In the book Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the American Meal, Eric Schlosser states that fast food has an impact on more than just our eating habits, it has an impact on “…our economy, our culture and our values”(3). At the heart of Schlosser's argument is that entrepreneurship – defined by hard work, innovation and taking extraordinary risks – has nothing to do with the rise of empire fast food and all its subsidiaries. In reality, a fast food restaurant's success depends on getting taxpayer dollars, avoiding government restrictions, and indoctrinating its target audience as young as possible. The resulting affordable, tasty, nostalgic and addictive foods make it difficult to be reasonable in food choices, especially in a fast food industry built primarily by greedy executives. One of the main reasons people choose to eat fast food is because it is inexpensive. The United States government has grown the fast food market by subsidizing much of the industry's costs and deregulating the industry, making it more difficult to combat collusion and monopolistic behavior. The construction of the interstate highway system and agricultural subsidies are more than enough to give fast food companies a competitive advantage over small businesses in the marketplace. However, providing tax breaks that allow for high employee turnover rates and forcing Americans to pay taxes on fast food companies' franchise fees, buildings, real estate, equipment and supplies transforms a capitalist economy into a corporatist economy (Schlosser 102). Since Nixon's proposal to deregulate the market, companies have committed unfair labor practices, also failing to pay their employees for overtime... middle of paper ...... an informed public where companies can exploit workers and consumers, and this would once again lead to a corporatist economy. There are few solutions to the problems of widespread obesity, unchecked greed, and huge wealth disparities. The first would be to place more emphasis on education, funding it through taxes, banning advertising of unhealthy foods or fast food companies, and teaching children to make healthy food choices. The second step would be to regulate the fast food industry as much as necessary, particularly regarding food safety and working conditions. A third step would be to stop subsidizing the fast food industry with agricultural subsidies and tax breaks, and allow companies to compete fairly. While no system is perfect, ignoring a problem will only cause more of them. Work cited Schlosser, Eric. Fast Food Nation. New York: perennial, 2002.