Because of the era difference between The Jungle and Fast Food Nation, the efficacy of each book cannot truly be compared to that of the other. Both of these books do share a great number of similarities: Each describes the horrors of the meatpacking industry, tells of companies’ disregard for the well-being of employees, fits into the category of “muckraking journalism,” and utilizes powerful language to invoke emotional reactions from readers. Beyond that, however, the effectiveness of similar each work was mostly dependent upon the time in which it was published. While Fast Food Nation was released during the twenty-first century – long after the first muckraking piece was published – Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle was among the first of its kind, giving it the added advantage of being utterly shocking to the stunned public.

It is interesting to note that The Jungle, though based on fact, was actually a fictional novel. Even so, after its publication in 1906, the American public began demanding federal regulation of the meatpacking industry; thanks to Sinclair’s efforts, legal provisions were passed that created what would ultimately become the Food and Drug Administration, which still exists today. When Fast Food Nation was published, however, the information it conveyed was hardly fresh news: The horrors of the meatpacking industry have long been documented by animal rights’ organizations, but the book still shocked with its accusations of employers’ neglect of human workers. Schlosser’s book did not have The Jungle’s advantage of being among the first of its kind, so while Sinclair will continue to be remembered as America’s first great muckraker, Eric Schlosser’s name may get lost in history, though he did the same type of work as his famous predecessor. If timelessness is a measure of a book’s effectiveness, then The Jungle certainly trumps Fast Food Nation. Aside from that, both of the works packed shock value that proved extremely valuable in raising awareness for abuses within the country’s most dangerous job, so within each book’s era, the influence that each had on its stunned readers was incredibly strong.