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On Thursday, fast food workers around the country will walk off their jobs in what is expected to be the largest strike the $200 billion industry has ever seen.
Workers at McDonald’s, Burger King, Wendy’s, and KFC will strike in 50 cities—from Boston to Denver to Los Angeles—demanding a wage increase to $15 an hour. They will be joined by retail workers at stores like Macy’s, Victoria’s Secret, and Walgreens, and members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus.
The strikes follow a massive walkout by fast-food workers in July, and are the latest in an escalating series of strikes hitting the industry.
As we noted last month:
Many fast-food workers are paid at, or just above, the minimum wage. The federal minimum wage is $7.25, though it’s higher in 18 states and the District of Columbia. Fast-food wages have fallen 36 cents an hour since 2010, even as the industry has raked in record profits.
This is part of an economy-wide problem; the bottom 20 percent of American workers—some 28 million employees—earn less than $9.89 an hour, or $20,570 a year for a full-time employee. Their income fell five percent between 2006 and 2012. Meanwhile, average pay for chief executives at the country’s top corporations leaped 16 percent last year, averaging $15.1 million…
The mobilization of fast-food workers is a pretty new thing, because the industry has traditionally had high turnover. But the slow economic recovery, which has been characterized by growth in mostly low-wage service sector jobs, has resulted in a growing population of adult fast-food workers who can’t find other work.
Many fast food workers are forced to rely on public assistance just to get by.
Use our calculator to get a better sense of what fast-food workers are up against.
![](/wp-content/uploads/big-mac-02_2.png)
var median_fast_food_worker_wage = 8.94; // Source: National Employment Law Project, July 2013; http://nelp.3cdn.net/84a67b124db45841d4_o0m6bq42h.pdf var work_weeks_per_year = 52; var months_per_year = 12; var average_fast_food_worker_hours_per_week = 24.4; var average_weeks_in_a_month = 4.348; var hours_worked_at_full_time = 40;
var days_in_2012 = 366; //leap year var McDonalds_customers_per_day_in_2012 = 69000000; // Source: McDonalds 2012 Annual Report var hours_in_day = 24; var mcD_systemwide_restaurants = 34480; var mcD_served_per_hour = McDonalds_customers_per_day_in_2012 / hours_in_day;
var mcD_earnings_in_2012 = 27567000000; // Source: McDonalds 2012 Annual Report http://www.aboutmcdonalds.com/content/dam/AboutMcDonalds/Investors/Investor%202013/2012%20Annual%20Report%20Final.pdf var mcD_earned_per_hour = Math.round(mcD_earnings_in_2012 / days_in_2012 / hours_in_day);
var cost_of_big_mac = 4;
var first_state = 'AK'; var first_locale = 'Anchorage, AK HUD Metro FMR Area'; var state_abbr = { 'AL' : 'Alabama', 'AK' : 'Alaska', 'AS' : 'America Samoa', 'AZ' : 'Arizona', 'AR' : 'Arkansas', 'CA' : 'California', 'CO' : 'Colorado', 'CT' : 'Connecticut', 'DE' : 'Delaware', 'DC' : 'District of Columbia', 'FM' : 'Micronesia1', 'FL' : 'Florida', 'GA' : 'Georgia', 'GU' : 'Guam', 'HI' : 'Hawaii', 'ID' : 'Idaho', 'IL' : 'Illinois', 'IN' : 'Indiana', 'IA' : 'Iowa', 'KS' : 'Kansas', 'KY' : 'Kentucky', 'LA' : 'Louisiana', 'ME' : 'Maine', 'MH' : 'Islands1', 'MD' : 'Maryland', 'MA' : 'Massachusetts', 'MI' : 'Michigan', 'MN' : 'Minnesota', 'MS' : 'Mississippi', 'MO' : 'Missouri', 'MT' : 'Montana', 'NE' : 'Nebraska', 'NV' : 'Nevada', 'NH' : 'New Hampshire', 'NJ' : 'New Jersey', 'NM' : 'New Mexico', 'NY' : 'New York', 'NC' : 'North Carolina', 'ND' : 'North Dakota', 'OH' : 'Ohio', 'OK' : 'Oklahoma', 'OR' : 'Oregon', 'PW' : 'Palau', 'PA' : 'Pennsylvania', 'PR' : 'Puerto Rico', 'RI' : 'Rhode Island', 'SC' : 'South Carolina', 'SD' : 'South Dakota', 'TN' : 'Tennessee', 'TX' : 'Texas', 'UT' : 'Utah', 'VT' : 'Vermont', 'VI' : 'Virgin Island', 'VA' : 'Virginia', 'WA' : 'Washington', 'WV' : 'West Virginia', 'WI' : 'Wisconsin', 'WY' : 'Wyoming' }
var selected_state = jQuery("#selected_state"); var selected_locale = jQuery("#selected_locale"); var selected_household = jQuery("#selected_household");
for (var state in bfjo) { var option = jQuery('
var fill_locale_selector = function(state_object) {
selected_locale.html("");
for (var locale in state_object) { var option = jQuery('
fill_locale_selector(bfjo[first_state])
selected_state.bind("change", function() { var state = $("#selected_state option:selected").val(); var state_object = bfjo[state];
fill_locale_selector(state_object);
} )
/* var fill_household_selector = function(locale_object) { var selected_household = jQuery("#selected_household");
selected_household.html("");
for (var household in locale_object) { var option = jQuery('
fill_household_selector(bfjo[first_state][first_locale]) */
selected_locale.bind("change", function() { var state = $("#selected_state option:selected").val(); var locale = $("#selected_locale option:selected").val(); var locale_object = bfjo[state][locale];
//fill_household_selector(locale_object); } )
enable_disable_locale = function() { var household = $("#selected_household option:selected").val(); if (household === '1P0C' || household === '2P0C') { selected_locale.attr('disabled', 'disabled'); } else { selected_locale.attr('disabled', ''); } } selected_household.bind("change", function() { enable_disable_locale(); } ); enable_disable_locale();
jQuery("#calculate_this").bind("submit", function() {
var state = $("#selected_state option:selected").val(); var locale = $("#selected_locale option:selected").val(); var household = $("#selected_household option:selected").val(); var salary = parseInt($("#input_salary").val());
var annual_living_wage = bfjo[state][locale][household]; console.log(state); console.log(locale); console.log(household); console.log(annual_living_wage); var hourly_for_living = annual_living_wage / months_per_year / average_weeks_in_a_month / hours_worked_at_full_time;
var hours_to_live_per_month = annual_living_wage / months_per_year / median_fast_food_worker_wage; var weeks_to_live_per_month = hours_to_live_per_month / hours_worked_at_full_time;
var salary_monthly = salary / months_per_year; var hours_to_salary_monthly = salary_monthly / median_fast_food_worker_wage; var weeks_to_salary_monthly = hours_to_salary_monthly / hours_worked_at_full_time;
var hours_living_a_week = hours_to_live_per_month / average_weeks_in_a_month; var hours_salary_a_week = hours_to_salary_monthly / average_weeks_in_a_month;
var commify = function(number) { while (/(d+)(d{3})/.test(number.toString())){ number = number.toString().replace(/(d+)(d{3})/, '$1'+','+'$2'); } return number; }
var salary_string = commify(salary); var yearly_living_wage_string = commify(annual_living_wage); /* while (/(d+)(d{3})/.test(salary_string.toString())){ salary_string = salary_string.toString().replace(/(d+)(d{3})/, '$1'+','+'$2'); } while (/(d+)(d{3})/.test(yearly_living_wage_string.toString())){ yearly_living_wage_string = yearly_living_wage_string.toString().replace(/(d+)(d{3})/, '$1'+','+'$2'); } */
jQuery("#calculated").show(); jQuery("#fast_food_calculator_hours").text(Math.round(hours_to_live_per_month)); jQuery("#fast_food_calculator_state").text(state_abbr[state]); jQuery("#fast_food_calculator_state2").text(state_abbr[state]); if (household === "1P0C" || household === "2P0C") { jQuery("#fast_food_calculator_locale").text(''); jQuery("#fast_food_calculator_locale2").text(''); } else { jQuery("#fast_food_calculator_locale").text(locale.replace(/,.*$/, '') + ','); jQuery("#fast_food_calculator_locale2").text(locale.replace(/,.*$/, '') + ','); } jQuery("#salary").text(salary_string); jQuery("#fast_food_calculator_time").text(Math.round(hours_to_salary_monthly));
jQuery("#living_hours_per_week").text(Math.round(hours_living_a_week)); jQuery("#living_hours_per_week2").text(Math.round(hours_living_a_week));
jQuery("#salary_hours_per_week").text(Math.round(hours_salary_a_week)); jQuery("#fast_food_calculator_living_wage_annual").text(yearly_living_wage_string);
jQuery("#mc_d_customers_served").text( commify( Math.round( Math.round(hours_living_a_week) * mcD_served_per_hour ) ) ); jQuery("#mc_d_money_earned").text( commify(Math.round(Math.round(hours_living_a_week) * mcD_earned_per_hour)) );
jQuery("#big_mac_count").text( commify( Math.round( Math.round(hours_living_a_week) * mcD_earned_per_hour / cost_of_big_mac ) ) );
console.log(hourly_for_living); var hourly_for_living_clean = Math.round(hourly_for_living * 100) .toString().replace(/(d+)(d{2})/, '$1'+'.'+'$2'); jQuery("#living_wage_hourly").text(hourly_for_living_clean);
return false;
}
)