Posts tagged Fast Food
Fast food chains find a way around $20 minimum wage: Get rid of the workers
April 26, 2024 // The layoffs present a stark reality for employees and their unions, who have long advocated for wage increments. Workers at well-known chains such as Pizza Hut and Round Table pizza restaurants have also felt the impact, with job losses reported following statements from management about the unsustainable nature of the new wage costs. Meanwhile, major fast food players including McDonald’s, Chipotle, and Starbucks have signaled intentions to offset the increased expenses by raising prices.
California restaurant owner fears $20 wage hike will put him out of business: ‘Increase prices or close’
April 17, 2024 // After hustling to keep his doors open throughout the pandemic, a Los Angles restaurant owner is speaking out against the state’s newly enacted $20 minimum wage law, fearing it could be the final straw that puts him and his employees out of business. Justin Foronda, the owner of HiFi Kitchen in Filipinotown ,a neighborhood in Los Angeles, has spent the last several years enacting new and creative ideas to keep his restaurant afloat, navigating an industry devastated by widespread closures during the pandemic. An LA Times column released on Saturday titled, "Small-business owners brace for uncertainty as the $20 hourly fast-food wage takes effect," details Foronda's plight as he and other restaurant owners say they're suffering at the hands of the state’s newly enacted $20 minimum wage.
Opinion: California’s Bad April Fools Joke: $20 Minimum Wage For Flipping Burgers
April 7, 2024 // Friedman reminded us that fast food jobs don’t require much training, and used to be a traditional training ground for the unskilled. But not any longer thanks to the minimum wage laws. And every increase in the minimum wage hurts the low paid and the unskilled the most. Any economist could have predicted, and Milton Friedman warned us so many years ago, fast food businesses are going to have to downsize their workforce, reduce employee hours, raise prices and automate more… all because Gavin Newsom and California’s Democrat lawmakers meddle in the private sector. As Friedman famously said, “The rise in the legal minimum-wage rate is a monument to the power of superficial thinking.”
SEIU, allies say $20 fast food wage should have minimal impact on employment
April 3, 2024 // “Our fight was never just about the raise, but having the power to improve our industry,” said Angelica Hernandez, a Los Angeles McDonald’s worker and member of the Fast Food Council created by AB 1228. Hernandez, speaking through an interpreter at a press event hosted by the Service Employees International Union and the Roosevelt Institute, a liberal American think tank, said employers are retaliating against supporters of AB 1228.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom Signs Bill To Carve Out Exemptions For New Minimum Wage Law Following ‘PaneraGate’ Scandal
March 27, 2024 // Pretty much, AB 610 now proposes to exempt fast food restaurants located in places which could most afford the $20 minimum wage increase because off how much more they charge already: at casinos, airports, hotels, event centers, theme parks, museums, gambling establishments, corporate campus cafeterias, and publicly owned lands including ports, piers, beaches and parks concessions. Only the mom and pop family-owned fast food restaurants will be paying the $20 per hour minimum wage – a “living wage.”
Here’s what might happen after California raises fast-food wages to $20, from higher burger and pizza prices to better wages for retail workers
March 7, 2024 // Tower said he expected fast-food chains to focus on their value deals in California to attract customers amid higher menu prices. Zackfia said she thought digital order kiosks, which restaurants are rolling out to save on labor costs and improve order accuracy, would spread "even more quickly" in California.
Why Is Panera Exempted From California’s New Minimum Wage Law?
March 4, 2024 // That exemption stands to benefit Greg Flynn, owner and CEO of the Flynn Restaurant Group, a conglomerate that operates more than 2,300 restaurants nationally and is the second-largest Panera franchisee in the world, according to the company's website. Flynn and Newsom go way back: Bloomberg reports that the two attended the same high school at the same time—Flynn was student body president during Newsom's freshman year—and the restaurateur has donated to Newsom's gubernatorial campaigns and bragged to colleagues about his close relationship with the governor.
Panera Bread exempt from California’s $20 minimum wage law after owner donated to Gov. Newsom: report
February 28, 2024 // But the Fast Food Accountability and Standards Recovery Act (FAST Act) includes an unusual carve-out that exempts “chains that bake bread and sell it as a standalone item,” according to Bloomberg News. Newsom reportedly sought the exemption, which benefits among others Greg Flynn, the billionaire CEO of Flynn Restaurant Group, the company that owns some two dozen Panera Bread locations in the state.
OPINION: The SEIU’s fake fast food union
February 12, 2024 // Struggling at the national level, the union turned to its legislative allies in California. It worked for several years to enact the so-called “Fast Recovery Act,” a scheme to create a new council that would regulate wages and working conditions for fast-food workers. The idea: Save the union the unproductive hassle of signing up new workers, and instead make all of them subject to a union-controlled government board. Though it took the union two legislative sessions to pass it, over fierce resistance from restaurants, it eventually got to the Governor’s desk in 2022. He signed it on Labor Day that year.
California fast food workers form statewide union
February 11, 2024 // The union comes at a time when fast food wages and pricing are top of mind in California. A $20-dollar minimum wage takes effect in April. And a backlash to meal price increases has caused viral anger online.