Fast-Food Workers Rally For $15 Minimum Wage
LOS ANGELES (CBSLA.com) — Fast-food workers and their supporters staged rallies in Los Angeles and across the country Thursday in a continuing campaign for a $15 hour wage and the right to unionize.
"Rolling strikes" happened at various fast-food outlets throughout the day and will include home health-care workers, security guards and retail employees, according to the Center on Policy Initiatives in San Diego.
Picketers attended protests in downtown Los Angeles, then marched to City Hall for a rally. Organizers, including the Service Employees International Union, say job actions were scheduled in about 160 cities.
"I work hard. I work really hard, and I don't get paid enough," Maribel Ponce, a 21-year-old fast food worker, said at a rally at City Hall.
The South Los Angeles resident said she is paid $9.35 an hour working at a McDonald's that sits across from Grand Central Market in downtown Los Angeles.
"We're fighting for $15 because $9 an hour is not enough to support my family, my two kids, my 2-year-old little girl and my 1-year-old boy," Ponce
said. "It's hard for me to pay my rent, my bills, to buy their needs, which is diapers, milk, wipies."
Labor unions and employees in low-wage jobs have been pushing for a minimum hourly wage of $15, which has been adopted in San Francisco and Seattle. The state of California's lowest pay rate was $8 an hour until July, when it was increased by $1.
The Los Angeles City Council is considering a proposal to raise the minimum wage in the city to $13.25 an hour by 2017, and potentially to $15.25 by 2019. A council committee has asked for an economic analysis of the proposal to be completed by February.
"These protests are just another clear example of unions attempting to generate headlines and grow union membership, which has been declining in the private-sector for decades," said Steve Caldeira, president and CEO of the IFA, which represents fast-food restaurants, many of which are franchised.
He said the unions want to redefine the corporate-franchisee relationship, which has been unchanged for 30 years.
"What the unions don't seem to understand, or want to accept, is that the brand company has absolutely nothing to do with setting wages, and these protests are really harming the very same workers the labor unions are claiming to help," Caldeira said.
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