Calling for $15-an-hour pay, tens of thousands of fast food workers are said to plan to walk off the job this week to protest in favor of higher wages, better working conditions and increased benefits for full-time workers.
The SEIU has provided money, logistics and communications for the group — comprised of New York Communities for Change, Jobs with Justice and Action Now — to stage protests in New York City, Chicago, St. Louis, Detroit, Milwaukee, Kansas City, Missouri, and Flint, Michigan, according to an email statement in a report by Bloomberg News.
American fast-food and retail workers have been striking this year for higher wages. In April, employees from McDonald’s and Yum! Brands Inc., which owns the KFC and Taco Bell chains, joined workers from Macy’s Inc. (M) and L Brands Inc.’s Victoria’s Secret chain in walking off the job in Chicago and New York for higher pay.
Congress last voted to raise the federal minimum wage in 2007 and President Barack Obama’s call to raise it to $9 an hour from $7.25 has recently gone nowhere with lawmakers. Certain states set minimum wage above the federal standard; minimum hourly pay in Illinois, for example, is $8.25.
McDonald’s CEO Don Thompson told Bloomberg that McDonald’s paid above minimum wage.
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