A new California law will raise the minimum wage for fast-food workers to $20 an hour next year, as state Democratic leaders acknowledge the often-overlooked workforce is a major source of income for low-income families.
When the bill takes effect on April 1, fast food workers in California will receive the highest guaranteed base wage in the industry. Minimum wage for all other workers in the state – $15.50 per hour ——Already the highest in the United States.
Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom signed the law Thursday before a cheering crowd of workers and labor leaders at an event in Los Angeles. Newsom dismissed the popular belief that fast-food jobs are meant to give teenagers their first workplace experience.
“This is a romanticized version of a world that doesn’t exist,” Newsom said. “We have an opportunity to reward that contribution, reward that sacrifice and stabilize an industry.”
Newsom’s signature reflects The power and influence of trade unions The nation’s most populous state has been working to organize fast-food workers in an attempt to improve their wages and working conditions.
It also resolves, at least for now, the fight between labor and business groups over how to regulate the industry. In exchange for higher wages, unions have abandoned attempts to hold fast-food companies accountable for misconduct by their California independent franchisees, a move that could upend the business model on which the industry relies.Meanwhile, the industry has agreed to pull referendum Related to worker wages after the 2024 vote.
“This is a tectonic plate that has to be moved,” Newsom said, referring to the more than 100 hours of negotiations it took to reach agreement on the bills in the final weeks of the state legislative session.
Mary Kay Henry, president of the Service Employees International Union, said the law has a 10-year working life and includes 450 strikes across the state in the past two years.
The moment was almost too much for Anissa Williams, who fought back tears as she spoke at a news conference before Newsom signed the bill. Williams, a mother of six — seven if you include her beloved dogs — works at a Jack in the Box restaurant in Inglewood.
“They’ve been on the picket lines with me and they’ve been marching with me,” Williams said of her children. “This is for them.”
Newsom signing the law is likely to win some support from labor groups, which sharply criticized him last week Veto individual bills Aimed at protecting truck driver jobs amid the rise of self-driving technology.Unions played an important role in Newsom’s political rise in California, providing a reliable source of resources campaign cash.
Newsom’s appearance in Los Angeles came a day after Republican presidential candidates (but not Donald Trump) appeared at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley for speeches honored. second televised debate. Newsom, while denying any interest in running for the White House, has positioned himself as a foil to Republican contenders and has traveled the country criticizing conservative positions on abortion and gun rights. His actions on the hundreds of bills before him can be viewed through the lens of his future political ambitions.
The new minimum wage for fast-food workers will apply to restaurants with at least 60 locations nationwide, with the exception of restaurants that make and sell their own bread, such as Panera Bread.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average fast food worker in California currently earns $16.60 per hour, or just over $34,000 per year. That’s below California’s poverty measure for a family of four, a statistic calculated by the Public Policy Institute of California and the Stanford Center on Poverty and Equity that takes into account housing costs and publicly funded benefits.
The new $20 minimum wage is just a starting point. The law establishes a Fast Food Commission with the authority to increase wages by 3.5 percent annually through 2029 or the change in the Consumer Price Index average for U.S. urban wage earners and clerical workers, whichever is lower.
Now, the focus will shift to another group of low-wage California workers awaiting a minimum wage increase. Lawmakers passed a separate bill earlier this month that would gradually increase the minimum wage for health care workers to $25 an hour over the next decade. The raise does not apply to doctors and nurses, but to most others who work in hospitals, dialysis clinics or other health care settings.
But unlike the quick pay raise that Newsom helped negotiate, the governor has not said whether he will sign the raise for health care workers. The problem is compounded by the state’s Medicaid program, which is a major source of revenue for many hospitals. Newsom’s administration estimates that the wage increases will cost the state billions of dollars more in payments to health care providers.
Unions supporting the wage increase point to a study by the UC Berkeley Labor Center that said the cost to the state would be offset by reducing the number of people relying on publicly funded aid programs.
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Associated Press reporter Michael R. Blood contributed from Los Angeles.
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