Petitions to organize have come faster than even those involved first believed possible, according to Richard Bensinger, union organizer with Starbucks Workers United and a former organizing director of the AFL-CIO.
The National Restaurant Association estimates there are now over 110,000 closures and says the industry badly needs government aid to get through the pandemic.
Tip theft and other forms of wage theft is already a serious problem, according to the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute. It estimated workers lost more than $50 billion a year in wage theft in 2014, or far more than the cost of robberies, burglaries and other property crimes.
Farm-to-table's sincere glow distracts from how the production and processing of even the most pristine ingredients — from field or dock or slaughterhouse to restaurant or school cafeteria — is nearly always configured to rely on cheap labor. Work very often performed by people who are themselves poor and hungry.
The mess was codified in 1966 when restaurant and other tipped workers finally got included in the Fair Labor Standards Act. But instead of one fair wage, the law created a second tier: tipped workers who could be paid a subminimum wage.
A recent National Labor Relations Board ruling means unions could one day organize nationally among all McDonald’s workers, rather than one store at a time. Nowhere perhaps did the ruling reverberate louder than in Atlanta, headquarters for Arby’s, Chick-fil-A, Popeye’s and other fast-food franchises, as well as many hotel, retail and temp agency chains.The ruling could be a huge boost for the Service Employees International Union, which is organizing fast-food workers.
John Oliver: Dr. Oz and Nutritional Supplements. "Waiting." Morning Mood in a Copenhagen Subway. America's Koch Problem.
Thadra Sheridan narrates the experience of waiting morning restaurant tables. Filmed by Jamie DeWolf. Score courtesy of Ludwig van Beethoven.
Bert and Ernie Outed; Commie Camp Profiled; The Blind Will Get Their Books; Chipotle Rejects GMO Ingredients; Race and Class in Evidence At the Zimmerman Trial; Kansas Takes a Sharp Turn to the Right
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