There’s beef over CA’s new $20 minimum wage for fast-food workers
Happier meal… California fast-food employees got a juicy pay bump yesterday: their minimum wage got hiked to $20/hour — now among the highest in the US. The law, passed last year, fattens paychecks for ~500K workers at chains with 60+ US locations (McDonald’s, Burger King, all the biggies). A Fast Food Council was also formed to create rules for CA’s industry, which could heat up calls for similar changes across the US.
Crispy: The minimum wage in the Golden State was already among the highest in the nation at $16/hour (~$3 higher than the average wage for US fast-food workers).
Still, before the $20/hour change, CA fast-food workers made only ~$35K/year, which is below the state’s poverty line.
Hot oil… Proponents of the $20 minimum say most fast-food workers are adults with families who need to earn more to afford CA’s high cost of living — not teens with summer gigs like Kenan and Kel. But some restaurant owners argue the raise is too high and that to afford it they’ll have to raise menu prices, bring in automation (hello, Chipotle Autocado), cut worker’ hours, or close locations.
Dollar(s) menu: McDonald’s, Starbucks, Chipotle, and Jack in the Box have said they plan to raise CA menu prices to cover higher labor costs.
Pick up: Pizza Hut preemptively laid off hundreds of CA delivery drivers in December, pushing customers to third-party apps like DoorDash.
One state can start a pay-it-forward chain… as long as no one orders 55 burgers. The national minimum wage has been $7.25 since 2009. But wage boosts are being pushed through at the city, county, and state level. Worker advocates hope that California (the US’s largest state economy) will inspire labor reform nationwide, and not just in the fast-grub industry.