Fast Food in America

Fast Food in America

Americans are becoming obsessed with fast food. Every person has most likely consumed fast food more than once in their lives. Most eat fast food everyday, for breakfast, lunch, and sometimes dinner. Fast food is a growing industry with more than 500,000 stores in the U.S. According to the Palo Alto Medical Foundation, Americans are spending more than $100 billon dollars on fast food every year. In an article by PAMF, it states, "When people all over the world are looking for a quick, easy meal to grab on the go, fast food is the common solution. With the efficient service, low prices and casual atmosphere, fast food seems like the ideal "all-American" choice. In fact, over 25 percent of Americans consume fast food every day." Fast food is becoming an obvious, quick food choice.

Most Americans realize that fast food is not the healthiest choice there is. People are becoming busier every day, going from work, to school, to extracurricular activities. With no time left to make and prepare food for the family, fast food is the easiest choice. You are already out and about, so why not drive through a fast food restaurant, adding only a couple of minutes to the everyday routine? Grab the food while you're out, and eat it on the go. The problem is, is that people are not realizing what is going into their food, and how many calories are in it/how bad it is for you. Besides the fact that the equipment and areas that your food is being prepared in is very unclean and not being maintained very often, but most of the ingredients going into your food is not natural, and have many preservatives. Bugs and inedible items can easily crawl into your food when it is not being supervised. The food in fast food chains could have been sitting for the whole day, drying out and collecting harmful items. Not much food that comes from fast food places are made to order, or on the spot. In an article by CBS News, it says, "Just about all the food in a fast food industry is processed, so much of the flavor is destroyed. So flavor has to be added. For example chicken McNuggets contain different additives including beef extract, the French fries contain animal products and they won't say which animal, and the buns and condiments also have artificial additives added to them." We need to realize what is going into the food we eat.

Fast food chains are one of the main reasons for obesity in America. Also stated in the CBS News article was, "About 300,000 people die each year from being obese or overweight, this is second only to smoking. Fast food isn't the only reason people are gaining weight, but it contributes to it."

Works Cited:

Ransohoff, Julia. "Fast Food." Palo Alto Medical Foundation. N.p., 25 Jan. 2005. Web.

"Americans Are Obsessed with Fast Food: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal."CBS News. N.p., 11 Feb. 2009. Web.