McDonald’s price freeze means your usual order costs the same for a year. But four thousand restaurants are closing in Canada, and this discount war has nothing to do with saving you money.

Charlebois: McDonald’s isn’t a food company, it’s real estate that controls a supply chain. The Big Mac price? Not frozen. Everything else on the value menu: locked for a year. Generic Ozempic approved in Canada, 11 more weight-loss drugs waiting—fewer hungry customers at the drive-thru. The dollar coffee loses money every sale. McDonald’s launched the same war in 2013, won for two years, but consumers had disposable income then.

Discover why the Big Mac exemption reveals more than the freeze itself, how generic weight-loss drugs are rewriting fast food economics, and what 4,000 restaurant closures say about who actually wins a price war when customers aren’t spending.

GUEST: Dr. Sylvain Charlebois | @‌foodprofessor

Originally aired on2026-01-15