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I ran the McBroken data through the Spatial Equity Data tool. It found McDonalds are slightly overrepresented in white areas while locations with broken ice cre

I ran the McBroken data through the Spatial Equity Data tool. It found McDonalds are slightly overrepresented in white areas while locations with broken ice cream machines skew Black and low-income. https://twitter.com/MarkStosberg/status/1319363954385297411 https://twitter.com/MarkStosberg/status/1319363954385297411

parliament32 6y ago
Considering that all of these machines come up/down cyclically and automatically for sanitizing (pasteurizing) purposes, as described higher ITT, you're a great example of how data can be massaged to drive whatever narrative you want.
- Liquix 6y ago
  Huh. I read higher up that they were more likely to remain off if there was not an employee with the time/skills available to sanitize it.
- shadowgovt 6y ago
  You're assuming fleetwide homogeneity. It's possible that there's a disproportionate number of machines in minority areas misconfigured. It's possible that there's a disproportionate number of machines in minority areas that are old-style manual-clean. It's possible that there's a disproportionate number of machines in minority areas disabled for some other reason (ingredient supply disruption? Demand not worth the cost of keeping the machine on all the time?). It is, indeed, possible that there is correlation without causation. But the real answer is "We don't know why, and huh, isn't that interesting."
  - parliament32 6y ago
    If they're automatically reporting via API to the online store, so the author can check the status in his script, they're all the same model with auto-sanitize. The old manual clean models always report online, then the customer gets rejected and refunded when they actually go pick up their order, as mentioned elsewhere in the thread about some NYC locations. Nice try, but you know, burden of proof on the accuser and whatnot.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
    - shadowgovt 6y ago
      That adds doubt on one possibility (though I don't know if those devices are reporting their up/down status via a voltage checker for manual cleaning units), but there are other possibilities.
ciarannolan 6y ago
The machines also perform better in areas with: low English proficiency, limited household internet access, low-income residents, uninsured residents, cost-burdened renters, residents with less than a high-school diploma, and unemployed residents, according to this tool. I wonder why you chose just that one specific stat to highlight.
- ska 6y ago
  You are mixing "over represented" and "under represented" information which could be tricky; they were only looking at over represented. The data does seem to suggest that in an area annotated as "white" you are more likely to have location and it is less likely to have broken machines, whereas in an are annotated as "black" the opposite is true. Those are the only two categories showing up as extremal on both tests. Without digging into the methodology it's hard to get much more out of it. It's also not clear hwy "Low-income" doesn't show up as blue/over-represented on that chart.
monoideism 6y ago
If you're implying that McDonald's is somehow racist for failing to maintain ice cream machines in black areas, recall that it's mostly local staff who are responsible for that.
- theduder99 6y ago
  haha self-owned

parliament32 6y ago

Considering that all of these machines come up/down cyclically and automatically for sanitizing (pasteurizing) purposes, as described higher ITT, you're a great example of how data can be massaged to drive whatever narrative you want.

Liquix 6y ago
Huh. I read higher up that they were more likely to remain off if there was not an employee with the time/skills available to sanitize it.
shadowgovt 6y ago
You're assuming fleetwide homogeneity. It's possible that there's a disproportionate number of machines in minority areas misconfigured. It's possible that there's a disproportionate number of machines in minority areas that are old-style manual-clean. It's possible that there's a disproportionate number of machines in minority areas disabled for some other reason (ingredient supply disruption? Demand not worth the cost of keeping the machine on all the time?). It is, indeed, possible that there is correlation without causation. But the real answer is "We don't know why, and huh, isn't that interesting."
- parliament32 6y ago
  If they're automatically reporting via API to the online store, so the author can check the status in his script, they're all the same model with auto-sanitize. The old manual clean models always report online, then the customer gets rejected and refunded when they actually go pick up their order, as mentioned elsewhere in the thread about some NYC locations. Nice try, but you know, burden of proof on the accuser and whatnot.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - shadowgovt 6y ago
    That adds doubt on one possibility (though I don't know if those devices are reporting their up/down status via a voltage checker for manual cleaning units), but there are other possibilities.

ciarannolan 6y ago

The machines also perform better in areas with: low English proficiency, limited household internet access, low-income residents, uninsured residents, cost-burdened renters, residents with less than a high-school diploma, and unemployed residents, according to this tool. I wonder why you chose just that one specific stat to highlight.

ska 6y ago
You are mixing "over represented" and "under represented" information which could be tricky; they were only looking at over represented. The data does seem to suggest that in an area annotated as "white" you are more likely to have location and it is less likely to have broken machines, whereas in an are annotated as "black" the opposite is true. Those are the only two categories showing up as extremal on both tests. Without digging into the methodology it's hard to get much more out of it. It's also not clear hwy "Low-income" doesn't show up as blue/over-represented on that chart.

monoideism 6y ago

If you're implying that McDonald's is somehow racist for failing to maintain ice cream machines in black areas, recall that it's mostly local staff who are responsible for that.

theduder99 6y ago
haha self-owned