Striking fast food workers in New York City, April 2013
Fast food and other restaurant workers around the country are stepping up their demands for more pay and better treatment on the job.
In Seattle, workers filed complaints and took their stories of wage theft public:
One employee said her manager at the Ballard Taco Bell would clock her out at the end of her shift, then make her work anywhere from 15 minutes to three hours longer, unpaid.
"I estimated about $800 of money was stolen from me,” said Caroline Durocher, “that could have been (for) food and bills, and my phone bill that I often can't pay."
According to the National Employment Law Project, which organized today's news conference, Seattle employers could be stealing as much as $100,000 a week from local workers.
Just as when a bank steals someone's belongings out of their house, it doesn't get treated as an individual burglar would, an employer that steals a worker's wages by not paying what the law requires faces fines at most, not the kind of treatment that someone stealing the same amount out of your pocket would face.
Meanwhile, activists with the Restaurant Opportunities Center rallied outside a New York City Capital Grille, a sit-down restaurant owned by the notorious Darden Group, describing discrimination and wage theft at the chain and citing its lobbying efforts to defeat an increase in the state's tipped minimum wage. But all the action wasn't outside on the sidewalk, Sarah Jaffe reports:
Signs, chants and cardboard rats made the sidewalk outside Capital Grille colorful, but inside the restaurant appeared to be business as usual—for a while. Several groups of customers who'd had lunch reservations sat quietly at their tables, ordering only water, for thirty minutes, as management grew notably frustrated. Then they struck up a chant, “We can't stomach the injustice occurring in this restaurant!”
The modified sit-in ended with the “customers” getting up for a “mic check,” accusing the company of denying its workers basic benefits like paid sick days and spending millions lobbying to keep the minimum wage low for all workers. They filed out in a row to join the protestors outside, chanting “Capital Grille, shame on you! Restaurant workers deserve fair pay too!” (They left big tips for the servers whose stations they'd occupied.)
Continue reading below the fold for more news on workers, organizing and education.
A fair day's wage
- Mark Bittman, New York Times columnist and author of How to Cook Everything (Completely Revised 10th Anniversary Edition)">my favorite cookbook, on fast food strikes:
Six elements are affected by the way food is produced: taste, nutrition and price; and the impact on the environment, animals and labor. We can argue about taste, but it’s clear that our production system — especially in the fast-food world — is flunking all the others. And if you think food is “cheap,” talk to the people working in the fields, factories and stores who can’t afford it. Remember: no food is produced without labor.
Well-intentioned people often ask me what they can do to help improve our food system. Here’s an easy one: When you see that picket line next week, don’t cross it. In fact, join it.
- A push for workers' rights in Massachusetts.
- Detroit's pension systems: Not 'unaffordable,' just battered by Wall Street.
- More carwasheros unionize, this time in the Bronx.
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- Not going to happen. But worth noting that Republicans are pushing it anyway.
- Restaurant charges hundreds of dollars per meal, doesn't pay its workers overtime.
- The denim isn't the only thing distressed in many brands of jeans:
According to a recent investigation by the advocacy groups Clean Clothes Campaign, War on Want, and Hong Kong-based Students and Scholars Against Corporate Misbehaviour (SACOM), several manufacturers in Guangdong, China—which supply global brands such as Levi Strauss, Lee and Wrangler—have used patently unsafe sandblasting techniques on their denim.
Sandblasting usually involves spraying chemicals and mineral dust against textiles to create a weathered look. It is commonly done by hand, using an air gun, though some manufacturers use mechanical sandblasting performed inside special cabinets. Without adequate ventilation and other protections, either technique can expose workers to damaging particles that increase the risk of silicosis, pulmonary fibrosis and other lung and respiratory problems.
Education
- Hmmm. Fascinating. The contract to bring wifi to Idaho high schools didn't go to the lowest bidder. Amazingly enough, the company it did go to has made a lot of contributions to state politicians. Who could have predicted?
- Why does it cost almost $600 to attend public school in this Illinois district?>
Perhaps the most notable charge being levied against public school parents in this district: $300 for a Chromebook for each student. A mandatory Chromebook. In an online FAQ on this subject, the school district—Maine Township, which pulls in students from Park Ridge and Des Plaines, Ill.—says that students must buy a Chromebook even if they already have a laptop or other computer at home.
- Let's hear from a couple of Chicago teachers. First, Michelle Gunderson explains what malicious reassignment is and why it matters:
It is a conversation educators dread. An administrator calls you for a “chat”. “By the way,” they say, “Instead of teaching 8th grade next year, it best suits our needs for you to teach kindergarten.” [...]
This is a tactic that can be labeled as “malicious re-assignment.” It is used to give a not so gentle signal to a veteran teacher that it is time to leave. We see it happen on several occasions. First, when a principal or administrator believes someone’s teaching methods are “too old-fashioned” and their years of experience and craft knowledge are not valued. Another is when an educator is considered too expensive and the administration would like to them to retire early. Or last, when a tenured teacher becomes too vocal about union or social justice issues. It’s an attempt to silence.
But malicious reassignment isn't all Chicago teachers are dealing with. More than 1,000 have been laid off there in recent weeks:
One example is Xian Barrett, a history and law teacher at Gage Park High School on the city’s South Side, who received a layoff notice on Friday. In 2009 Barrett was chosen as a Classroom Teaching Ambassador Fellow by the U.S. Department of Education. As the education department’s website notes, Barrett founded a citywide youth-led social justice organization called Chicago Youth Initiating Change, brought students to New Orleans for service learning trips and organized sister-city events with Japanese schools. [...]
Barrett is among those who see the layoffs and school closings as part of a larger plan to reduce the size and power of the teachers union and to replace regular public schools with non-union charter schools. He was an early member of the Caucus of Rank and File Educators (CORE), the group that won leadership of the Chicago Teachers Union in 2010 union elections and became a thorn in Emanuel’s side after he took office in May 2011.
But even more, Barrett sees the administration’s moves as an attack on the students who have demanded their voices be heard in the debate over the future of education in Chicago.