Most recently, workers and activists picketed an annual McDonald's shareholders meeting in Oak Brook, IL
Demonstrators holds a sign and chant slogans outside of a Wendy's fast food restaurant, Thursday, April 4, 2013 in New York. New York City fast food workers plan a second job action day to press for higher wages. Organizers say hundreds of workers plan to demonstrate Thursday at dozens of fast food establishments, including McDonald's, Domino's, Wendy's and Pizza Hut. Labor activism within the ranks of fast food industry employees, originally focused on New York City restaurant locations, has taken on a nationwide character recently.
The protests, which began last fall with one-day strikes and walkouts, have since spread to Detroit, St. Louis, Chicago, and Washington, DC.
Most recently, workers and activists picketed an annual McDonald's shareholders meeting in Oak Brook, IL
At the center of the controversy is economic opportunity; a fulltime, minimum-wage fast food job just isn't enough to support a family. Protesters are demonstrating for higher wages – $15 an hour – and the right to organize without employer retaliation.
It's hard to argue with the logic of the protestors' assertions. In cities like New York or Chicago, the cost of living is such that a nine-dollar-an-hour restaurant gig doesn't come close to producing the earnings needed to pay for food, clothing, and rent at even a subsistence level.
On the other hand, social justice doesn't come cheap. Building a $15-an-hour starting wage into the labor cost structure of the typical chain restaurant would mean the need to increase menu prices by 30 percent or more.
Such price hikes could be devastating to business, radically changing consumer behavior and putting many restaurants in an untenable financial position.
"Dollar" menus and similar value pricing strategies in the food service business, it could be argued, come at the expense of vulnerable minimum-wage workers, just as "cheap fashion" in clothing is only possible thanks to the kind of worker abuse and neglect recent events in South Asia have highlighted.
Hugh Robert is a faculty member in Holyoke Community College's hospitality and culinary arts program and has over 35 years of restaurant and educational experience. Please send items of interest to Off the Menu at the Republican, P.O. Box 2350, Springfield, MA 01102; Robert can also be reached at OffTheMenuGuy@aol.com