“Clowning” with Six Degrees of Food News
Editor’s note: What does the opening of a McDonald’s in Beijing have to rising food prices in the US, or food riots in other parts of the developing world? Plenty, according to Jen Humphrey, a student in Professor Simran Sethi’s Media and the Environment course at the University of Kansas. This post was originally published to the course blog on Tuesday, March 11, 2008.
Anyone else find this photo creepy?
Something about the sunglasses, I guess. Or the export of American culture.
The photo depicts clowns who were on hand to celebrate the opening of a McDonald’s in Beijing, and it was part of a New York Times article about the company’s record profits in February. McDonald’s profits jumped 11.7 percent internationally, fueled in part by Leap Year sales but also the weak U.S. dollar. You can get more Mac for your Yuan these days.
I’d like to use that story to play the Six Degrees of Separation game. But instead of people, in this instance, I’d like to look at the short distance between food news. We know McDonald’s is doing well – that’s one data point. Let’s put another marker by the story that University of Washington researchers determined that calorie for calorie, junk food is way cheaper than good-for-you food. According to the researchers, who compared foods in major grocery stores in the Seattle area, you pay $1.76 per 1,000 calories for sugary, fatty foods that have the most calories, but you pay $18.16 per 1,000 calories for the lowest-calorie foods (which are most often better for you, such as fruits and vegetables).
