Free Market and obedience

Free Market and obedience

            

          Free market is one of the most important concepts that Erich Schlosser who’s the author of the Fast food nation has introduced and developed through the whole book, however, it would be meaningless to talk about it without the concept “obedience.” I think that these two ideas are linked together. A free market is an idealized market where the government has no say, no power. The market is free to set up its own price, its own regulation, it’s a laissez-faire market. Obedience is the alacrity to follow the will of others. The significance of these two crucial concepts will be developed in the following sentences.

The IBP revolution began in Denison, Iowa when J. Holman and Anderson began Iowa Beef Packers, applying similar labor rules to meat packing that the McDonald brothers applied to making hamburgers. This system required very little skill from its human operators. The meat packing industry now employs some of the poorest, most vulnerable workers in the United States because all it wants is to take advantage on those frail people by imposing on them its power. The industry is basically looking for people who have no hope, people who can be easily under control. The industry hires those are illiterate and those who don’t speak English. The fast food industry employs this tactic in order that the workers follow the exact rules. Schlosser, Eric Fast Food Nation New York, Harper, 2002, considers how teenagers have been, for some time, the bulk of the fast –food workforce. This is because the fast food industry seeks employees who are willing to work part-time for low wages .Moreover. In page 75, the author points out Esther Reiter, a former worker at Burger King shows how obedient fast food workers are. Workers at the fast food industry are working as robot which means they do as their employers told them to do, they can’t propose anything. The chains have worked seriously hard to de-skill the jobs in the kitchens by imposing strict rules on how everything should be done , selling food that already been prepared so  when the workers should have been prepare the food , the food is already prepared so that employees wouldn’t need trainings that would cost the chains.

The fast food industry is one of the most vicious industries I’ve ever seen. The chains such as ConAgra, IBP, and other large meatpacking firm are too powerful, they are under no pressure, they set up their own prices, the government doesn’t have any regulation in their business, and they have their own rules. The chains are willing to put up with turnover rates of 300 to 400 percent in order to keep their labor cost low. It doesn’t really matter to them who comes or goes, since this system treats all workers as thought they are interchangeable. Meatpacking workers belonged to strong unions that could fight for better pay and working conditions. "No other American industry is robbed so frequently by its own employees." Joseph A. Kinney, the president of the National Safe Workplace Institute says this is about the fast-food industry when he urges restaurants to pay their employees higher wages to addition to updating security measures. OSHA regulations designed to protect employees who work at restaurants late at night. All of these things will help improve the lives of fast food workers—the biggest groups of minimum wage earners in the United States .These regulations don’t do much to protect those people, more need to be done. Today’s workers often fell that they can’t speak out because many of them are immigrants and illegal. They are scared to be deported or fired. Congressman Tom Lantos, whose subcommittee conducted the meatpacking injury, called IBP” one of the most irresponsible and reckless corporations in America.” Murphy lied to the Congress, shredded documents requested by OSHA. He told the Congress that workers supposed to follow rules and do what as they told even its unlawful. Many people are suffering because of these rules that the chains or the fast food industry have. In a article, “The Human Behavior Experiment,” written by Alessandra Stanley, published in June 1, 2006 in the Nytimes paper, a prankster posing as a police officer –over the telephone-instructed an assistant manager, Donna Jean Summers to strip-search a teenage employee the imposter said was a thief; by the end of the evening the caller had also persuaded Ms. Summer’s fiancé to abuse the employee and force her to perform oral sex. Most of the workers who work in the meatpacking industry are Spanish women, supervisors regularly forced those female workers to have sex with them and I’m so choked that nothing has been done to put a halt in this inhumane act. Those are severely injured at work can’t get basic care; most of them can’t have any medical attention which is absolutely unacceptable.

In chapter 9, Schlosser opens the door of truth which how companies agreed to feed customers what they want. Animals are feeding by other animals; beef meat is mixing with human being body. The government knows exactly how the meat industry processes and no laws have passed. This means that everything is controlled by the chains, so that everyone is suffering. People are getting sick just by eating these meat ,  and people died .The food is poisonous and Erich Schlosser argues that “everyday in the United States, 200,00 people are sickened by a food borne disease. The government doesn’t impose any fines on companies that are selling bad meat because millions Americans are needlessly being sickened just by eating those meat.

This plant totally violated the law which is all men are equal, no matter what color you are, no matter where you from, no matter the level your education is. It's amazing to me how well hidden these abuses remain. I think everyone has something to say about this, the media, the government because we can’t keep proclaiming this is a democratic country if workers can’t be part in a union, if workers can’t oppose what their employers are asking N them to do, if workers can’t receive medical attention the same as blond-haired people. Recent immigrants, elderly people, undocumented alien, teenagers are the ones who makes the kitchens fire up, the ones who make the industry so strong but they are constantly threatened. I hope that one day someone would bring justice to these people because everyone should be treated as human.