2. After watching, think about these questions:
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What questions do you still have?
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What connections can you make between this film and your own life or experience? Why? Does this film remind you of anything else you’ve read or seen? If so, how and why?
3. An additional challenge | Respond to the essential question at the top of this post: What can a food cart in New York City tell us about the national problem of inflation?
4. Next, join the conversation by clicking on the comment button and posting in the box that opens on the right. (Students 13 and older are invited to comment, although teachers of younger students are welcome to post what their students have to say.)
5. After you have posted, try reading back to see what others have said, then respond to someone else by posting another comment. Use the “Reply” button or the @ symbol to address that student directly.
6. To learn more, read “What’s Behind This $10 Chicken Over Rice? An $18,000 Permit.” Stefanos Chen, a Times reporter covering New York City’s economy, writes:
But Mr. Mousa focused on one number: 3,892. That was his position on a New York City food vendor waiting list.
Like thousands of the city’s mobile food vendors, Mr. Mousa cannot get a permit for his cart, the Halal Plates. A longstanding cap limited the number of permits to 5,100, before a 2021 law began allowing for 445 new permits a year for a decade. So far, the city has issued 71 new permits.
Almost 9,500 people were on waiting lists in January, according to the city’s health department. A spokesman said it had released 1,074 applications — a permit prerequisite — since the law was enacted, but most applicants had yet to complete the process.
While he waits, Mr. Mousa said he and his business partner pay $18,000 in cash every two years to rent their permit from a Bronx cabdriver who Mr. Mousa said obtained it decades ago for a few hundred dollars. Mr. Mousa said such arrangements were the only ways many vendors, who otherwise follow regulations, can avoid fines and confiscation of their carts.
Mr. Mousa hopes to negotiate the same price this summer, but anticipates the permit holder will try to raise it.
“What can I do?” Mr. Mousa said, adding, “He has the thing I need.”
Such is the math of chicken and rice — a heavily spiced mound of boneless chicken with yellow rice and a side salad — which swept the city in the 1980s, after a wave of Egyptian immigrants arrived.
Want more student-friendly videos? Visit our Film Club column.
Students 13 and older in the United States and Britain, and 16 and older elsewhere, are invited to comment. All comments are moderated by the Learning Network staff, but please keep in mind that once your comment is accepted, it will be made public.