16 Ester Reiter FAST FOOD: IS OUR FUTURE FRIED? Ester Reiter How does freedom and empowerment become defined as the choice of topping with which one orders a hamburger? How are the fixed tastes and focused desires, which limit decisions to which name brand of product to buy, replacing the critical thinking involved in exploring notions of the public good? McDonald=s Corporation is the leader in this area. Global Expansion In 1995, thirty years after Ray Kroc took over the profitable hamburger stand in California, McDonald0s Corporation reported $30 billion in system- wide sales in 89 countries around the world. ($29,914,000,000 to be exact.) Fourteen billion dollars in sales were outside the United States. Employees numbered more than one million in 18,000 restaurants. In their words, McDonald0s vision is to dominate the global foodservices industry. Global dominance means setting the performance standards for customer satisfaction while increasing market share and profitability through our Convenience, Value and Execution Strategies.1 These figures are hard to grasp, so perhaps some comparisons will help. Three quarters (eighteen of twenty four) of the countries in Latin America each 1 McDonald0s, Annual Report (1995). had a Gross National Product (GNP) in 1987 that was less than the gross sales of McDonald0s.2 When one looks at the development of the industry, the creation and expansion of the market, and the use of a division of labour in the home for both production and consumption purposes, one begins to realize that the fast food industry is not just about food. There is a political, social, and cultural message, and a powerful one quite suited to the nineties, that is being sold along with the hamburgers. The fast food industry has become a symbol of the advantages of a 00free00 market. People want a taste of American culture, an American way of life, a market-driven free enterprise economy, and so American fast food restaurants enjoy an extraordinary popularity across the globe in places as far flung as Russia or China. I was in Nanjing, China, during the summer of 1995. The two Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurants (owned by Pepsico Corporation) were always jammed, and the Chinese watched expectantly as the first McDonald0s was being built. Indeed, the students I treated to lunch with the offer of any place in town chose the Kentucky Fried Chicken. Why? All they would say is that they liked it and admired the technology. 2Ruth Sivard, World Military and Social Expenditures, 1991 (Washington: World Priorities, 1991). 18 Ester Reiter The advertising budget of McDonald0s alone counted in the billions (1.4 in 1993), inviting potential customers to 00get up and get away,00 a catchy slogan that has an influence. Indeed, Ronald McDonald is a more familiar figure than is Santa Claus.3 The 1990s are a time when structural adjustment policies reign globally, self-imposed in the first world and demanded by the international banking system in the third world. Structural adjustment policies require internal economies to restructure in order to get loans from world financial institutions such as the World Bank or the International Monetary Fund. The adjustments require an increase in exports and a reduction of imports, or the production of goods and services for the international market. This goes along with cuts in public expenditures, reduction in public sector employment, and deregulation or reduced government intervention in the economy. Thus, for example, the use of land for growing beans or corn for local use is unproductive, while establishing cattle ranches to provide beef for North American fast food companies is a good investment. In 1994, over 48 million pounds of beef were purchased in Canada alone. Where is this beef produced? Who is going hungry while we die of cholesterol-induced heart attacks? Is there a relation-ship between the global expansion of a transnational chain like McDonald0s and structural adjustment policies? The individual or the individual firm is the primary unit of analysis. Rich or poor, whether or not we can afford to purchase the good life, the ideology of free choice and consumer sovereignty is a potent international force. The culture-ideology of consumerism in a global system creates tastes and aspirations that are supposed to be met through individual effort. 3 Andrew E Serwer, 00McDonald0s Conquers the World,00 Fortune 130, no. 8 (17 October 1994): 103-116. Fast Food: Is Our Future Fried? 19 All countries are encouraged to embrace the new religion, that of the 00free00 or unregulated marketplace. The gospel is one of com-petitiveness and privatization. The public domain is a waste of money and resources, while the private sphere must be supported (if necessary by public monies) so that it will grow. The profitability of large transnational fast food companies, such as Pepsico, McDonald0s and Grand Met PFC, is admired, and the hopes are that the wealth of these large transnationals will trickle down into the countries in which they locate. Indeed, the words 00Big Mac 00 and 00Quarter Pounder00 are part of the vocabularies in more than 40 different languages.4 The commoditization of increasingly wide arenas of social life in North America has made it more economic for women to enter wage labour even in menial, low-paid jobs, than to produce goods and services at home. Thus, the period when the fast food industry grew in the 1960s and 1970s also marked the vast increase in women entering paid labour, as well as a substantial increase in teenagers who looked for part-time employment while they were full-time students. Indeed, McDonald0s is the largest employer of young people in Canada. The first labour force used for what is now called 00numerical flexibility00 were young people. In Ontario, in 1993, at any one point in time, 42 percent of teenagers 15 to 19 years of age held part-time jobs. A Financial Post article in 1993 estimated that, on average, a teenager spends 50 to 60 hours each week on schoolwork and employment combined. In any school year, approximately two thirds of high school students in Canada work at some point. Working a moderate number of hours is not particularly detrimental for school performance. However, beyond 14 to 16 hours of work a week, grades begin to fall and the dropout rate increases.5 Exploring the Fast Food Industry My information about the fast food industry comes from participant observation. I tried to get access to McDonald0s. I did get as far as an interview with the president, George Cohon, who was concerned that I might 4 McDonald0s Restaurants of Canada Limited, McFacts about McDonald0s (McDonald0s Restaurants of Canada Ltd, 1995). 5"Kids At Work C Close-up On Trials of Young Workers," Th e Financial Post (June 19-21,1993): s18-s19. 20 Ester Reiter attempt to use the Asecrets@ I might discover to either launch a rival fast food chain or foment discontent which could lead to unionization C I0m not sure which. They are so far ahead of other restaurants in Canada, that they feel no need to cooperate with anyone else in the industry, even restaurant programmes such as one I attended at George Brown college, where a number of restaurants formed an advisory body for a program training students as fast food supervisors. I had more luck with Burger King. 6 When I started this research, fifteen or so years ago, Burger King was just expanding in Canada. As Burger King was then owned by the Pillsbury Corporation (since swallowed up by Grand Met PFC), investment funds were not a problem. This expansion led to a rapid restructuring, doubling their revenue and number of outlets in Canada, and making them the fifth largest food services company in Canada by the end of the eighties. One might have expected this American takeover by a megacorporation to elicit objec tions from the Canadian Restaurant Industry. On the contrary, they applauded the company and gave them an award as a Hospitality Leader. The head of the food services program at George Brown felt the industry had exerted a downward pull on the quality of all restaurants. Few could afford, for example, to hire a pastry chef to bake fresh goods. It was not possible to compete with the economies of pre-prepared, mass- produced food. Burger King would give me the information I needed, since the organization of work there is not only influenced by the same philosophy, but was designed by the same man, Donald Smith, lured away from Director of Operations at McDonald0s to overhaul Burger King as its president in the late 1970s. I0ve discovered that insight into the work culture from actually working in a place is substantially greater than what could be learned from passive observation or just reading what others have to say. 6Ester Reiter, Making Fast Food: From the Frying Pan into the Fryer(Montreal: McGill-Queens University Press, 1996) Fast Food: Is Our Future Fried? 21 Over the last fifteen years, I have worked with school boards and unions interested in unionizing fast food places to tell them what I know about the industry. My research was used in an award-winning play called 00Flipping In00 written by Ann Chislett about the fast food industry. That play, put on by the Young People0s Theatre, was performed in various high schools in Toronto. I heard McDonald0s was so annoyed by the critical look at the industry, that they threatened to encourage corporate donors to withdraw funding from Young People0s Theatre if the play was mounted as part of the regular offerings for the season.