The Chain
Book description
A powerful and important work of investigative journalism that explores the runaway growth of the American meatpacking industry and its dangerous consequences.
On the production line in American packinghouses, there is one cardinal rule: the chain never slows. Every year, the chain conveyors that set the pace of slaughter have…
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Why read it?
2 authors picked The Chain as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?
This is a must-read book about Spam. No, not the kind that clogs up your inbox, but the cheap canned meat that pioneered the postwar love affair with processed foods, which Monty Python so cleverly satirized.
In this hard-driving and wide-ranging investigation, Ted Genoways focuses on Hormel Foods and its signature product—Spam—to expose the dark underbelly of industrial pork production that brings us our bacon, hams, chops—and Spam. It broke my heart and turned my stomach at the same time.
From Donald's list on what’s wrong with what’s for dinner.
This book did for me what Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle did for millions in 1906—it made me think deeply about the safety of our food supply, how the animals we turn into our meats are handled, and the treatment of the workers who kill, cut, and pack our meats.
Genoways’ searing expose of current-day meatpacking plants became a companion to my own research on the early days of Hormel and its competitors. His stories about the people who work in our factories portray the devastating tradeoffs in health and safety they must make for their livelihood, costs that ultimately fall…
From Gretchen's list on the intersection of history, business, and personality.
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