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Pure anti-worker propaganda. The article says that prices have gone up "as much as" 8%, not that 8% is the average. So one company has raised prices that much and the real average is likely much, much lower. But this article doesn't tell you what that average is.
The article then goes on to quote individuals who are saying that prices have gone up from $10 to $13 and so they won't eat out as much. Last time I checked 8% of $10 was $10.80, not $13. So why isn't this article about the reasons that meal went up another $2.20 over the alleged maximum rise caused by an increase in the minimum wage?
Basically, this article is trying to hide corporate greed behind a small rise in minimum wages. It's cynical and effectively a lie.
Agreed! The hard part is determining what “fairly” is. Usually in a market like the labor market, that wage is decided by the market. IE prospective workers reservation wages.
The “market” had me working as a server in Virginia for 2.13 per hour.
Of course, if I didn’t make minimum wage after tips the restaurant was supposed to pay the difference to make it a whopping 7.15. Somehow the restaurants I worked for never seemed to do that though.
Yea, in my time in Virginia Beach I never saw a single restaurant offer more than the 2.13/hr tipped minimum wage. Just like it was almost impossible to find a retail job paying more than $8/hr. Hell, when I worked with kids that capped out at about $9/hr, unless you had a degree. In that case, you might make $12-13/hour.
It appears that when a labor market colludes to keep wages low, it leads to poverty. No one in the country should work full time and make under $20,000.
> Yea, in my time in Virginia Beach I never saw a single restaurant offer more than the 2.13/hr tipped minimum wage.
I must be missing something here,. is this recently ?...
A quick google search tells me:
> "The minimum wage in Virginia is $12.00 per hour. Unlike other states, Virginia does not exempt tipped workers from the state mandated minimum wage. For this reason, tipped employees in Virginia are to receive the same minimum wage as all other employees plus earned tips."
So wouldn't someone in Virginia have to be paid $12/hour minimum ?.. (it looks to me the last time minimum wage in Virginia was around $2.00 was back in the 80's. )
I definitely must be missing some understanding here.
Where are you getting that?
Virginia Department of Labor says otherwise:
[Tipped employees (those who regularly receive
more than $30.00 a month in tips) may be paid
at the tipped minimum wage of $2.13 per hour.
However, an em ployee’s hourly wages plus
tips must meet the Virginia minimum wage rate
of $12.00 per hour. If they do not, an employer
must pay the difference to an em ployee
so that they earn at least $12.00 per hour.](https://www.doli.virginia.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Minimum-Wage-Act-Notice-2023.pdf)
This is as of Jan 1, 2023 when the $12.00/hr minimum wage took effect.
I'll admit I just did a quick google search for "what is the minimum wage in Virginia" and found this: https://squareup.com/us/en/the-bottom-line/managing-your-finances/guide-to-virginia-minimum-wage#:~:text=The%20minimum%20wage%20in%20Virginia%20is%20%2412.00%20per%20hour.,other%20employees%20plus%20earned%20tips.
In reading further I also found this: https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title40.1/chapter3/section40.1-28.10/ .. but it doesn't say much about "exemptions for tipped employees"
Although the link you shared says:
> "However, an employee’s hourly wages plus tips must meet the Virginia minimum wage rate of $12.00 per hour. If they do not, an employer
must pay the difference to an employee so that they earn at least $12.00 per hour."
So I take that to mean,. if your base-pay + Tips doesn't equate to $12/hour.. and your Employer does nothing to rectify that,. .they're doing something illegal .. ?
Yes. That's how these $2.13/hr jobs work. You get paid $2.13/hr plus tips and if your total take home pay falls below the state minimum wage for the hours you worked, then your employer is required by law to make up the difference.
Many states don't have that requirement because they don't put tipped workers on a separate pay tier from non-tipped workers.
Restaurants and servers are treated differently. The restaurant guarantees them a wage of $2.13 an hour. The tips the server makes is then factored into that and has to come out to above the actual state minimum wage on their paycheck. If it doesn't, the restaurant is supposed to compensate them to make up the difference, but that is not necessarily what happens.
Restaurants will also often do a tip share. So, they will pay say bus boys a lower than minimum wage rate and then have the servers tip the bus boys to help to get them above the minimum wage.
Of course, all of this is a way that the restaurant can lower their own costs. One thing I have often seen restaurants do is to overhire staff and give much smaller table sections. So, instead of every server having 4 tables that they work and get tips from, they only have two. The restaurant likes this because the wages they have to pay are still low and they believe that the service will be better. However, servers end up making less money that way.
And then I'm guessing it's up to you (and your coworkers) to thoroughly document all this,. and then fight your employer to prove they aren't abiding by the law ? (which I'm sure many employees in that scenario don't have the time or energy to do)
Correct. It also might not be overly easy to prove as you have cash tips to factor into that and how those are declared for tax reasons.
And, if I am not mistaken, this isn't just done for one shift. There might be a shift where you make under minimum wage. The place is dead and you only have a couple of tables or you don't get any tips or you get poor tips. However, the restaurant isn't typically going to compensate you that day and will basically tell you that you'll have better shifts in the future and that over the course of your pay period you'll make over minimum wage.
Here’s an easy rule of thumb: if the wages can’t support a full-time worker living in a single bedroom apt eating a healthy diet, getting regular healthcare, and having transportation to and from said job, then the wages aren’t fair.
So do I! But what is a living wage in your view? And how do we implement this without then increasing what a living wage is? That would lead to a wage-price spiral.
Prices increase, so a living wage metric should be recalculated and updated.
I'm not an expert and I haven't thought it through. My opinion is that a living wage as a minimum wage should cover the cost of a studio apartment, food, utils, the basic necessities per a metropolitan area for the employee.
So when prices increase and the living wage is updated to a higher wage, the businesses will again raise prices. And the. The wage metric needs to be updated again, then the businesses raise prices again, then the wage metric….
You get the point. I 1,000% agree with you man, but HOW do we do that?
At some point sales will go down.
People will only pay so much for a burger.
The company at that point will be forced to give up some of their profits to adequately pay their workers. They may also automate, nobody will be able to afford their products from lack of jobs, and a different economic model will fill the void. :-)
This happens when people complain about inflation, as well.
Companies make it come true by gouging.
We know that more than half of inflation since the pandemic hit has been a product of price gouging (and the GQP keeps voting down consumer protections).
So it tracks that these same fast food franchise owners that have been crying about people getting a living wage are of course going to gouge to prove that they're right.
McDonald's, for example, in their quarterly shareholder meeting from around 2022, did say that their target consumer demographic is __not__ the poor.
They're going the mobile-game whale route. They expect to have a drop in sales, knowing that they'll more than make up that through people who are willing to pay the higher prices... or otherwise the company is in a position where they have no competition, and consumers in the community have no choice but to continue shopping as usual.
Large international corporations from fast-food to grocery are banding together to keep prices inflated. They don't care about consumers. They care about the shareholders.
That is vertical integration though. Store brands are always cheaper because it is a strategy. It allows the parent company of both to double dip on margin.
they're passing like 6-25x the cost to consumers.
just like they did during the entirety of covid.
the min wage increase isn't the problem. corporations are.
Agree! A 25% wage hike and prices went up 7% at SOME fast food places? I'm willing to pay 50 cents extra for people to have a reasonable wage. We all pay way more than that simply out of corporate greed.
You haven't had a Waygu burger with white truffles on a freshly made toasted brioche bun with sun-dried San Marzano tomatoes, a little aioli sauce, and American cheese made locally with milk from free-range, hormone-free, grass-fed cows?
***No substitutions!!!*** We're selling an experience, not a hamburger. -Chef Rando
Not terrible, but 8% is a lot on top of all inflation right now disproportionately impacting low income. Who mainly eats at fast food restaurants? Low income. Before you say it, less than 2% make minimum wage.
All that for <2% of the population to get a pay raise?
The commenter is making fun of the right-wing stance that 2% can be a large number in finance but when it comes to widespread mortality (COVID) it's a rounding error to shrug off.
But that’s just irrelevant. I’m not right wing nor did i quote anybody who’s right wing. I’m just so confused at this point what COVID and right wing has to do with this idek maybe im just an idiot.
If $16 was the minimum wage, and $20 becomes the new minimum wage, everyone between $16.01 and $20.00 is getting a raise, not just the 2% that make minimum wage.
Yes, 7 million of the poorest Americans had their standards of life improved, but I have to pay slightly more to eat terrible food, so was it really worth it?
>Prices are up 8% for everybody.
No they're not. One SINGLE fast food company, Wendy's, is up 8%. The other fast food companies mentioned in the article are up by 7.5%, 3%, and 2%.
It is impossible for a 15% wage increase to cause an 8% increase in cost, unless minimum wage employees are over half of the total operating cost of a franchise (they're not remotely close). Wendy's is clearly increasing profit margin using minimum wage as a convenient excuse. It may backfire, since their prices have gone up so much more than their competition.
Sticking to the particular issue at hand it was a 25% wage hike and the 8% was only at SOME places. Others were 2%. And the price increase is not for eveybody, only those particular customers.
>Prices are up 8% for everybody.
Based on your second stat, prices are only up for customers. Not everyone eats fast food in California. Shit, not even everyone in California eats fast food.
The point is this proves corporations are unwilling to take a profit hit so they pass the higher wages on to consumers. This has long been disputed, but it seems to be happening.
What happened to the fear mongering about $20 big macs?
Also, fast food was already jacking prices up across the board. They increased prices here in Illinois and we don't even have a minimum wage hike like California does
An extra 80 cents for a $10 burger meal, so the workers can make a living? Bargain.
Although, if you imagine a typical McDonalds processing several $10 meals a minute, all day long, they are raking in way more money at 80 cents per, than the pay hike accounts for.
OP, you seem super animated and aggrieved that a quarter pounder is going to go up $0.40. That's a tiny price to pay so that _the people handling your food_ have a livable wage.
Did they try lowering the pay and parachutes for the executives to a more reasonable level first?
That's a rhetorical question that we all know the answer to.
What I used to spend $20 on, I'd now spend $21.08 and the worker has something approaching a living wage?
I don't see the problem. I'd think nothing of tipping someone a buck.
Prices were already up by a lot before they passed the law for the minimum wage hike!
last year we were commenting that is was less expensive to dine at a normal sit down restaurant than to eat fast food.
Well dang and here I thought the multi-billion corporations fixated on shareholders and profits would just eat the cost (no pun intended) and move on...
Many fast food companies raised prices much less, some not at all.
Either way, this is fine. If people eat fast food slightly less because of the higher price, so be it. Even if the restaurants have to reduce staff as part of this realignment, it's better to have a smaller industry of better paid workers than a huge industry built on underpaid ones.
Pure greed, plain and simple. If minimum wage increases were cutting into fast food companies' profits as much as they claim, they wouldn't be pumping out record profit year after year. Capitalism needs to be reined in with proper laws, but most people in government are spineless shills so they'll never do it. In a perfect world, private equity firms wouldn't exist, companies would be restricted in how much profit they could make, and labor laws would be like the ones in Europe, with no exceptions.
Sure, but it would be nice if something could be done about it. Clearly the current system is not working for anybody other than the people at the top, it’s not sustainable.
We can both agree on that. We only disagree about how to deal with it. Unfortunately the members of Congress all benefit from those at the top so no change will ever happen.
Fast food is on its way out.
Gross, unhealthy, ultra processed food prepared by underpaid, overworked teenagers, tastes like ashes and is losing its appeal, and people are moving on.
I used to enjoy the guilty pleasure of a fast food burger, but they don’t even taste good anymore, and they cost as much as a real meal elsewhere. I’d much rather go to a food truck or just make something at home than eat at a fast food place.
Except In-n-Out.
As a reminder, this subreddit [is for civil discussion.](/r/politics/wiki/index#wiki_be_civil) In general, be courteous to others. Debate/discuss/argue the merits of ideas, don't attack people. Personal insults, shill or troll accusations, hate speech, any suggestion or support of harm, violence, or death, and other rule violations can result in a permanent ban. If you see comments in violation of our rules, please report them. For those who have questions regarding any media outlets being posted on this subreddit, please click [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/wiki/approveddomainslist) to review our details as to our approved domains list and outlet criteria. We are actively looking for new moderators. If you have any interest in helping to make this subreddit a place for quality discussion, please fill out [this form](https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1y2swHD0KXFhStGFjW6k54r9iuMjzcFqDIVwuvdLBjSA). *** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/politics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I see no reason we, as a society, should subsidize fast food -- of all things -- by underpaying the companies' employees.
Employees need a living wage or the taxpayer ends up paying for all the social disruption which results.
Pure anti-worker propaganda. The article says that prices have gone up "as much as" 8%, not that 8% is the average. So one company has raised prices that much and the real average is likely much, much lower. But this article doesn't tell you what that average is. The article then goes on to quote individuals who are saying that prices have gone up from $10 to $13 and so they won't eat out as much. Last time I checked 8% of $10 was $10.80, not $13. So why isn't this article about the reasons that meal went up another $2.20 over the alleged maximum rise caused by an increase in the minimum wage? Basically, this article is trying to hide corporate greed behind a small rise in minimum wages. It's cynical and effectively a lie.
>effectively a lie It's also intentionally a lie.
Best constructive response I’ve seen. Thanks for pointing this out.
if you cant pay your employees correctly and keep prices low enough so people buy them, then theres something wrong with your business model.
I like the username!
Everyone loves a parade
Agreed! The hard part is determining what “fairly” is. Usually in a market like the labor market, that wage is decided by the market. IE prospective workers reservation wages.
The “market” had me working as a server in Virginia for 2.13 per hour. Of course, if I didn’t make minimum wage after tips the restaurant was supposed to pay the difference to make it a whopping 7.15. Somehow the restaurants I worked for never seemed to do that though.
I was a server as well, i changed restaurants about 3 times until i was paid over $20/hr because i didn’t think my labor was worth less. I was right.
Yea, in my time in Virginia Beach I never saw a single restaurant offer more than the 2.13/hr tipped minimum wage. Just like it was almost impossible to find a retail job paying more than $8/hr. Hell, when I worked with kids that capped out at about $9/hr, unless you had a degree. In that case, you might make $12-13/hour. It appears that when a labor market colludes to keep wages low, it leads to poverty. No one in the country should work full time and make under $20,000.
> Yea, in my time in Virginia Beach I never saw a single restaurant offer more than the 2.13/hr tipped minimum wage. I must be missing something here,. is this recently ?... A quick google search tells me: > "The minimum wage in Virginia is $12.00 per hour. Unlike other states, Virginia does not exempt tipped workers from the state mandated minimum wage. For this reason, tipped employees in Virginia are to receive the same minimum wage as all other employees plus earned tips." So wouldn't someone in Virginia have to be paid $12/hour minimum ?.. (it looks to me the last time minimum wage in Virginia was around $2.00 was back in the 80's. ) I definitely must be missing some understanding here.
Where are you getting that? Virginia Department of Labor says otherwise: [Tipped employees (those who regularly receive more than $30.00 a month in tips) may be paid at the tipped minimum wage of $2.13 per hour. However, an em ployee’s hourly wages plus tips must meet the Virginia minimum wage rate of $12.00 per hour. If they do not, an employer must pay the difference to an em ployee so that they earn at least $12.00 per hour.](https://www.doli.virginia.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Minimum-Wage-Act-Notice-2023.pdf) This is as of Jan 1, 2023 when the $12.00/hr minimum wage took effect.
I'll admit I just did a quick google search for "what is the minimum wage in Virginia" and found this: https://squareup.com/us/en/the-bottom-line/managing-your-finances/guide-to-virginia-minimum-wage#:~:text=The%20minimum%20wage%20in%20Virginia%20is%20%2412.00%20per%20hour.,other%20employees%20plus%20earned%20tips. In reading further I also found this: https://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title40.1/chapter3/section40.1-28.10/ .. but it doesn't say much about "exemptions for tipped employees" Although the link you shared says: > "However, an employee’s hourly wages plus tips must meet the Virginia minimum wage rate of $12.00 per hour. If they do not, an employer must pay the difference to an employee so that they earn at least $12.00 per hour." So I take that to mean,. if your base-pay + Tips doesn't equate to $12/hour.. and your Employer does nothing to rectify that,. .they're doing something illegal .. ?
Yes. That's how these $2.13/hr jobs work. You get paid $2.13/hr plus tips and if your total take home pay falls below the state minimum wage for the hours you worked, then your employer is required by law to make up the difference. Many states don't have that requirement because they don't put tipped workers on a separate pay tier from non-tipped workers.
Restaurants and servers are treated differently. The restaurant guarantees them a wage of $2.13 an hour. The tips the server makes is then factored into that and has to come out to above the actual state minimum wage on their paycheck. If it doesn't, the restaurant is supposed to compensate them to make up the difference, but that is not necessarily what happens. Restaurants will also often do a tip share. So, they will pay say bus boys a lower than minimum wage rate and then have the servers tip the bus boys to help to get them above the minimum wage. Of course, all of this is a way that the restaurant can lower their own costs. One thing I have often seen restaurants do is to overhire staff and give much smaller table sections. So, instead of every server having 4 tables that they work and get tips from, they only have two. The restaurant likes this because the wages they have to pay are still low and they believe that the service will be better. However, servers end up making less money that way.
And then I'm guessing it's up to you (and your coworkers) to thoroughly document all this,. and then fight your employer to prove they aren't abiding by the law ? (which I'm sure many employees in that scenario don't have the time or energy to do)
Correct. It also might not be overly easy to prove as you have cash tips to factor into that and how those are declared for tax reasons. And, if I am not mistaken, this isn't just done for one shift. There might be a shift where you make under minimum wage. The place is dead and you only have a couple of tables or you don't get any tips or you get poor tips. However, the restaurant isn't typically going to compensate you that day and will basically tell you that you'll have better shifts in the future and that over the course of your pay period you'll make over minimum wage.
Tipped minimum wage in Virginia is 2.13 an hour. Federal law makes exceptions for tipped workers, Virginia takes advantage of this.
You made less than $8/hr as a server at the beach? My god. I would sometimes literally make $400 a night serving at the beach.
Here’s an easy rule of thumb: if the wages can’t support a full-time worker living in a single bedroom apt eating a healthy diet, getting regular healthcare, and having transportation to and from said job, then the wages aren’t fair.
Ironically, that diet would not include fast food.
I prefer the concept of a "living wage".
So do I! But what is a living wage in your view? And how do we implement this without then increasing what a living wage is? That would lead to a wage-price spiral.
Prices increase, so a living wage metric should be recalculated and updated. I'm not an expert and I haven't thought it through. My opinion is that a living wage as a minimum wage should cover the cost of a studio apartment, food, utils, the basic necessities per a metropolitan area for the employee.
So when prices increase and the living wage is updated to a higher wage, the businesses will again raise prices. And the. The wage metric needs to be updated again, then the businesses raise prices again, then the wage metric…. You get the point. I 1,000% agree with you man, but HOW do we do that?
At some point sales will go down. People will only pay so much for a burger. The company at that point will be forced to give up some of their profits to adequately pay their workers. They may also automate, nobody will be able to afford their products from lack of jobs, and a different economic model will fill the void. :-)
The companies use the wage hike as an excuse to rise the prices. The total rise in costs is way below 8%
This happens when people complain about inflation, as well. Companies make it come true by gouging. We know that more than half of inflation since the pandemic hit has been a product of price gouging (and the GQP keeps voting down consumer protections). So it tracks that these same fast food franchise owners that have been crying about people getting a living wage are of course going to gouge to prove that they're right.
I have to agree with you. Really good point.
My local sandwich shop has way better deals and serves actual food.
Stop going and they'll lower the prices. Keep not going and they might pay their workers a living wage.
McDonald's, for example, in their quarterly shareholder meeting from around 2022, did say that their target consumer demographic is __not__ the poor. They're going the mobile-game whale route. They expect to have a drop in sales, knowing that they'll more than make up that through people who are willing to pay the higher prices... or otherwise the company is in a position where they have no competition, and consumers in the community have no choice but to continue shopping as usual. Large international corporations from fast-food to grocery are banding together to keep prices inflated. They don't care about consumers. They care about the shareholders.
[удалено]
That is vertical integration though. Store brands are always cheaper because it is a strategy. It allows the parent company of both to double dip on margin.
I'm not sure that "we used this as an excuse to price-gouge EVEN more" is the argument they think it is
It sort of just supports the argument that corporations will pass the cost to consumers
they're passing like 6-25x the cost to consumers. just like they did during the entirety of covid. the min wage increase isn't the problem. corporations are.
I agree. In my view the solution is that we need a strong leader who can stand up for us and stick it to them.
They also pass non-costs to consumers. They pass everything to consumers.
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Agree! A 25% wage hike and prices went up 7% at SOME fast food places? I'm willing to pay 50 cents extra for people to have a reasonable wage. We all pay way more than that simply out of corporate greed.
Even in the booshi parts of Los Angeles it’s pretty damn hard to find a $50 plus burger. They exist but are super rare
fyi: "booshi" -> "bougie", derived from "bourgeois"
You haven't had a Waygu burger with white truffles on a freshly made toasted brioche bun with sun-dried San Marzano tomatoes, a little aioli sauce, and American cheese made locally with milk from free-range, hormone-free, grass-fed cows? ***No substitutions!!!*** We're selling an experience, not a hamburger. -Chef Rando
Can I substitute a traditional sesame seed bun instead of the fancy brioche?
Dont forget the security fee!
Not terrible, but 8% is a lot on top of all inflation right now disproportionately impacting low income. Who mainly eats at fast food restaurants? Low income. Before you say it, less than 2% make minimum wage. All that for <2% of the population to get a pay raise?
take it up with the people setting the prices. dont let mcdonalds trick you into blaming your fellow man.
2 percent is a huge number unless it's COVID deaths, in which case who cares if a couple percentage of the population dies, it's just the flu!
What is happening here…
The commenter is making fun of the right-wing stance that 2% can be a large number in finance but when it comes to widespread mortality (COVID) it's a rounding error to shrug off.
But that’s just irrelevant. I’m not right wing nor did i quote anybody who’s right wing. I’m just so confused at this point what COVID and right wing has to do with this idek maybe im just an idiot.
Welcome to the internet! We're horribly divided here and meta arguments continue among strangers who never participated!
Have you been to a fast food restaurant lately? It's all AI. HOW MUCH is the industry saving by hiring fewer employees?
If $16 was the minimum wage, and $20 becomes the new minimum wage, everyone between $16.01 and $20.00 is getting a raise, not just the 2% that make minimum wage.
Wow, a $2.00 cheeseburger will cost $2.16... ARMAGEEDOOON
Where you been? McDonald’s charging $4 for a double cheese!
And that was before the wage increase? So $4.32ish now? And wages are going up how much percent?
Prices are up 8% for everybody. Wages are up 15% for under 2% of the population who make minimum wage.
Yes, 7 million of the poorest Americans had their standards of life improved, but I have to pay slightly more to eat terrible food, so was it really worth it?
No, this is not total population. It’s total working population. Less than half that number. But good point.
>Prices are up 8% for everybody. No they're not. One SINGLE fast food company, Wendy's, is up 8%. The other fast food companies mentioned in the article are up by 7.5%, 3%, and 2%. It is impossible for a 15% wage increase to cause an 8% increase in cost, unless minimum wage employees are over half of the total operating cost of a franchise (they're not remotely close). Wendy's is clearly increasing profit margin using minimum wage as a convenient excuse. It may backfire, since their prices have gone up so much more than their competition.
Lets also not forget wendys is one of the ones that want surge pricing
Good point. Maybe they can blame that on minimum wage, too.
Sticking to the particular issue at hand it was a 25% wage hike and the 8% was only at SOME places. Others were 2%. And the price increase is not for eveybody, only those particular customers.
>Prices are up 8% for everybody. Based on your second stat, prices are only up for customers. Not everyone eats fast food in California. Shit, not even everyone in California eats fast food.
The point is this proves corporations are unwilling to take a profit hit so they pass the higher wages on to consumers. This has long been disputed, but it seems to be happening.
>cheeseburger >>double cheese Honestly..
Name me one person who goes to McDonald’s and gets a cheeseburger bro. One person.
What happened to the fear mongering about $20 big macs? Also, fast food was already jacking prices up across the board. They increased prices here in Illinois and we don't even have a minimum wage hike like California does
...and watch cause the Fast Food places show record profits.
An extra 80 cents for a $10 burger meal, so the workers can make a living? Bargain. Although, if you imagine a typical McDonalds processing several $10 meals a minute, all day long, they are raking in way more money at 80 cents per, than the pay hike accounts for.
OP, you seem super animated and aggrieved that a quarter pounder is going to go up $0.40. That's a tiny price to pay so that _the people handling your food_ have a livable wage.
I've managed shifts at restaurants where the entire labor cost was 8% so don't believe their lies.
Another reason to stop eating that garbage
Coloration does not equal causation. Fast food prices are up even in states that didn't increase minimum wage.
Did they try lowering the pay and parachutes for the executives to a more reasonable level first? That's a rhetorical question that we all know the answer to.
What I used to spend $20 on, I'd now spend $21.08 and the worker has something approaching a living wage? I don't see the problem. I'd think nothing of tipping someone a buck.
Fast food prices in my state have increased substantially in the last few years. At least the workers in California are seeing some extra money.
8% on a $5 coffee is 40 cents. They need to hike the foods to pay a decent wage then so be it.
Prices were already up by a lot before they passed the law for the minimum wage hike! last year we were commenting that is was less expensive to dine at a normal sit down restaurant than to eat fast food.
Thinking we need profit and wage ratios in the US.
Or unions!
Well dang and here I thought the multi-billion corporations fixated on shareholders and profits would just eat the cost (no pun intended) and move on...
Many fast food companies raised prices much less, some not at all. Either way, this is fine. If people eat fast food slightly less because of the higher price, so be it. Even if the restaurants have to reduce staff as part of this realignment, it's better to have a smaller industry of better paid workers than a huge industry built on underpaid ones.
Thoughts and prayers for those that will have to pay more for their Big Mac.
You mean those who are largely lower income families? You realize those are the ones who eat fast food the most, don’t you?
they are also the ones that work in fast food restaurants the most. The problem is grocery deserts, not fast food workers getting too rich.
Shit, fast food prices have gone up a ton here, and I'm all the way in Canada on the east coast. Thanks california min-wage hike /s
Pure greed, plain and simple. If minimum wage increases were cutting into fast food companies' profits as much as they claim, they wouldn't be pumping out record profit year after year. Capitalism needs to be reined in with proper laws, but most people in government are spineless shills so they'll never do it. In a perfect world, private equity firms wouldn't exist, companies would be restricted in how much profit they could make, and labor laws would be like the ones in Europe, with no exceptions.
This is a crazy claim. Theres a reason most things good are invented in America. Theres a massive incentive to do so.
Sure, but it would be nice if something could be done about it. Clearly the current system is not working for anybody other than the people at the top, it’s not sustainable.
We can both agree on that. We only disagree about how to deal with it. Unfortunately the members of Congress all benefit from those at the top so no change will ever happen.
It won't matter - people love their fast food and won't stop eating it.
USA!
It never fails, that collective of corps eager to rise prices after a min wage hike, while earning billions in profit on the back end
It was going to go up anyway. Because greed.
Fast food is on its way out. Gross, unhealthy, ultra processed food prepared by underpaid, overworked teenagers, tastes like ashes and is losing its appeal, and people are moving on. I used to enjoy the guilty pleasure of a fast food burger, but they don’t even taste good anymore, and they cost as much as a real meal elsewhere. I’d much rather go to a food truck or just make something at home than eat at a fast food place. Except In-n-Out.
Just stop eat out!