Vol. 77/No. 30      August 19, 2013

The workers — from McDonald’s, Wendy’s, Burger King, Dunkin’ Donuts and other fast-food restaurants, along with workers from Sears and Walgreens — were part of several days of strikes and protests in at least seven cities around the country, including New York; Milwaukee; Detroit; St. Louis; Kansas City, Mo.; and Flint, Mich.

Many protesters carried signs that read “Fight for $15,” a slogan of the Workers Organizing Committee of Chicago, which initiated the protests there. WOCC is backed by the Service Employees International Union.

The day ended with a rally of 300 at Navy Pier, where strikers were joined by SEIU members and other supporters.

At $8.25 an hour, the minimum wage in Illinois is a dollar higher than the federal minimum wage. That translates into $17,160 a year, if someone works full time. Many fast-food and retail workers are employed only part time, however, because bosses don’t want to pay for benefits workers might be eligible for if they worked a 40-hour week.

DeJuan Jackson and several coworkers from Walgreens drugstore and Chick-fil-A restaurant joined the Navy Pier protest. “I work part time at Walgreens for $10.72 per hour and part time at Chick-Fil-A for $8.75 an hour,” Jackson told the Militant. “The reason I’m striking is because I have to work two jobs to take care of my family. I have two children who are asleep when I leave for work and they’re asleep by the time I get home.

“We’re not looking for bonuses tied to sales, but something we can depend on in our paycheck every week,” Jackson said. “And it’s not just for ourselves, but for all people who have kids and want a better life.”

Workers at Whole Foods in the Lake View neighborhood of Chicago walked off the job July 31. “After the last demonstration, they gave us two paid 15-minute breaks. Before, we had only one,” Whole Foods employee Matthew Camp, 32, told the Chicago Sun Times. “They renovated our break room and put our attendance policy under review. After this protest, yeah, we’re at least expecting to hear back about the attendance policy.”

Fast-food workers winning support
In New York, several hundred fast-food workers and supporters rallied at Union Square July 29. SEIU-backed Fast Food Forward helped organize this and earlier protests, which have won widespread support from fellow workers around the city.

“If we keep fighting together, we can pull this thing through,” said Jessica Cogle, 22, in an August 5 interview with the Militant. “$7.25 an hour just doesn’t pay the bills, especially when you can’t get the hours or any overtime.

“People from the union came to my job at McDonald’s in Harlem last October,” said Cogle. “They talked about the fight to win $15 an hour and the protest they were organizing in November. We asked if we would lose our jobs. They said, ‘no,’ so four of us went out. I didn’t lose my job and I participated in the second strike in April too.”

Cogle, who is living in a battered women’s shelter with her new baby, was fired in June. McDonald’s is challenging her unemployment claim.

Sonya, 38, who did not want to give her last name for fear of reprisal, is a worker at a McDonald’s restaurant in the Times Square area of Manhattan. She has worked as a cleaner for six months, making $7.25 an hour, she told the Militant.

With two children, a daily commute from Jersey City, N.J., and a schedule of 30 hours a week or less, she was supportive of the protests, although no one from the McDonald’s where she works attended, she said. But they all knew about it and many were sympathetic. “Next time, I think I will take part,” she said.

McDonald’s and other fast-food chains and retail companies have responded to workers’ demands for a minimum wage raise with the claim that higher wages would force them to increase prices, leading to layoffs.

A full-page ad appeared in USA Today July 26 in response to the fast-food workers’ latest round of protests. Raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour “would have negative consequences for employees,” the ad stated. If wages go up, companies “will be forced to replace employees with less-costly, automated alternatives like touch-screen ordering and payment devices.”

The ad was paid for by the Employment Policies Institute, a research organization that “focuses on issues that affect entry-level employment,” according to its website.

Earlier this year President Barack Obama called for increasing the minimum wage to $9 an hour over time. Bills calling for a raise introduced into Congress earlier this year have so far gone nowhere. The last increase in the federal minimum wage was in 2009, when it rose to $7.25.

In 1968, the federal minimum wage was $1.60 an hour. That would be $10.56 an hour today, when adjusted for inflation.

There was no reply from McDonald’s corporate headquarters in Chicago to the Militant’s request for comment.  
 
 
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