Sept. 6, 2005
English 101-Summary
Word Count: 894
Do you love McDonald’s?
“I’m lovin’it,” the slogan of the world’s largest fast food company, McDonald’s,
has been translated into different languages and posted on its food packs, flyers, and
working uniforms all around the world. Representative of the fast food industry,
McDonald’s provides job opportunities for the entire labor force; many young people
may even get the chance to experience their first time of work at McDonald’s. In the
article “McDonald’s—We Do It All For You ， ” Barbara Garson interviews a
McDonald’s manager and three employees. “McDonald’s Crew Member,” written by
Kysha Lewin, outlines her own experiences at McDonald’s. These two articles
highlight the similarities within the fast food industry including mechanization and
diminished personal value.
Although they work in the most famous fast food company, crewmembers at
McDonald’s are often treated like machines; they are instructed to follow procedures
without personal intuition. As told by Jason Pratt from Garson’s article, the whole
procedure of making a hamburger includes grilling meat under the timeslot set by
different beepers and buzzers, putting the patty on bread and adding two pieces of
onions, squirting mustard which is on the right and ketchup which is on the left, then
getting pickles, lettuce, and cheese according to customers’ preferences (Garson 153).
The procedure for making fries is almost the same. The only thing a worker needs to
do is press the button. In McDonald’s, workers do not have to know how to cook:
“there’s a procedure for everything and you just follow the procedures” (Garson 152).
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Other than that, if a crewmember uses too much onions or pickles, he or she may have
disobeyed the portion control. Every procedure at McDonald’s is fixed, which makes
the crewmembers work like machines; they never need their own thoughts and
creativities.
Except for strict procedures, McDonald’s rule of busyness also drives people as
machines, described in both Garson’s and Lewin’s articles. According to Kysha,
workers should never let themselves stop; they must always cook, clean, or serve the
customers: “If you don’t have a customer to serve, maybe somebody else has.”
Crewmembers always need to be prepared to help others (Lewin 25). Claimed by Jon
DeAngelo from Garson’s article, who has been a McDonald’s manager for three years,
managers at McDonald’s also try a variety of ways in bringing up their productivities,
such as stretching out their crewmembers by giving them the lowest wages possible.
Although McDonald’s high productivity generates a large portion of its revenue, none
of its machine-treated workers want to bear this rule of busyness. Kysha, for instance,
would like to find a job out of fast food business since “it would be totally different,
not like McDonald’s. McDonald’s is fast and crazy” (Lewin 27).
“I would never go back to McDonald’s, not even as a manager,” stated Jason in
Garson’s article. The reasons that make people want to leave McDonald’s are not only
mechanization, but also diminished personal value, which includes hasty flow of labor
force and heavy work with low payment. It is shown that “McDonald’s employs
500,000 teenagers at any one time. Most don’t stay long” (Garson 153). Since getting
a job at McDonald’s is easy, managers there do not value their employees as much as
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other restaurants may; when someone quits his or her job, managers can easily find
another kid just out on the street. As conveyed in Lewin’s article, only McDonald’s
hires people at the age of fifteen. Many teenagers who need a job but can not find one
will then come to McDonald’s. After they become familiar with all the components of
the job, they tend to find a better job elsewhere. Managers also know this fact, “they
just [say] to bring back the uniform” (Garson 155). As easily as it is to find a worker,
it is also simple to train one. The innovation of “fresh-fry” training shows that it is
possible to let a new worker become a “maximum profit generator” within half an
hour (Garson 155). The hasty flow of labor force diminishes peoples’ value in
McDonald’s.
Additionally, heavy work but low payment also adds to this problem. Dictated in
Garson’s article, McDonald’s gives its workers only a wage of $3.35, which is the
minimum wage at that time. The working hours, however, may result in as high as 9
hours without rest. June Sanders, an employee interviewed by Garson, signed up for 6
hours availability everyday but her manager forced her to work until 1A.M. (Garson
155). Kysha, whose manager yelled at her because she was two minutes late, really
feels upset about this kind of diminished personal value. She works in her spare time
of study to help her mother cover the bills, but life is still a little hard for their family.
“My mother says she feels bad about how much I’m working,” Kysha said (Lewin
27).
People working at McDonald’s are complaining more and more about their se
severe treatments. As discussed by both Garson’s and Lewin’s articles, McDonald’s
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demonstrates the job aspects of mechanization, strict procedures and the rule of
busyness, diminished personal value, the hasty flow of labor force and heavy work
with low payment in the fast food industry. Behind the slogan, “I’m lovin’it,” there
may also be some hard experiences for workers at McDonald’s, a fast food company
which has employed nearly 7 percent of the American labor force (Garson 153).
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Works Cited
Garson, Barbara. “McDonald’s—We Do It All For You.” Literature, Class, and
Culture. Ed. Paul Lauter, and Ann Fitzgerald. New York: Adison Wesley
Longman, 2001. 152-164.
Lewin, Kysha. “McDonald’s Crew Member.” Gig-Americans Talk About Their Jobs.
Ed. John Bowe, Marisa Bowe, and Sabin Streeter. New York: Three Rivers Press,
2001. 24-28.
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