Question

The labor practices of the fast food industry have their origins in the assembly line systems adopted by American manufacturers in the early twentieth century. Business historian Alfred D. Chandler has argued that a high rate of “throughput” was the most important aspect of these mass production systems. A factory’s throughput is the speed and volume of its flow — a much more crucial measurement, according to Chandler, than the number of workers it employs or the value of its machinery. With innovative technology and the proper organization, a small number of workers can produce an enormous amount of goods cheaply. Throughput is all about increasing the speed of assembly, about doing things faster in order to make more.

—Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser

Excerpted from FAST FOOD NATION: THE DARK SIDE OF THE ALL-AMERICAN MEAL by Eric Schlosser. Copyright © 2001 by Eric Schlosser. Used by permission of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Identify the claim made in this passage.

Technology increases “throughput.”

The fast-food industry is based on the mass production idea of “throughput.”

The fast-food industry’s labor practices are innovative and organized.

Answer 1

The fast-food industry is based on the mass production idea of “throughput.”

Explanation: The passage opens by linking fast-food labor practices to early-twentieth-century assembly-line systems and then defines and emphasizes "throughput" as the central feature of those mass-production systems.