more than 90 percent of the children in the United States: Cited in Rod Taylor, “The Beanie Factor,” Brandweek, June 16, 1997

263 safest food supply in the world: The National Academy of Science’s Committee to Insure Safe Food from Production to Consumption recently found “little evidence to either support or contradict that assertion.” The committee’s reluctance to pass judgment was based on the unreliable reporting system for foodborne illness in the United States. The panel did not compare the American food safety system with systems in Western Europe. See Ensuring Safe Food, p. 25.

about 0.1 percent of Swedish cattle: Cited in “Swedish Salmonella Control Programmes for Live Animals, Eggs and Meat,” National Veterinary Institute, Swedish Board of Agriculture, National Food Administration, January 16, 1995.

lower than the rate in the United States: At the time, roughly 7.5 percent of American ground beef contained Salmonella. Cited in “Nationwide Federal Plant Raw Ground Beef Microbiological Survey, August 1993-March 1994,” United States Deartment of Agriculture, Food Safety and Inspection Service, Science and Technology, Microbiology Division, April 1996.

The Netherlands began to test ground beef: Interview with Steven Bjerklie.

a dozen federal agencies: Cited in Ensuring Safe Food, p. 26.

if a pizza has pepperoni on it: Ibid., p. 27.

264 Eggs are regulated by the FDA: This example of bureaucratic folly was cited by Carol Tucker Foreman, a prominent food safety advocate, during recent testimony before Congress. For an excellent critique of our current food safety system and some rational proposals for reform, see Prepared Statement of Carol Tucker Foreman, Director of Food Policy Institute, before the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee, Oversight of Government Management, Restructuring, and the District of Columbia Subcommittee, August 4, 1999.

264 more than 500,000 people become ill: Ibid.

on average, once every ten years: Cited in Ensuring Safe Food, p. 87.

roughly 200,000 fast food restaurants: Cited in “Top 100 Share of Restaurant Industry Units by Menu Category,” Technomic Top 100, Technomic Information Services, 2000.

They said IBP slowed down the line: In 1996, an official at the U.S. Meat Export Federation recommended slowing down the line speeds at American plants on export days in order to improve the “hygiene.” See Keith Nunes, “Attitude Adjustment: U.S. Beef and Pork Exporters Need to Develop an ‘Export Mentality,’” Meat & Poultry, March 1996.

the maximum OSHA fine: See OSHA Field Inspection Reference Manual, Section 8 — Chapter IV, C.2.M.

266 “I do not believe”: Quoted in Rudolph J. R. Peritz, Competition Policy in America, 1888–1992: History, Rhetoric, Law (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996), p. 15.

“veggie libel laws” backed by agribusiness: See Ann Hawk, “Veggie Disparagement: Laws in 13 States Prompt Fears Activists and Journalists Will Be Stifled,” The Quill, September 1998; Ronald K. L. Collins and Paul McMasters, “Veggie Libel Laws Still Out to Muzzle Free Speech,” Texas Lawyer, March 30, 1998.

267 “Grow or die”: Quoted in Richard Gibson, “Beef Stakes: How Bill Foley Built a Fast Food Empire on Ailing Also-Rans,” Wall Street Journal, December 2, 1998.

268 environmentalists criticized the chain: For the story behind the “greening” of McDonald’s, see Sharon M. Livesey, “McDonald’s and the Environmental Defense Fund: A Case Study of a Green Alliance,” Journal of Business Communications, January 1999.

269 it continues to use them overseas: See “An Incoherent Policy,” South China Morning Post, May 15, 1995; Jo Bowman, “Little Relish to Scrap Burger Boxes,” South China Morning Post, October 24, 1999.

it would no longer purchase frozen french fries: For McDonald’s decision on biotech fries, see Scott Kilman, “McDonald’s, Other Fast Food Chains Pull Monsanto’s Bio-Engineered Potato,” Wall Street Journal, April 28, 2000; Hal Bernton, “Hostile Market Spells Blight for Biotech Potatoes,” Seattle Times, April 30, 2000.

Afterword: The Meaning of Mad Cow

Since writing Fast Food Nation I’ve come across a number of relevant and noteworthy books. Almost twenty years ago Orville Schell issued an eloquent warning against treating livestock like industrial commodities. Schell approached the subject not only as a journalist, but as an innovative rancher. Had the recommendations in his book Modern Meat (New York: Random House, 1984) been followed, the American meatpacking industry would have avoided many of the health scares and export restrictions it now faces. In The Great Food Gamble (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 2001), John Humphrys explains the mentality and the institutional changes that have led Great Britain from one agricultural distaster to another. George Monbiot’s Captive State (London: Macmillan, 2000) brilliantly outlines the corporate takeover of the British government during the past twenty years. Naomi Klein’s No Logo (London: Flamingo, 2001) offers a damning critique of global corporate power and the reigning cult of the brand. Klein has rightly emerged at the forefront of today’s young rebels. Tony Royle’s Working for McDonald’s in Europe (New York: Routledge, 2000) skillfully outlines how McDonald’s has exported its anti-labor policies to countries with long traditions of respecting workers’ rights. Among other things, Royle describes how the McDonald’s Corporation recruited low-wage workers in Bulgaria and Romania for its restaurants in Germany, providing these new immigrants with housing as a means of controlling them (see pp. 76–8). José Bové, the sheep farmer who became a national hero in France by demolishing a McDonald’s restaurant, offers a plea for sustainable agriculture in The World is Not for Sale: Farmers Against Junk Food (London: Verso, 2001). Written with François Dufour, the General Secretary of the French Farmers’ Confederation, The World is Not for Sale argues that important decisions about what we eat should never be made without considering their social costs and their impact on future generations. The most radical thing about Bové’s argument is how sensible it seems.

Two alarming books have been published about the risk of mad cow disease in the United States. Richard Rhodes’s Deadly Feasts: The Prion Controversy and The Public’s Health (New York: Touchstone, 1998) contains fascinating information on the health risks posed by cannibalism and a fine account of the detective work that linked BSE to the consumption of tainted animal feed. In Mad Cow U.S.A. (New York: Common Courage, 1997), Sheldon Rampton and John C. Stauber reveal how the beef industry and the federal government collaborated to thwart public discussion of mad cow. The duo’s efforts at the Center for Media and Democracy offer a necessary antidote to the P.R. industry’s relentless propaganda. As of this writing, the most definitive and disturbing investigation of mad cow disease is the sixteen-volume report on BSE submitted to the British government by Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers. Its official title is Return to an Order of the Honourable the House of Commons dated October 2000 for the Report, evidence and supporting papers of the Inquiry into the emergence and identification of Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) and variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (vCJD) and the action taken in response to it up to 20 March 1996. Its full text is available online (www.bse.org.uk). Also known as The BSE Inquiry: The Report, it offers some extraordinary glimpses of bureaucratic cowardice and incompetence.

In addition to those works, my account of mad cow disease and the FDA rulemaking process is based on the following documents: “Finding of No Significant Impact and Environmental Assessment for 21 CFR 589.2000, Prohibition of Protein Derived from Ruminant and Mink Tissues in Ruminant Feeds,” Center for Veterinary Medicine, Food and Drug Adminstration, November 1996; “Substances Prohibited for Use in Animal Food or Feed; Animal Proteins Prohibited in Ruminant Feed; Proposed Rule,” Part IV, Federal Register, January 3, 1997; “Cost Analysis of Regulatory Options to Reduce the Risk of an Outbreak of Transmissable Spongiform Encephalopathies (TSEs) in the United States, Addendum to the Final Report,” Office of Planning and Evaluation, Food and Drug Administration, April 30, 1997; “Substances Prohibited from Use in Animal Food or Feed; Animal Proteins Prohibited in Ruminant Feed; Final Rule,” Part II, Federal Register, June 5, 1997. I also relied on transcripts of two public forums held by the FDA to allow discussion of its proposed feed rules: “Food and Drug Administration, Public Forum on the Proposed Rule 21 CFR 589: Substances Prohibited from Use in Animal Food or Feed, St. Louis, Missouri, February 4, 1997” and “Public Meeting for Consumers Regarding Federal Register 21 CFR Part 589, Substances Prohibited from Use in Animal Food or Feed; Animal Proteins Prohibited in Ruminant Feed; Proposed Rule; Washington D.C., February 13, 1997.” For years the reporting about mad cow disease in Food Chemical News has been objective and first-rate.

Interviews with software designer Hitesh Shah, journalist Viji Sundaram, and attorney Harish Bharti helped me understand how revelations about McDonald’s fries and the flavor industry led to riots in India. I am grateful to Eugene Richards for pushing hard to complete our photoessay on the lives of meatpacking workers, and to Roger Cohn, the editor of Mother Jones, for publishing it without hesitation. The plight of Latino meatpacking workers in Texas was eloquently described to me by Trini Gamez at the Centro Gamez in Amarillo and by Michael Wyatt, the director of Texas Rural Legal Assistance. Attorneys Jim Wood, Channy Wood, and Kevin Glasheen explicated for me some of the unique features of Texas workers’ comp law. They have demonstrated real courage in their legal battles with the meatpacking giants. Karen Olsson, editor of the Texas Observer, was extremely generous with her own research on IBP. Michael J. Broadway, an expert on meatpacking who heads the Department of Geography at the University of Michigan, provided much information and encouragement. Most of all, I am grateful to the injured meatpacking workers who shared their stories with me: Kenny Dobbins, Hector Reyes, Raul Lopez, Rita Beltran, Dora Sanchez, and Michael Glover, among others. Their suffering cannot adequately be put into words.

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272 the agency would “expedite”: Quoted in Lawrence K. Altman, “Cow Disease Sparks Voluntary Rules on Feed,” New York Times, March 30, 1996.

“keen consumers of beef burgers”: Quoted in Claire O’Brien, “Scant Data Cause Widespread Concern,” Science, March 29, 1996.

American cattle were eating about 2 billion pounds: According to the USDA, the rendering industry at the time handled about 7.6 million tons of ruminant protein per year, about 5.5 million tons of it derived from cattle. Approximately 13 percent of the animal protein handled by industry (992,099 tons) was used in cattle feed. I have converted the tons into pounds to give a sense of the massive amounts of slaughterhouse waste involved. The figures are cited in “Finding of No Significant Impact and Environmental Assessment for 21 CFR 589.2000, Prohibition of Protein Derived from Ruminant and Mink Tissues in Ruminant Feeds,” Center for Veterinary Medicine, Food and Drug Administration, November 1996, pp. 15–16, 21.

three-quarters of all American cattle: Cited in Michael Satchell and Stephen J. Hedges, “The Next Bad Beef Scandal? Cattle Feed Now Contains Things Like Chicken Manure and Dead Cats,” U.S. News & World Report, September 1, 1997.

273 “totally unsupported by any scientific evidence”: Quoted in “Rendering Industry Supports Voluntary Guidelines for Cattle with Suspected CNS Disease,” Food Chemical News, July 29, 1996.

“unfeasible, impractical, and unenforceable”: Quoted in ibid.

brains, spinal cords, eyeballs: See “NCBA Urges Scientific BSE Prevention,” Press Release, National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, February 18, 1997.

fats, blood, blood products: See “Industry, Public Interest Groups Differ on FDA’s Proposed Ruminant Ban,” Food Chemical News, March 10, 1997.

allowing cattle to continue eating dead pigs: See the statement of Dr. Beth Lautner, vice president of science and technology at the National Pork Producers Council, Transcript of “Food and Drug Administration, Public Forum on the Proposed Rule 21 CFR 589: Substances Prohibited from Use in Animal Food or Feed, St. Louis, Missouri, February 4, 1997,” p. 101.

“all mammal remains to all food animals”: Quoted in “Controlling ‘Mad Cow Disease’: We call for stronger FDA action,” Consumer Reports, May 1997.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advised: See “CDC Rejects Any Weakening of FDA’s Ruminant Feed Ban Proposal,” Food Chemical News, March 31, 1997.

“The United States has no BSE”: Quoted in “Substances Prohibited from Use in Animal Food or Feed; Animal Proteins Prohibited in Ruminant Feed; Final Rule,” Part II, Federal Register, June 5, 1997, p. 30939.

“mammalian-to-ruminant, with exceptions”: Quoted in ibid., p. 30968.

274 these industry groups rightly worried: See “FDA Public Forum,” pp. 36–9.

a remarkable example of cooperation’: Quoted in Chuck Cannon, “Renderers Appear To Be Bearing Up Well to FDA’s Ban on Ruminant Protein in feed,” Meat Marketing & Technology, March 1998.

“protected the beef industry”: Quoted in ibid.

“verbatim”: Quoted in ibid.

“the number of BSE cases there soon doubled”: Cited in “Developments in Mad-Cow History,” Wall Street Journal, March 1, 2001.

the number of BSE cases increased fivefold: Cited in Geoff Winestock, “Tracking Spread of ‘Mad Cow’ in Europe Remains Random,” Wall Street Journal, January 8, 2001.

that supplied ground beef to McDonald’s restaurants: See Melanie Goodfellow, “Italy’s First BSE Case Found in Cow Destined for McDonald’s,” The Independent, January 16, 2001, and “Final Tests Confirm BSE in Cow in Italian Slaughterhouse That Supplies McDonald’s,” AP Worldstream, January 16, 2001.

plummet by as much as 50 percent: Cited in Geoff Winestock, “‘Mad-Cow’ Disease Cases Jump Despite EU Increased Testing,” Wall Street Journal, January 8, 2001.

275 one-quarter of the firms handling “prohibited” feed: Cited in “Food Safety: Controls Can Be Strengthened to Reduce the Risk of Disease Linked to Unsafe Animal Feed,” GAO/RCD-00–255, United States General Accounting Office, September 2000, p. 12.

one-fifth of the firms handling both: Cited in ibid., p. 12.

one out of every ten rendering firms: Cited in ibid., p. 12.

In Colorado, more than one-quarter: Cited in Michael Booth, “Mad Cow Rules Violated,” Denver Post, May 13, 2001.

sales in Europe had already fallen by 10 percent: Cited in “McDonald’s Not Out of Mad Cows Woods Yet — CFO,” Reuters, February 28, 2001.

“If McDonald’s is requiring something”: Quoted in Philip Brasher, “McDonald’s Forcing Beef Industry to Comply with Mad Cow Rules,” Associated Press, March 13, 2001.

“Because we have the world’s biggest shopping cart”: Quoted in ibid.

276 “McGarbage”: Douglas Kern, “McGarbage”, National Review Online Weekend, January 27–8, 2001.

“hodgepodge of impressions”: Cynthia Crossen, “A Culinary Wasteland,” Wall Street Journal, January 12, 2001.

“anecdotal”: The AMI spokeswoman was Janet Riley, quoted in Regina Schrambling, “Catching America with Its Hand in the Fries,” New York Times, March 21, 2001.

“The real McDonald’s”: Quoted in Alby Gallun, “McDonald’s Mid-Life Crisis,” Crain’s Chicago Business, April 30, 2001.

277 One of President George W. Bush’s first acts: For the implications of Bush’s move, see “Working America Challenges Corporate America,” U.S. Newswire, March 6, 2001; Victor Epstein, “Arguments over Ergonomics Keenly Felt by Injured Workers,” Omaha World-Herald, March 8, 2001; and Mike Allen, “Bush Signs Repeal of Ergonomics Rules,” Washington Post, March 21, 2001.

Norwood sponsored legislation: In 1997, Norwood sponsored a bill (along with Congressman Joel Hefley from Colorado Springs) that essentially aimed to repeal the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970. See “Hutchison, Hefley Introduce Proposals in House, Senate to Overhaul OSHA,” Asbestos & Lead Abatement Report, April 7, 1997.

repetitive stress injuries from skiing: See Sarah Anderson, “OSHA under Siege,” The Progressive, December 1995.

The meatpacking industry’s lobbyists were delighted: See Allison Beers, “USDA Plans to Change School Lunch Specs for Ground Beef, Pork, Turkey,” Food Chemical News, April 2, 2001; Marc Kauffman, “USDA Proposes to Reverse School Ground Beef Rules,” Washington Post, April 5, 2001; and Marian Burros, “U.S. Proposes End to Testing for Salmonella in School Beef,” New York Times, April 5, 2001.

roughly 5 million pounds were rejected: Cited in Beers, “USDA Plans”.

278 “For flavor enhancement”: Quoted in Viji Sundaram, “Where’s the Beef? It’s in Your French Fries,” India-West, April 5, 2001.

“Eating a cow for a Hindu”: Quoted in Laurie Goodstein, “For Hindus and Vegetarians, Surprise in McDonald’s Fries,” New York Times, May 20, 2001.

279 “We came to warn them”: Quoted in “Hardline Hindus: Close McDonald’s,” Ha’aretz, May 6, 2001.

“If you visit McDonald’s anywhere”: “Healthy Eating,” McDonald’s Corporation, Australian Web site, www.McDonalds.com.au, 2001.

adjusting its french fry recipe: Interview with Anna Rozenich, the McDonald’s Corporation.

“We regret if customers felt”: “McDonald’s French Fry Facts”, McDonald’s Corporation, May 2001.

“confusion” was the wrong word: Quoted in Transcript, “Class Action Suit Against McDonald’s Claims Company Misleads Consumers About Fry Oil,” CNN News, May 3, 2001.

“We apologize for any confusion”: The spokesman was Walt Riker, repeating a denial made on numerous occasions. Quoted in Transcript, “Class Action Suit.” See also “McDonald’s Apologizes,” Calgary Herald, May 25, 2001.

280 “Thank you for contacting us”: Letter from Beth Petersohn, Manager, Customer Satisfaction Department, McDonald’s Corporation, to Ms. Laura Strickland, May 5, 1993.

the fast food industry did not gain any new customers: Cited in Robert O’Brien, “Consumer Update & Industry Outlook,” NPD Foodworld, March 2001. See also Milford Prewitt, “COEX Attendees Upbeat Despite Economic Cloud,” Nation’s Restaurant News, March 12, 2001, and Peter Romeo, “Is Fast Food Ill?”, Restaurant Business, April 1, 2001. Romeo, the editor of Restaurant Business, subsequently spoke with me about some of the marketing challenges and economic problems that the fast food industry now confronts.

not only hamburger chains, but also pizza: Cited in Robert O’Brien, “Consumer Update & Industry Outlook,” NPD Foodworld, March 2001.

at a cost of more than $70 million: Cited in Jennifer Ordonez, “How Burger King Got Burned in the Quest to Make the Perfect Fry,” Wall Street Journal, January 16, 2001

a “K minus” program: For the details and the rationale of “K minus,” see Richard Martin, “Taco Bell Accelerates ‘Value’ Exploration,” Nation’s Restaurant News, November 18, 1991; Ronald Henkoff, “Service is Everybody’s Business,” Fortune, June 27, 1994; and Tim Durnford, “Redefining Value: For Whom the Taco Bell Tolls,” Cornell Hotel & Restaurant Quarterly, June 1997.

fell by 9 percent in the fourth quarter: Cited in Chuck Hutchcraft, “Off the Mark,” Restaurants and Institutions, May 1, 2001.

281 “We are not doing a great job”: Quoted in Jennifer Ordonez, “Taco Bell Chief Has New Tactic: Be Like Wendy’s,” Wall Street Journal, February 23, 2001.

doubts on Wall Street: For pessimistic views of McDonald’s financial prospects, see Ken Kurson, “Supersize Dread: McDonald’s Future is Smelling Worse Than Its Restaurants,” Esquire, April 1, 2001, and Alby Gallun, “McDonald’s Mid-life Crisis,” Crain’s Chicago Business, April 30, 2001. For a much rosier view, see Moises Naim’s interview with Jack Greenberg, McDonald’s CEO, “McAtlas Shrugged,” Foreign Policy, May 1, 2001.

doubling its sales within the United States: Cited in Alby Gallun, “McDonald’s Mid-life Crisis.”

McDonald’s ranked just a couple of places: Cited in Bob Krummert, “QSR Patron Picks and Pans; American Customer Satisfaction Research Shows Customer Dissatisfaction with Fast Food Restaurants,” Restaurant Hospitality, April 1, 2001. The survey was conducted by the National Quality Research Center at the University of Michigan Business School. It ranked two hundred national organizations on the basis of 50,000 consumer interviews.

282 acted decisively and hired Temple Grandin: Grandin, an associate professor of Animal Science at Colorado State University, has designed livestock handling facilities throughout the world. She gained renown for her ability to “see through the eyes” of cattle of order to minimize the fear and stress they experience before slaughter. Her commitment to animal welfare is heartfelt and unassailable. Grandin was profiled by the neurologist Oliver W. Sacks in An Anthropologist on Mars (New York: Vintage Press, 1996), and has published her own memoir, Thinking in Pictures: And Other Reports from My Life with Autism (New York: Vintage Press, 1995).

According to Grandin: Temple Grandin discussed McDonald’s humane slaughter program with me at length.

the enthusiastic support of the meatpacking industry: Janet Riley, a spokeswoman for American Meat Institute (AMI), told me that the industry has eagerly backed the new guidelines devised by Grandin. Slaughtering animals humanely is a good idea, not just for ethical reasons; it also improves the quality of the meat. The meatpacking industry much prefers a program administered by McDonald’s to one administered by the USDA. McDonald’s inspectors are employed by meatpacking companies; their inspection reports are not open to public scrutiny; and the names of companies that fail an inspection are not disclosed. For the AMI’s resistance to greater USDA involvement in humane slaughter, see “Panel Gives Agriculture Dept. $2.5 Million,” AP Online, July 17, 2001.

I visited meatpacking communities in Texas: Our photoessay, “The Most Dangerous Job in America,” appeared in Mother Jones, July/August 2001.

283 forever surrendering the right to sue: See Tad Fowler, “In the Matter of Michael Glover vs. IBP, Inc. Workplace Injury Settlement Program, Judgement in Arbitration,” p. 3. The ability of workers to sign away their common law rights has been upheld by the Texas Supreme Court, which has given precedence to the sanctity of contracts. See Supreme Court of Texas, Lawrence v. CDB Services, Lambert v. Affiliated Foods, Inc., Nos. 00–0142, 00–0201, March 29, 2001.

control over the job-related medical treatment: See “Workplace Injury Settlement Program — Texas,” IBP, p. 7.

The Texas Supreme Court has ruled: According to the court’s perverse logic, companies participating in the worker’s comp system are not allowed to fire injured workers — but companies who leave the system are free to do so. See Supreme Court of Texas, Mexican Railway Company v. Bouchet, No. 96–0194, February 13, 1998.

When Lonita Leal’s right hand was mangled: See Karen Olsson, “Chain of Casualties: How an Amarillo Beef Packing Plant Disposes of Injured Workers,” Texas Observer, May 22, 1998.

When Duane Mullin had both hands: See ibid.

the world’s biggest and most powerful meatpacking firm: See Kelly P. Kissel, “Tyson, IBP Agree to Terms on Chicken–Beef Merger,” AP, June 27, 2001, and Bill Hord, “Livestock Producers ‘Feel the Squeeze’ of Tyson–IBP Deal,” Omaha World-Herald, January 3, 2001.

$1.7 billion in debt: Cited in Kelly P. Kissel, “Tyson, IBP Agree to Terms on Chicken–Beef Merger,” AP, June 27, 2001.

284 “If McDonald’s is requiring something”: Quoted in Brasher, “McDonald’s Forcing Beef Industry,” Associated Press, March 13, 2001.

about a hundred people: As of August 31, 2001, the number of confirmed and probable cases of vCJD in the United Kingdom had reached 106. See “CJD Statistics,” The UK Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease Surveillance Unit, September 3, 2001.

Roughly the same number of people die every day: 41,611 Americans died in traffic accidents during 1999 — a rate about 114 a day. Cited in “Traffic Safety Facts 1999,” National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, U.S. Department of Transportation, 2000.

About 800,000 cattle with mad cow: This figure was cited by Professor Jeffrey Almond, a member of the United Kingdom’s Spongiform Encephalopathies Advisory Committee. See Transcript, “Meeting of U.S. Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathies Advisory Committee, Gaithersburg, Maryland, June 3, 1999.”

If it takes about ten years: For discussion of vCJD’s potential incubation period, and the implications for public health, see Charles Arthur, “BSE infection: This is a New Disease and We Are Entering the Unknown,” Independent, April 29, 2000; Dorothy Bonn, “Healthy carriers could increase vCJD risk,” The Lancet, September 2, 2000; Charles Arthur, “CJD Threat Could Last for 40 Years, Says Expert,” Independent, November 16, 2000; and David Derbyshire, “Scientists Fear Second Round of Human BSE,” Daily Telegraph, May 16, 2001. For a good review of the risk to human health, see Paul Brown, Robert G. Will, Raymond Bradley, David M. Asher, and Linda Detwiler, “Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy and Variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease: Background, Evolution, and Current Concerns,” Emerging Infectious Diseases, vol. 7, no. 1, January–February, 2001.

285 much as Three Mile Island and Chernobyl: Nicols Fox astutely made this analogy back in 1997. See Nicols Fox, Spoiled (New York: Basic Books, 1997), p. 331.

British agricultural officials were concerned: See Volume I, “Findings and Conclusions, Section 3, The Early Years, 1986–88,” paragraphs 223–34, The BSE Inquiry: The Report, October 2000.

a leading manufacturer of pet foods: The story of how the British pet food industry took the lead in defending the public from BSE can be found in Volume 5, “Animal Health, 1989–96, Section 3, Introduction of the Animal SBO Ban,” paragraphs 3.1–3.26, The BSE Inquiry: The Report; Volume 6, “Human Health, 1989–96, Section 3, Introduction of the Ban on Specified Bovine Offal,” paragraphs 3.91–3.203, ibid.; and Anthony Bevins, “How We Had to Rely on Pedigree Chum Firm for CJD Advice,” Express, October 27, 2000.

a good idea: See Volume 6, “Human Health, 1989–96, Section 3, Introduction of the Ban on Specified Bovine Offal,” paragraph 3.201, The BSE Inquiry: The Report.

some of the nation’s cheapest meats: See Judy Jones, “McDonald’s Takes British out of Burgers’, Observer, March 24, 1996.

The death of “Mad Max”: See Allison Pearson, “How We Swallowed the BSE Lie”, Evening Standard, October 4, 2000, and Kamal Ahmed, Antony Barnett, and Stuart Miller, “Focus: BSE: How the Government Betrayed the People”, Observer, October 29, 2000.

“constantly sought to prevent or delay”: Quoted in Le Monde, “Time to Make Some Radical Reforms in the Food Industry,” Manchester Guardian Weekly, May 30, 2001.

286 “might have had an adverse effect”: Quoted in ibid.

about 150 million pounds of the stuff: In 1989 Great Britain exported roughly 15,000 tons of potentially tainted feed, and exported an additional 8,500 to 9,000 tons per year until 1996. That adds up to roughly 75,000 tons over the eight-year period. Cited in Steve Stecklow, “U.K.’s Exports May Have Expanded the Boundaries of Mad Cow Disease’, Wall Street Journal, January 23, 2001.

blocked publication of the EU report: See Peter Hadfield, “Ministry Bungle puts Japan at risk of BSE,” Sunday Telegraph, September 23, 2001.

“disposed of”: See ibid.

about a billion pounds of rendered cattle: Cited in Steve Secklow, “In Battling Mad Cow, Britain Spawns Heaps of Pulverized Cattle,” Wall Street Journal, January 8, 2001.

generates electricity by burning cattle: See Philip Pullela, “Mad Cow Scare on Front Burner around Europe,” Reuters, January 22, 2001.

287 BSE may easily cross the species barrier: See Bonn, “Healthy Carriers,” The Lancet, and Barry James, “‘Mad Cow’ Disease in Pigs and Sheep?” International Herald Tribune, August 31, 2000.

“All cannibalistic recycling”: Quoted in Jonathon Leake, “New BSE Outbreak Linked to Blood in Feed,” Sunday Times, September 24, 2001.

at least 60,000 other cattle: This figure was cited by Professor Jeffrey Almond, Transcript, “U.S. TSE Committee.”

“If you don’t look”: Quoted in John S. Long, “Nation Isn’t Doing Enough to Detect Mad Cow Disease, CWRU Experts Say,” Plain Dealer, May 6, 2001.

approximately 375 million cattle: Since 1990, about 34 million cattle have been slaughtered each year in the United States. See “The Texas Blues,” Leather, August 1998.

about 15,000 of them were tested for mad cow: See Megan Mulholland, “Wisconsin-Based Renderer’s President Stands Firm on Safety of U.S. Feed,” Post Crescent, May 20, 2001.

a cattle herd roughly one-thirtieth the size: Belgium has about 3 million cattle; the United States has about 100 million. See Terry Downs, “Mad Cow Disease Testing Reveals Widespread Infection in Europe,” Food Chemical News, January 22, 2001.

leading American manufacturers promise: See Tim Phillips, “Are Pets Being Reccled into Pet Food?” Petfood Industry, March/Aril 1992.

40,000 pounds of dead dogs and dead cats: Cited in Patrick White, “Canada Pet Food Firm Turns Back on Dog and Cat Meat,” Reuters, June 5, 2001.

“This food is healthy and good”: Quoted in ibid.

288 the most common source of animal protein in poultry feed: See Daniel Rosenberg, “Mad Cow Disease Concern Could Change Chicken Feed’, Wisconsin State Journal, May 5, 2001.

processes about 10 million pounds of chicken parts: Cited in “Multi-million Dollar Facility to Help Tyson Ensure That Nothing Goes to Waste’” M2 Presswire, June 7, 1996.

the export needs of Nestlé: See John Vidal and Peter Hethrington, “Foot-and-Mouth Crisis: Food Lobby Forced PM into U-Turn on Plan for Vaccination,” Guardian, September 8, 2001.

supplied the milk for McDonald’s milkshakes: Cited in Amanda Hall, “Whole-meal Haskins: Chris Haskins, Maverick of Northern Foods and Express Dairies, Mixes a Healthy Serving of Politics with His Business,” Sunday Telegraph, June 14, 1998.

289 20 percent of its farmland: Cited in Paul Geitner, “Scare Helps Europe’s Organic Food,” AP Online, March 19, 2001.

“Things will no longer be”: Quoted in Michael Adler, “Greens Trumpet Their New Star, Agriculture Minister Kuenast,” Agence France Presse, March 11, 2001.

“Our Cows should get only water”: Quoted in “Germany Plans Radical Farm Reform — Food Must Be As Pure As Beer, Says Government,” Deutsche Presse-Agentur, February 8, 2001.