The Voice of Heard/The Fast Food Industry and Youth Exploitation

Submitted by TC Tim on May 20, 2008 - 11:28am.

Today, I have done some complicated research on the fast food industry and the issue of youth exploitation.  I have wondered if young people these days are aware of the issue and if they are doing anything about the issue.   During the course of my research, I found a couple of surveys done by people who are investigating the fast food industry's practices that include, but are not limited to, youth exploitation.  You can check them out at these links:

http://www.job-watch.org.au/jwinfo/fastfoodreport.pdf

http://www98.griffith.edu.au/dspace/bitstream/10072/1609/1/19449.pdf

It was a stressful topic for me.  The question I have on my mind was "Are young people taking any action against the fast food industry in the form of boycotts or protests?"  If you have an answer to this question, please send me some feedback.  It would be of great help.

P.S.  I have found a typo in my first Voice of Heard blog.  In my first sentence, I have meant to say "For most of my life, I never have thought that young people would (not wouldn't) care about how tobacco impacts their health since they smoke for whatever reason."  If anyone had noticed it, I apologize if it had caused a little confusion.

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Re: The Fast Food Industry and Youth Exploitation

Submitted by Anonymous on May 24, 2008 - 7:16pm.

This post interested me. At first I thought the post would be about manipulative advertising practices on the part of the fast food industry. But the issue of exploitation of youth labor is clearly a major issue, at least in Australia. I would be interested to learn whether these same practices can also be found here in the US. I would guess so. And I would also wonder what kinds of organized action would help to improve labor conditions.

Youth Exploitation in the Fast Food Industry

Submitted by TC Tim on May 27, 2008 - 10:54am.

The issue of exploitation of youth labor is an issue not only in Australia, as you have mentioned, but here in the US and most likely everywhere else in the world as well.  There are similar practices of youth exploitation here in the US.  I wish I knew the kinds of organized action that would help improve labor conditions.  But I would first of all read the book Fast Food Nation by Eric Schlosser and check out this website, http://www.slowfoodblog.org/, as a start.  But I strongly encourage you to do your own research. 

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