US fast food workers protested on Tuesday in support of a $15 an hour minimum wage and union rights in a campaign they hope will catch the attention of candidates in the 2016 elections.
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He said he’s speeding up the hike in NY City because the cost of living is so much higher. “Put $15 on our check!” said a tweet from @FightFor15Mass, a Boston group organizing protests outside a McDonald’s there.
The hike will be phased in over a number of years: For about 1,000 state workers in NY City, the raise would reach $15 per hour on December 31, 2018.
The majority of the protesters were child care, home care or fast food workers – a few of the many occupations that earn minimum wage.
In Los Angeles protesters – backed by the Service Employees global Union – gathered at a local McDonald’s before marching to City Hall.
Dave Loobie, who works for UPS, joined crowds in Foley Square to show solidarity with their fight.
Ohio’s minimum wage of $8.10 an hour is higher than the federal minimum wage, but according to Deb Kline of Cleveland Jobs with Justice, it leaves many families scraping to get by.
“In America, today what we are seeing is the richest people becoming richer, and nearly everybody else becoming poorer”, said the democratic candidate, pictured above at the event, attended by dozens of striking US Senate cafeteria workers. A state wage board recently approved that increase, another effort that like Tuesday’s announcement didn’t require approval from the state Legislature.
Another 9,000 employees upstate will see wages rise to that level three years later.
A spokesperson for McDonald’s referred questions to a statement from the company that read, in part, “in July, wages at our company-owned restaurants in the USA increased one dollar over the locally-mandated minimum wage, which affects more than 90,000 employees” and “we respect people’s right to peacefully protest…”
“It is simple math”, said Governor Cuomo.
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State Sen. Dwight Bullard, D-Cutler Bay, is pushing a bill in the statehouse that would raise Florida’s minimum wage to $15, although it seems unlikely to gain traction in Republican-dominated Tallahassee.
