Are Fast Food Restaurants a Safe Working Place For Teens?

Teenagers are the main target who Fast food restaurants go after to make them become a staff member. As we all might know, the fast food industry pays their employees minimum wage. The reason why teenagers are mostly hired to work for these restaurants is because although they barely have any working experience, they are the only ones who would accept such a low salary. The problem is not only that teenagers are exploited at work and still receive a very low amount of money but are also hired without any type of training. This is a major problem because employers don't seem to acknowledge that these teenagers are running a very high risk of being injured if they do not follow any type of training program.

Eric Schlosser mentions on his book Fast Food Nation in the chapter "Behind The Counter" (pg.83) that "the injury of teenagers workers in the United States is about twice as that of adult workers. Teenagers are far more likely to be untrained, and every year, about 200,000 are injured on the job". The employers should offer teenagers a training program in which prepares them to familiarize themselves with their environment as well as the machines they'll be using. Eric Schlosser also says that "the most common work place injuries at a fast food restaurant are slips, falls, strains, and burns". A training program would certainly help avoid many of these accidents. They should recognize that putting new employees in the kitchen at a fast food restaurant without training can be very dangerous and the consequences can be severe.

Besides having a training program, teens working for fast food restaurants should also be taught safety. Fast food restaurants have become the main attraction to armed robbers so teenagers should be prepared for any type of emergency. "Roughly four or five fast food workers are now murdered on the job every month, usually during the course of robbery" says Eric Schlosser. According to Sanford Nowlin, not a lot is being done to protect teen employees. In his article he mentions that there are two main problems, "One is the kid going into the workplace not knowing enough about the importance of workplace safety. The second is the employer isn't recognizing that and making sure that kid gets enough training. This stuff just isn't taught anywhere in our educational system". If the employers refuse to train teens, they should at least make sure teens don't go near any machinery and their primary function should only be to stay in front of the store and deal costumers. Also, since robberies mostly happen when only a few staff members are present, fast food restaurants should always make sure to have more people working at all times specially near closing time or over night. It is important that employers become aware of what an unsafe step they take every time they hire an untrained teenager. Most importantly, teens should know what their rights are and fight for them.


Nowlin, Sanford. "Safety Advocates Say Not Enough Is Being Done To Protect Teen Employees" San Antonio Express-News. August 27, 2005.